Module 06:

The Development of Social Cognition

Part II
There is more to passing the false belief task
than theory of mind.
e.g., attention, language, memory, inhibition,
overcoming the curse of knowledge
There is more to theory of mind than
passing the false belief task
e.g., understanding goals, desires, bias, how
knowledge is acquired
Keep in mind
There is more to passing the false belief task
than theory of mind.
e.g., attention, language, memory, inhibition,
overcoming the curse of knowledge
There is more to theory of mind than
passing the false belief task
e.g., understanding goals, desires, bias, how
knowledge is acquired
Keep in mind
Reasoning about mental states

2 categories of mental states
Dispositional states: Orientation toward reality
Desires and Preferences
Goals and Intentions

Epistemic states: Representations of reality
Knowledge vs. Ignorance
Beliefs and false beliefs

More to Theory of Mind than
False Beliefs
even BEFORE children pass the classic false
belief tasks they have some understanding of
mental states

And, even AFTER they pass the false belief
task they still have a lot to learn
18 month-old infants will imitate intentions of actors, even when they
dont see the completed action.
But, they do not imitate the intention/goal of the mechanical device.
Suggests they infer that people, not inanimate objects, have mental states
such as intentions/desires/goals
Dispositional States: Goals, Desires, and Intentions
Dispositional States: Goals, Desires, and Intentions
5-month-old infants expect the human arm to reach
towards the same object (goal), not in the same direction
If the arm is mechanical, infants expect reaching in the
same direction

What does this demonstrate?
By 5 months, infants expect human behavior to be goal-
oriented
They expect humans to have goals but not inanimate objects
Dispositional States: Goals, Desires, and Intentions
Broccoli vs. goldfish cracker study:
18-month-olds, but not 14-month-olds appreciate
others have different desires or preferences



Mmm!
Yuck!
Dispositional States: Goals, Desires, and Intentions
Repacholi & Gopnik, 1994

Epistemic States:
Knowing about Knowledge
At ages 2 and 3 they understand
Some knowledge can be acquired through looking
Looking leads to knowing



Other knowledge (unobservable properties, e.g. names) cannot
Prior experience leads to knowing

Epistemic States:
Knowing about Knowledge
At ages 2 and 3 they understand
Some people are more knowledgeable than others
They prefer to learn from someone with a history of being
accurate

Prefer to learn from someone who is confident rather than
uncertain





Epistemic States:
False Beliefs (Nonverbal task)

Why do they pass nonverbal false belief
tasks (using looking time) so early in
development but fail verbal ones until
age ~4?
Maybe its language?
Elicited vs. Non-elicited (spontaneous)
False Belief Tasks

Some tasks (e.g. anticipatory looking tasks) show
false belief understanding even in verbal tasks well
before 4 years old!
I wonder where she will look? 2-3 years old (Clements &
Perner, 1994)
So it cant be just the language that makes it hard
He et al. (2012) hypothesized a difference between
elicited (e.g. child-directed questions) and non-
elicited measures (e.g., self/speaker-directed
questions)
He et al. 2012:
False Belief Conditions
He et al. 2012:
False Belief Condition-Spontaneous
But when E1 comes back shes going to need the
scissorshmm.. Where will she think they are?
[To self, looking up and chin in hand as if thinking out load]
He et al. 2012:
False Belief Condition-Elicited
But when E1 comes back shes going to need the
scissorsWhere will she think they are?
[Directed to the child, looking at child when asking]
He et al. 2012:
Knowledge Condition
He et al. 2012:
Knowledge Condition
But when E1 comes back shes going to need the
scissorshmm.. Where will she think they are?
[To self, looking up and chin in hand as if thinking out load]
Results: 2.5 year olds
False Belief
Spontaneous
False Belief
Elicited
Knowledge
More looks to target Less looks to target Less looks to target
Success! Failure Success
Using looking time data during 5secs following prompt
(compared to 5 sec before prompt)
And using overt responses (e.g., saying or pointing)
He et al (2012) Conclusions
Discrepancies between false belief tasks showing
early success vs. late failure are due to whether the
task uses an elicited or spontaneous measure
Supports a continuous view (a processing demands
account) of false belief understanding
He et al (2012):
Why does eliciting make it harder?
Tacit/Implicit vs. Explicit Accounts
Different systems are tapped
Discontinuous, Representational change: Tacit awareness develops
early (it may be rule-based); With time these become conscious and
can be articulated explicitly
A Processing Demands Account (He et al, 2012)
Same false belief system is tapped but other processes are also being
tapped
Inhibition: Attention is drawn to childs own perspective and
requires more inhibition to reason about the others perspective
Response Selection: Cognitive resources are required to actively
think about the answer one is going to give

Epistemic mental states
Late (even post-FB) accomplishments
Failure to distinguish what is known from different
senses (vision vs. touch vs. hearing, etc.)




Dont understand how much info is necessary to be
informative (e.g. partial picture)


Epistemic mental states
Late (even post-FB) accomplishments
Bias (e.g., people might see what they want to see)

Interpretive Theory of Mind (age ~7): 2 people see same
thing but have a different perspective



Summary
Theory of mind is an essential skill for everyday life in a
social species
A prerequisite is to distinguish things with and without
mental states
There are different types of mental states: dispositional
and epistemic
It was previously thought that ToM emerged quite late in
development (around age 4), but recent research suggests
very young children understand mental stateseven
epistemic ones (albeit not without some limitations)
The type of mental state (disposition > epistemic) and the
type of measure (elicit < spontaneous) influence how well
children perform

There is more to passing the false belief
task than theory of mind.
e.g. attention, language, memory, inhibition,
overcoming the curse of knowledge, response selection
There is more to theory of mind than passing
the false belief task
e.g. understanding goals, intentions, desires, knowledge,
biases, and other aspects of mental state reasoning
e.g., how knowledge is acquired through the senses
e.g., interpretive theory of mind
Keep in mind