Die Borderline-Persönlichkeitsstörung (BPS) ist eine schwere psychiatrische Störung, die durch tiefgreifende Probleme in Emotionsregulation und zwischenmenschlichen Beziehungen gekennzeichnet ist. In der vorliegenden Dissertation wurde die Beziehung zwischen Leitsymptomen der BPS und kognitiven Fähigkeiten, die für die Bewältigung eines gut funktionierenden Alltags notwendig sind (Aufmerksamkeit, adäquate Belohnungsverarbeitung), untersucht. Weiter wurde für zukünftige Untersuchungen der interpersonellen Instabilitäten und Empathiefähigkeit ein neues Stimulus Set zur Erforschung von sozialer Kognition im Alltag erstellt: die ToMenovela. Mittels fMRT-Untersuchungen konnte gezeigt werden, dass das Ausmaß an selbstberichteter Ängstlichkeit positiv mit der Verarbeitung von emotionalen, ablenkenden Reizen in konfliktbehafteten Bedingungen korreliert. Dies ist ein Hinweis darauf, dass Patientinnen möglicherweise eine erhöhte unbewusste Verarbeitung von irrelevanten Informationen haben, die emotional negativ besetzt sind. Weiter wurde gezeigt, dass das Ausmaß von selbstberichteter Impulsivität negativ mit der neuronalen Signatur der Erwartung von (vermeidbaren) aversiven Konsequenzen korreliert. Dieser Befund steht im Einklang mit dem bei BPD bekannten Phänomen von riskanten Entscheidungen oder selbstschädigendem Verhalten. Die dritte Studie stellt die ToMenovela vor, eine Sammlung von 190 emotional aufgeladenen Photographien mit hoher ökologischer Validität, die von einem fiktiven Freundeskreis handeln. Fragestellungen zur 1. und 3.-Person-Perspektive sowie affektiven und kognitiven Theory of Mind sind durch die Komposition der Fotos möglich. Die Bilder wurden von einer gesunden Kontrollgruppe nach emotionaler Valenz bezüglich der 6 Basis-Emotionen nach Ekman (Freude, Trauer, Wut, Angst, Überraschung, Ekel) bewertet, und stehen nun für den experimentellen Einsatz in der Empathie- und Emotionsforschung, auch über das BPS-Klientel, hinaus zur Verfügung. / Borderline personality disorder (BPD) is a severe mental health disorder characterized by severe problems in emotion regulation and interpersonal relationships. In this dissertation, the relation between core symptoms of BPD and two cognitive abilities that are necessary for a well-functioning daily life, attention and adequate reward processing, were investigated. Furthermore, a new stimulus set for the investigation of social cognition in daily life that is suitable for future research on relational instabilities and trait empathy was generated: the ToMenovela. Using fMRI, it could be shown that self-reported trait anxiety and neural BOLD-response correlated positively during conflict processing in an experimental flanker task with emotional distractors. These results indicate that patients might exhibit more pronounced implicit processing of irrelevant negative emotional information. In a second study, using a reward paradigm, a negative relationship was observed between self-reported impulsivity and neural signature of loss anticipation. This result is in line with recent findings on BPD patients’ tendency towards disadvantageous, risky choices or self-harming decisions. The third publication introduces the ToMenovela, a new stimulus set for the assessment of social interaction in daily life. The ToMenovela presents a set of 190 emotionally charged pictures of a fictitious circle of friends with high ecological validity. The stimulus set is suitable for experimental designs on 1st and 3rd person perspectives, as well as for affective and cognitive Theory of Mind tasks. The stimulus set was rated by healthy control subjects according to emotional valence with respect to Ekman’s basic emotions (happiness, sadness, anger, fear, surprise and disgust) and is available for further use in experiments on empathy and emotions within and beyond the context of research on BPD.

