Theory of Mind (Psychology)

Why Studies of Autism Spectrum Disorders Have Failed to Resolve the Theory Theory Versus Simulation Theory Debate

by Meredith Wilkinson

Co-authored with Linden J Ball

Wilkinson, M. R., & Ball, L. J. (forthcoming) Why Studies of Autism Spectrum Disorders Have Failed to Resolve the Theory Theory Versus Simulation Theory Debate, Review of Philosophy and Psychology, 2012, DOI 10.1007/s13164-012-0097-0

Beyond Folk Psychology? Toward an Enriched Account of Social Understanding

by Mitchell Herschbach

Ph.D. Dissertation, Philosophy & Cognitive Science, UC San Diego, 2010

Arbitrating between Theory-Theory and Simulation Theory: Evidence from a Think-aloud Study of Counterfactual Reasoning

by Meredith Wilkinson

Co-authored with Linden J. Ball and Rachel Cooper

Wilkinson, M. R., Ball, L. J., & Cooper, R. (2010).  Arbitrating between theory-theory and simulation theory:  Evidence from a think-aloud study of counterfactual reasoning. Chapter in S. Ohlsson & R. Catrambone (Eds.) Proceedings of the Thirty-Second Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society. (pp. 1008-1013) Austin, Texas: Cognitive Science Society     

Consciousness from a first-person perspective

by Max Velmans

This is a clean PDF of my reply to 36 peer reviews of my target article in BBS, 1991 “Is human information processing conscious?” As it develops quite a few themes that are fundamental to consciousness studies, I have added an Abstract and references so that it can be read as a stand-alone paper. As this paper tries to address all the points raised by the commentaries it ranges widely, and to assist easier reading it has been subdivided into sections that separate experimental issues from the more theoretical and philosophical issues. The commentators included many of the experimentalists and theoreticians that were prominent in consciousness studies at the time, including scientists such as Bernie Baars, Francis Crick, Christoph Koch, John Gardiner, Jeffrey Gray, Marcel Kinsbourne, Ben Libet, Dan Lloyd, George Mandler, Bruce Mangan, Norman Dixon, Howard Shevrin, Keith Stanovich, Geoff Underwood and philosophers such as Ned Block, Fred Dretske, Valery Hardcastle, Georges Rey, Aaron Sloman and Robert van Gulick. Viewed historically, it is interesting to see how confused the literature was at the time concerning how phenomenal consciousness relates to information processing and particularly to attentional processing. Viewed 20 years later, I would still make a similar defence of my original target article although many of the themes introduced in these two papers have now been elaborated in my subsequent writings.

This paper replies to the first 36 commentaries on my target article on “Is human information processing conscious?”... more This paper replies to the first 36 commentaries on my target article on “Is human information processing conscious?” (Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 1991, pp. 651-669). The target article focused largely on experimental studies of how consciousness relates to human information processing, tracing their relation from input through to output, while discussion of the implications of the findings both for cognitive psychology and philosophy of mind was relatively brief. The commentaries reversed this emphasis, and so, correspondingly, did the reply. The sequence of topics in the reply roughly follows that of the target article. The discussion begins with a reconsideration of the details of the empirical findings, whether they can be extrapolated to non-laboratory settings, and the extent to which one can rely on their use of subjective reports. This is followed by an in-depth discussion of what is meant by “conscious processing” and of how phenomenal consciousness relates to attentional processing. We then turn to broader philosophical and theoretical issues. I point out some of the reasons why I do not support epiphenomenalism, dualist-interactionism, or reductionism, and elaborate on how first- and third-person views of the mind can be regarded as complementary and mutually irreducible. I suggest how the relation of conscious experiences to their neural correlates can be understood in terms of a dual-aspect theory of information, and how this might be used to resolve some of the paradoxes surrounding the causal interactions of consciousness and brain. I also suggest that, viewed from a first-person perspective, consciousness gives purpose to existence, which allows a different way of viewing its role in evolution.

Constructs and Words

by Khosrow Bagheri Noaparast

What is the main characteristic of constructive explanation? In other words, what is the nature of a construct and,... more What is the main characteristic of constructive explanation? In other words, what is the nature of a construct and, consequently, what kind of relationship is there between constructs and behavior? Kelly stated that a "psychological response is initially and basically the outcome of a construing act."(1955, vol. 1, p. 171) Somewhere else, he asserts it in a more clear way: "Since they construe them differently, they will anticipate them differently and will behave differently as a consequence of their anticipations." (Kelly, 1963, p. 90)
The relationship between constructs and "psychological response" could be considered in terms of either 'causation' or 'implication'.

