For the first time a representative Theory of Mind (ToM) scale (Wellman &amp / Liu, 2004) has been cast into three different linguistic forms in order to show the impact of evidential markers on ToM understanding. With Turkish children, we studied (i) a control form without explicit evidential markers, as conducted by Bayramoglu &amp / Hohenberger (2007), (ii) a verbal form with &ndash / DI (marking factuality in the past ) and (iii) a verbal form with &ndash / MIS (marking hearsay in the past). To predict ToM performance of children, we also conducted a working memory task and two language tasks for complex syntax understanding. Our analysis showed that Turkish children, ranging from 4 to 7 years of age, performed significantly better with the form &ndash / DI than the control form. Also one of the language tasks which measures relative clause understanding was found to be a significant predictor of ToM performance. We conclude that evidential markers may help Turkish children in their online reasoning of ToM. We think that the relation between evidentiality and ToM may be understood clearer with cross-linguistic studies by varying the presence of evidentials and also their linguistic properties (i.e. lexical or morphological) while controlling the materials across languages. Theory of Mind (ToM), Evidentiality, ToM scale, Cognitive Development, Language.

Anxiety and socio-emotional functioning were examined in a single case study of a girl with autism. The objective was to determine the effect of visualization on the experience of anxiety during social interaction, and three target situations that triggers anxiety responses were therefore selected. The ATEC checklist, personal observations and adapted behavior during the specified target behaviors, measured reduced levels of anxiety. The results and conclusions indicate that visualization, as intervention, may be successful in promoting the social and emotional functioning of a child with autism by reducing the high levels of anxiety associated with social interaction. Additionally, increased levels in general functioning, as indicated by the ATEC checklist, and of functioning in different developmental areas were observed. / Dissertation (MEd (Educational Psychology))--University of Pretoria, 2007. / Educational Psychology / unrestricted

Theory of Mind (ToM) has repeatedly been defined as the ability to understand that others believe their own things based on their own subjective interpretations and experiences, and that their thoughts are determined independently from your own. In this study, we wanted to see if individual differences in ToM are capable of causing different perceptions of an individual's interactions with human like robotics and highlight whether or not individual differences in ToM account for different levels of how individuals experience what is called the "Uncanny Valley phenomenon" and to see whether or not having a fully developed theory of mind is essential to the perception of the interaction. This was assessed by inquiring whether or not individuals with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) perceive robotics and artificially intelligent technology in the same ways that typically developed individuals do; we focused on the growing use of social robotics in ASD therapies. Studies have indicated that differences of ToM exist between individuals with ASD and those who are typically developed. Comparably, we were also curious to see if differences in empathy levels also accounted for differences in ToM and thus a difference in the perceptions of human like robotics. A robotic image rating survey was administered to a group of University of central Florida students, as well as 2 surveys - the Autism Spectrum Quotient (ASQ) and the Basic Empathy Scale (BES), which helped optimize a measurement for theory of mind. Although the results of this study did not support the claim that individuals with ASD do not experience the uncanny valley differently than typically developed individuals, there were significant enough results to conclude that different levels of empathy may account for individual differences in the uncanny valley. People with low empathy seemed to have experienced less of an uncanny valley feeling, while people with higher recorded empathy showed to experience more of an uncanny valley sensitivity.

Yes / Evidence has shown that older adults have lower accuracy in Theory-of-Mind (ToM) tasks compared to young adults, but we are still unclear whether the difficulty in decoding mental states in older adults stems from not looking at the critical areas, and more so from the ageing Asian population. Most ToM studies use static images or short vignettes to measure ToM but these stimuli are dissimilar to everyday social interactions. We investigated this question using a dynamic task that measured both accuracy and error types, and examined the links between accuracy and error types to eye gaze fixation at critical areas (e.g. eyes, mouth, body). A total of 82 participants (38 older, 44 young adults) completed the Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition task on the eye tracker. Results showed that older adults had a lower overall accuracy with more errors in the ipo-ToM (under-mentalising) and no-ToM (lack of mentalisation) conditions compared to young adults. We analysed the eye gaze data using principal components analysis and found that increasing age and looking less at the face were related to lower MASC accuracy in our participants. Our findings suggest that ageing deficits in ToM are linked to a visual attention deficit specific to the perception of socially relevant nonverbal cues. / This study was funded by the Ministry of Higher Education Malaysia (FRGS/1/2016/SS05/SYUC/03/2) awarded to M.H.Y.

In this study, the development of a second-order false belief task is investigated by considering the impact of the acquisition of Turkish evidential markers, namely &ndash / DI (direct evidence) and &ndash / mIs (inference or hearsay). A neutral version of the tasks served as a control form. 21 kindergarten children (aged 4-5 years), 47 primary school children (aged 6- 12 years) and 10 adults participated in the study. Our results revealed that there is no effect of acquisition of evidentials on false belief understanding. Together with the other studies, there is a facilitative effect of &ndash / DI (direct evidence) in understanding of stories/narratives in general rather than false belief understanding for the children at the age of 4 to 6/7. In addition to the second-order false belief tasks (FBT_2), a simple working memory task (WST), a complex working memory task (LST), a perspective taking task (PTT) and a double- embedded relative clause task (REL_2) were used in order to investigate the developmental trend of these tasks and their possible relationship with second-order false belief understanding. Also, to the best of our knowledge this is the first time that a REL_2 task has been devised in a Turkish study. The general developmental trend was found for all tasks. Even if some significant correlations were found for FBT_2 score predicted from other tasks, analyses showed that only the contribution of age was significant. Since all of these domains are not related to second-order false belief reasoning but develop at the same time, it is not incompatible with the serial bottleneck hypothesis. In sum, the findings are matching with the modularity view that ToM is a faculty of the human mind at their own pace that does not share intrinsic content with other faculties such as language and working memory (Leslie et al., 2004). However, it develops together with those other faculties and they may constrain the expression of child

Theory of mind (ToM) refers to a cognitive ability that enables one to attribute mental states (such as desires, emotions, beliefs) to self and others. In recent years researchers have identified cultural variations in the onset of ToM understanding in collectivist and individualist cultures. However, the findings of cross-cultural studies regarding these variations are inconsistent. The major aim of this innovative research was to investigate differences in the acquisition of ToM in children from a collectivist culture (Pakistan) and an individualist culture (UK). The second aim of the study was to assess the specific association between ToM and social competence in a culturally diverse sample. An additional aim of the study was to investigate the universality of various correlates of ToM such as executive functioning (EF), parenting styles, and maternal mental state talk. The findings of the studies demonstrated a significant delay in the acquisition of ToM in Pakistani children, when compared with Western children from individualist societies. These findings were corroborated by the results of novel cross-cultural study that compared the performance of White British, British Pakistani, and Pakistani children on a ToM scale. White British children outperformed both Pakistani and British Pakistani children on measures of ToM, EF, and social competence. The current findings also provide support for the association of mental state understanding with EF, social competence, parenting styles, and maternal mental state talk. These findings have important implications for the role of general (collectivist vs. individualist cultures) as well as specific cultural practices (such as parenting and education) in the acquisition of mental state understanding.