Theory of mind involves the ability to take another person’s perspective in thought, emotions and intentions.  There is today a lack of instruments to assess children’s development of Theory of Mind (ToM) in Swedish. ToM is considered by many scientists to be the basis for development of pragmatic competence. The relationship between these two abilities is complex and not fully resolved. Both abilities are important components for the development of social skills.     The purpose of this study was to compare 4 and 5-year olds ToM-ability measured with a Swedish version of Wellman and Liu’s ToM-scale, Sally Anne and Social Emotional Test with estimated pragmatic competence measured with the Children’s Communication Checklist (CCC). To make this possible the study also aims to translate and evaluate a Swedish version of Wellman and Liu’s ToM-scale. In the study 39 children in the age of 4 and 5 years old participated (20 4-year olds and 19 5-year olds).     The present study can point to the relationship between the ToM1 ability false belief and pragmatic abilities, as well as different abilities related to pragmatics (conversational rapport, use of discourse context and prosody). Correlation between prosody and other measures of ToM1 abilities was also observed. The result can be linked to previous research on the relationship between pragmatics and ToM. ToM and pragmatic are two abilities that are linked to each other. But as the result is not entirely conclusive, they may also shed more light to the complexity of these abilities and their relationship.      The result of the evaluation of Wellman and Liu’s ToM-scale shows that most of the children got a result pattern that agreed with the hypothesis of a gradual acquisition of ToM-abilties. However, Swedish 4 year olds did to a greater extent passed questions in a pattern that was not compatible with the gradual acquisition claim than American children did in a previous study. One reason for this result may be cultural differences. More research is needed on a larger selection of subjects and a wider range of age groups before any conclusions can be drawn. However, the translated scale can be used in a qualitative way, to examine which aspects of a ToM a child comprehends.

Kundenorientierung ist ein maßgeblicher Erfolgsfaktor für Unternehmen. Entscheidenden Einfluss hierauf besitzen Mitarbeiter mit Kunden-Kontakt, die sich in Bedürfnisse der Kunden einfühlen können und die ihr Wissen mit anderen Mitarbeitern im Unternehmen teilen. In einem schrittweisen und systematischen Vorgehen werden in dieser Arbeit betriebswirtschaftliche und neurowissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisse zusammengeführt und hierdurch dargelegt, welche Faktoren im Unternehmen diese Gehirnleistung des Einfühlens begünstigen. Die Mehr-Ebenen-Analyse erfolgt ausgehend von der Unternehmensebene, insbesondere Phänomenen der Unternehmenskultur, über die Ebene der Beziehungen zwischen Kunden und Mitarbeitern bis hin zur Ebene des sozialen Gehirns.

Kundenorientierung ist ein maßgeblicher Erfolgsfaktor für Unternehmen. Entscheidenden Einfluss hierauf besitzen Mitarbeiter mit Kunden-Kontakt, die sich in Bedürfnisse der Kunden einfühlen können und die ihr Wissen mit anderen Mitarbeitern im Unternehmen teilen. In einem schrittweisen und systematischen Vorgehen werden in dieser Arbeit betriebswirtschaftliche und neurowissenschaftlichen Erkenntnisse zusammengeführt und hierdurch dargelegt, welche Faktoren im Unternehmen diese Gehirnleistung des Einfühlens begünstigen. Die Mehr-Ebenen-Analyse erfolgt ausgehend von der Unternehmensebene, insbesondere Phänomenen der Unternehmenskultur, über die Ebene der Beziehungen zwischen Kunden und Mitarbeitern bis hin zur Ebene des sozialen Gehirns.

I dagens samhälle har användning av digitala medier ökat drastiskt och i fler områden. Användning av mobila pekskärmenheter har ökat successivt hos småbarn och förskolebarn, och åldern när barn först exponeras till dessa enheter har minskat. Till skillnad från en tidigare tidsperiod utsätts barn idag för en stor mängd stimuli från digital media under sina utvecklingsår. De kort- och långsiktiga effekterna av denna typ av exponering är fortfarande inte helt utforskade. Theory of Mind (ToM) är ett väsentligt område i utvecklingsprocessen hos barn. Vi har i denna studie undersökt barns ToM i en narrativ kontext, där vi bryter ner och analyserarderas yttranden och beteendemönster som visar ToM-förmåga både språkligt och interaktionellt. Multimodal interaktionsanalys låg som grund för analyserna i denna studie, där 45 barn speladesin när de berättar utifrån bilder i boken ”Frog, where are you?”. Resultatet redovisades både kvalitativt för att besvara frågan hur barn visar ToM-förmåga i ett narrativt sammanhang, och kvantitativt för att besvara frågan huruvida det finns en korrelation mellan ToM-förmåga ochdigital mediaanvänding. Det kvantitativa resultatet visade inget signifikant samband mellandigital mediaanvändning eller bokläsning och ToM-förmågan hos barn. Det kvalitativa resultatetvisar att barn integrerar flera olika kunskapsområden för att uppvisa sin ToM både språkligt ochinteraktionellt. / Currently, the use of digital media has increased significantly and has become dominant in manyareas in our society. The use of mobile touch screen devices has increased gradually in youngchildren and preschool children, and the age at which children are first exposed to these deviceshas decreased. Unlike earlier eras, children today are exposed to a substantial quantity of stimulifrom digital media during their developmental years. The short- and long-term effects of thistype of exposure are still not fully explored. Theory of Mind is an essential part of thedevelopmental process in children. In this study, we examined children's ToM in a narrative context, where we analyzed their statements and behavioural patterns that show ToM abilities both linguistically and interactively. Multimodal interaction analysis was the basis for the analyses in this study, where 45 children were recorded when they told a story called "Frog, where are you?". The results were reported qualitatively to answer the question of how children show ToM ability in a narrative context, and quantitatively to answer the question of whether there is acorrelation between ToM ability and children’s digital media use. The quantitative result showed no significant relation between digital media usage or book reading and children’s ToM ability.The qualitative result shows that children integrate several different areas of knowledge to present their ToM both linguistically and interactively, during the narrative activity.