Toward a second-person neuroscience

by Bert Timmermans

Schilbach L and* Timmermans B, Reddy V, Costall A, Bente G, Schlicht T, & Vogeley K. Toward a second-person neuroscience. Behavioral and Brain Sciences, target article accepted for publication. *equal contributions

In spite of the remarkable progress made in the burgeoning field of social neuroscience, the neural mechanisms that... more In spite of the remarkable progress made in the burgeoning field of social neuroscience, the neural mechanisms that underlie social encounters are only beginning to be studied and could —paradoxically— be seen as representing the ‘dark matter’ of social neuroscience. Recent conceptual and empirical developments consistently indicate the need for investigations, which allow the study of real-time social encounters in a truly interactive manner. This suggestion is based on the premise that social cognition is fundamentally different when we are in interaction with others rather than merely observing them. In this article, we outline the theoretical conception of a second-person approach to other minds and review evidence from neuroimaging, psychophysiological studies and related fields to argue for the development of a second-person neuroscience, which will help neuroscience to really go social; this may also be relevant for our understanding of psychiatric disorders construed as disorders of social cognition.

Shaka, when the walls fell? What cognitive semantics can tell us about the metaphorical language in "Darmok."

by Krystian Aparta

Slides from a talk given at TrekSfera 2009, intended for an audience with little to no knowledge of linguistics

In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Darmok," a humanoid alien race provides a challenge to the... more In the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode "Darmok," a humanoid alien race provides a challenge to the Universal Translator - they only communicate in metaphors. A cognitive semantic approach is used to discuss the question of whether that language is as strange as it seems, comparing the metaphoricity of Darmok with eponimization and lexicalization. The real oddity of the language is proposed to lie in an innate Theory of Mind impairment in the alien race.

Do chimpanzees know what others can and cannot do? Reasoning about 'capability'

by Francys Subiaul

Personality-Dependent Effects of Oxytocin: Greater Social Benefits for High Alexithymia Scores

by Delphine Grynberg

Luminet, O., Grynberg, D., Ruzette, N., & Mikolajczak, M. (2011). Biological Psychology

Originally known for its role in labor and lactation, oxytocin (OT) has recently been shown to facilitate social... more Originally known for its role in labor and lactation, oxytocin (OT) has recently been shown to facilitate social behaviour by improving socio-emotional abilities. However, whether OT is equally beneficial to all people, or whether it is particularly beneficial to less emotionally/socially competent (i.e., high alexithymia) individuals is not yet known. We investigated the effects of OT on individuals of varying socio-emotional ability by randomly assigning sixty male students to receive either oxytocin (OT) or a placebo (PL), and had them perform the Reading the Mind in the Eyes test (RMET). Results showed that whereas the performance of lower alexithymia individuals was equally good in both OT and PL conditions, the performance of higher alexithymia people was better under OT than PL. These results suggest that the effects of OT are not only context-dependent—as recently shown—but also personality dependent. They also provide new insights into the remediation of socio-emotional deficits.

The "Reading the Mind in the Eyes" test as a new way to explore complex emotions decoding in alcoholism

by Delphine Grynberg

Maurage, P. , Grynberg, D. , Noël, X. Joassin, F., Hanak, C.,
Verbanck, P., Luminet, O., de Timary, P., Campanella, S., & Philippot, P.

It has been repeatedly shown that alcohol dependence is associated with emotional impairments, particularly for... more It has been repeatedly shown that alcohol dependence is associated with emotional impairments, particularly for emotional facial expression decoding. Nevertheless, most earlier studies focused on basic emotions and did not explore more subtle affective states. In order to obtain a more accurate evaluation, and in view of earlier results showing impaired performance for this task among high-risk children of alcohol-dependent participants (Hill et al., 2007), the “Reading the Mind in the Eyes” test was used here to explore emotional recognition in alcohol dependence. We showed that the deficit described earlier for basic negative emotions is (1) generalizable to complex and positive emotions; and (2) specific for emotional features. This strengthens the proposition of a general face recognition impairment in alcohol dependence

Do I have more free will than you do?

by Brian Earp

Earp, B. D. (2011). Do I have more free will than you do? An unexpected asymmetry in intuitions about personal freedom. New School Psychology Bulletin, Vol. 9, No. 21, 34-40.

The present research explores the relationship between moral evaluations and intuitions about the causes of human... more The present research explores the relationship between moral evaluations and intuitions about the causes of human behavior, in particular freedom of the will. Two studies test for a self-serving bias in intuitions about free will. Study 1 explores whether individuals may seek to exculpate themselves from wrongdoing by denying free will, while justifying blame of others by endorsing free will. Study 2 explores whether individuals may justify personal failures by denying free will, while taking credit for personal successes by endorsing free will. In neither study do the data show the predicted differences between conditions. However, an unexpected finding is reported. By pooling the data from both experiments and collapsing across conditions, it is shown that participants give greater endorsement of free will whenever actions are described from a first-person, instead of third-person, perspective—a tentative “I have more free will than you do” effect. Possible explanations for these findings are discussed, as are avenues for further research on this topic.

