Children’s Application of Theory of Mind in Reasoning and Language
Journal of Logic, Language and Information
Short Title:
Journal of Logic, Language and Information
Format:
Journal Article
Publication Date:
2008/10/01/
Pages:
417 - 442
Sources ID:
38961
Collection:
Theory of Mind
Visibility:
Public (group default)
Abstract:
(Show)
Many social situations require a mental model of the knowledge, beliefs, goals, and intentions of others: a Theory of Mind (ToM). If a person can reason about other people’s beliefs about his own beliefs or intentions, he is demonstrating second-order ToM reasoning. A standard task to test second-order ToM reasoning is the second-order false belief task. A different approach to investigating ToM reasoning is through its application in a strategic game. Another task that is believed to involve the application of second-order ToM is the comprehension of sentences that the hearer can only understand by considering the speaker’s alternatives. In this study we tested 40 children between 8 and 10 years old and 27 adult controls on (adaptations of) the three tasks mentioned above: the false belief task, a strategic game, and a sentence comprehension task. The results show interesting differences between adults and children, between the three tasks, and between this study and previous research.