Beeinflusst unsere Variabilität, wie wir über andere denken? Betrifft die Veränderung unserer Persönlichkeitszustände mehr als uns selbst? Wie beeinflussen andere unsere Persönlichkeitsentwicklung? Wie wirkt sich Selbstbezug auf das Denken über andere aus? In dieser Arbeit werden die vielfältigen Beziehungen zwischen unserer Persönlichkeit und der Beziehung zu und Interaktion mit anderen Menschen in verschiedenen Bereichen der Persönlichkeitspsychologie untersucht. Neben der Zusammenfassung der vier Veröffentlichungen, wird der theoriegeleitete Ansatz erläutert und in Persönlichkeitsdynamik und -prozesse eingeführt. Zentral sind die Konzepte der Persönlichkeitsmerkmale, der innerpersonellen Variabilität, der Persönlichkeitsentwicklung, des Selbstfokus, des Egozentrismus und der egozentrischen Verzerrung–im Rahmen ihrer Bedeutung für die Theory of Mind (ToM). Publikation 1 schlägt ein zweistufiges Model vor, wie die innerpersonelle Variabilität die ToM durch Erweiterung und Relativierung des Egozentrismus einer Person erleichtern kann. Publikation 2 fürht die Terminologie und die statistischen Werkzeuge der dynamischen Systemtheorie für die Untersuchung von Persönlichkeitszuständen ein und diskutiert Anwendungsfälle. Publikation 3 stellt ein Klassifizierungssystem vor, mit dem systematisch zwischen persönlichen und kollektiven Lebensereignissen unterschieden werden kann, wobei die unterschiedlichen Mechanismen berücksichtigt werden, durch die beide Arten von Lebensereignissen die Persönlichkeitsentwicklung beeinflussen können. Publikation 4 präsentiert Belege für eine kleine, aber robuste positive Beziehung zwischen achtsamer Selbstfokussierung und ToM. Nach der Reflektion der Beiträge zum Fachgebiet werden drei Forschungsansätze aus dem Risikomanagement, der Persönlichkeitspsychologie und den Neurowissenschaften diskutiert, die auf die Forschung zu innerpersönlicher Variabilität und Persönlichkeitsentwicklung sowie zu Egozentrismus und ToM einzahlen könnten. / Does our own variability affect how we think about others? Do personality states changes involve more than ourselves? How do others affect our personality development? How does focusing on oneself affect thinking about others? This dissertation explores the many relationships between an individual’s personality and ther relation to and interaction with other people across multiple areas of personality psychological research. Before summarizing four publications of this cumulative project, I explain my theory-driven approach and introduce the field of personality dynamics and processes. In particular, I focus on the concepts of personality traits, within-person variability, personality development, self-focus, egocentrism, egocentric bias–often in light of their relevant for Theory of Mind. The first publication proposes a two-tier framework of how within-person variability can facilitate Theory of Mind by broadening and relativizing a person’s egocentrism. The second publication introduces the terminology and statistical tools of dynamic systems theory to the investigation of personality state levels and presents possible use cases. The third publication introduces a classification system to differentiate between personal and collective live events in a systematic way that is sensitive to the different mechanisms by which both kinds of life events can affect personality development. The fourth publication presents evidence for a small but robust positive relationship between mindful self-focus and Theory of Mind. Finally, I reflect on the publications’ contributions to the field and suggest three lines of research stemming from risk management, personality psychology, and neuroscience that could inform research on within-person variability and personality development as well as on egocentrism and Theory of Mind further in the future.

No description available.

Psychological research suggests that children acquire cultural concepts through early developing cognitive mechanisms combined with specific cultural learning. An understudied area of cultural acquisition is children’s understanding of non-human minds, such as God. This thesis gives evidence that young children need not anthropomorphize non-human minds in order to understand them. Instead, children have a general “theory of mind” that is tailored through experience to accommodate the various important minds in their cultural environment. The intuitive default is toward super-attributes, making children naturally inclined or “prepared” to acquire god concepts. Four empirical studies were conducted with 75 British and 66 Israeli preschool-aged children. In Study 1, children participated in an ignorance-based theory-of-mind task and were asked to consider the mental states of human and supernatural agents. Children at all ages attributed correct knowledge to the supernatural agents and ignorance to the human agents. In Study 2, children participated in two perception-based theory-of-mind tasks and were asked to consider the perspective of two super-perceiving animals, God, and two human agents. Three-year-olds attributed knowledge to the animals and God and, by age four, children could distinguish among agents correctly. Also, by age four, children recognized that aging limits the perception of human agents but not God’s. In Study 3, children participated in a memory-based theory-of-mind task in which they were asked to consider the memory of God and differently aged agents Children at all ages responded that God would remember something that the children themselves had forgotten. By age five, children responded that a baby and granddad would have forgotten. These results propose that preschool-aged children regard individual constraints when considering mental states. Study 4 focused on children’s notions of immortality. Cultural differences were found. British children attributed immortality to God before correctly attributing mortality to human agents, and Israeli children attributed immortality to God and mortality to humans more consistently than did British children. Collectively, these studies indicate that children do not have to resort to anthropomorphism to reason about non-human agents but instead have the cognitive capacity to represent other types of minds because of early cognitive capacities. It appears that concepts vary in their degree of fit with early-developing human conceptual systems, and hence, vary in their likelihood of successful cultural transmission.

Research suggests that children are only able to flexibly apply more than one label (e.g. mouse and animal) in one situation with one conversational partner after they pass standard false belief tasks. Both abilities have been attributed to the understanding of perspective. The aim of the studies was to extend previous research to examine the disambiguation effect, children’s tendency to select an unfamiliar object in the presence of another but familiar object as referent for a novel word. Theoretical considerations suggest this effect initially results from a lack of understanding perspective. Five studies were conducted in Scotland and Austria, involving 243 children between the ages of 2.5 and 6.5. Studies 1 to 3 compared the standard disambiguation task with a task in which a strong pragmatic cue indicates the familiar object is the correct referent. Performances on these tasks were compared with performances on the false belief task, the alternative naming task, as well as tests of executive functioning. Studies 4 and 5 extended these methods to examine bilingual children’s metacognitive abilities in relation to word learning. Children become able to suspend the disambiguation effect when presented with strong pragmatic cues at the same time as they pass false belief and alternative naming tasks (Experiment 1). This can neither be attributed to impulsivity or the ability to inhibit a response, nor order effects of pragmatic cues and novel words (Experiment 2). Children’s ability to apply two labels to one object in a correction task also related to their perspectival understanding. Previous findings that suggested that younger children could produce multiple labels in a misnaming paradigm were not replicated (Experiment 3 a, b). The developmental change in children’s metalinguistic behaviour was demonstrated to follow the same trajectory in monolinguals, bilinguals and children exposed to another language (Experiment 4 and 5). Bilinguals show a marginally better ability to recall novel foreign language labels. The disambiguation effect is the result of cognitive immaturity in young children. Older children show a change in behaviour at the same time as they present more metacognitive maturity. Common development with theory of mind and metalinguistic abilities is attributed to an understanding of perspective.

The effect of pretend play on 150 (~ 75 girls; 75 boys; M=3 yro) preschool children’s social cognition will be assessed through a semester long intervention study. Research has reported a trend of female superiority in empathy and ToM and a likelihood of young girls to engage in pretend play more frequently and to a higher degree than young boys. Previous research has also found a relationship between play and social cognition, as through the act of imagination, one is able to thoroughly take on the perspectives of someone other than the self. This study attempts to show a shift in these mental capabilities after an extensive engagement in pretend play (more than seen in a typical preschool classroom). Boys are expected to reach equal levels of ToM and empathy of their female peers after the intervention. This study attempts to hopefully find an intervention to instill higher levels of empathy in developing children and to support the need for more creative free play in the classroom.