Age effects on different components of theory of mind

by Alexandre Bejanin

The effects of aging on the cognitive and affective dimensions of theory of mind (ToM), and on the latter’s links with... more The effects of aging on the cognitive and affective dimensions of theory of mind (ToM), and on the latter’s links with other cognitive processes, such as information processing speed, executive functions and episodic memory, are still unclear. We therefore investigated these effects in young (n = 25), middle-aged (n = 20) and older adults (n = 25), using separate subjective and objective assessment tasks. Furthermore, a novel composite task probed participants’ abilities to infer both cognitive and affective mental states in an interpersonal context. Although age affected the objective ToM tests, results revealed a direct aging effect on the second-order ToM, but an indirect one on the first-order cognitive ToM, mediated mainly by age-related declines in executive functions. This study supports the notion of an age-related distinction between subjective and objective assessments of ToM, and confirms that ToM is a complex mental ability with several characteristics reliant to some extent on executive processes.

Theory of mind impairments in patients with semantic dementia

by Alexandre Bejanin

Semantic dementia is characterized by semantic deficits and behavioural abnormalities that occur in the wake of... more Semantic dementia is characterized by semantic deficits and behavioural abnormalities that occur in the wake of bilateral inferolateral and predominantly left-sided anterior temporal lobe atrophy. The temporal poles have been shown to be involved in theory of mind, namely the ability to ascribe cognitive and affective mental states to others that regulates social interactions by predicting and interpreting human behaviour. However, very few studies have examined theory of mind in semantic dementia. In this study, we investigated both cognitive and affective theory of mind in a group of patients with semantic dementia, using separate objective and subjective assessment tasks. Results provided objective evidence of an impact of semantic dementia on cognitive and affective theory of mind, consistent with the patients’ atrophy in the left temporal lobe and hypometabolism in the temporal lobes and the medial frontal cortex. However, the subjective assessment of theory of mind suggested that awareness of the affective but not cognitive theory of mind deficit persists into the moderate stage of the disease.

Feng, G. (2008). Theory of Mind.

by Gary Feng

International Encyclopedia of the Social Sciences, 2nd edition.

ToM Rules, but it is not OK!

by Daniel D. Hutto

2009. In Against Theory of Mind. Leudar, I. and Costall, A. (ads). Palgrave: Basingstoke.  p. 166-202

The 'theory of mind' framework dominants thinking about the everyday ways in which we make sense of each other. This... more The 'theory of mind' framework dominants thinking about the everyday ways in which we make sense of each other. This paper supplies reasons for thinking that is all too common way of understanding FP should be reject. It reveals it to be far from philosophically innocent. My intention is to persuade the reader that it would be best to free ourselves completely from ToM-based thinking. To start the process we must ask if the ToM characterization of FP practice can be justified, despite its popularity. If ToM rules, does it do so by right?

A non-verbal Turing Test: Differentiating mind from machine in gaze-based social interaction

by Bert Timmermans

Pfeiffer UJ, Timmermans B, Bente G, Vogeley K, & Schilbach L (2011). A non-verbal Turing Test: Differentiating mind from machine in gaze-based social interaction. PLoS ONE 6(11): e27591.

In social interaction, gaze behavior provides important signals that have a significant impact on our perception of... more In social interaction, gaze behavior provides important signals that have a significant impact on our perception of others. Previous investigations, however, have relied on paradigms in which participants are passive observers of other persons’ gazes and do not adjust their gaze behavior as is the case in real-life social encounters. We used an interactive eye-tracking paradigm that allows participants to interact with an anthropomorphic virtual character whose gaze behavior is responsive to where the participant looks on the stimulus screen in real time. The character’s gaze reactions were systematically varied along a continuum from a maximal probability of gaze aversion to a maximal probability of gaze-following during brief interactions, thereby varying contingency and congruency of the reactions. We investigated how these variations influenced whether participants believed that the character was controlled by another person (i.e., a confederate) or a computer program. In a series of experiments, the human confederate was either introduced as naïve to the task, cooperative, or competitive. Results demonstrate that the ascription of humanness increases with higher congruency of gaze reactions when participants are interacting with a naïve partner. In contrast, humanness ascription is driven by the degree of contingency irrespective of congruency when the confederate was introduced as cooperative. Conversely, during interaction with a competitive confederate, judgments were neither based on congruency nor on contingency. These results offer important insights into what renders the experience of an interaction truly social: Humans appear to have a default expectation of reciprocation that can be influenced drastically by the presumed disposition of the interactor to either cooperate or compete.

Attributions as behavior explanations: Toward a new theory (2007)

by Bertram Malle

Malle, B. F. (2007). Attributions as behavior explanations: Toward a new theory. In D. Chadee and J. Hunter (Eds.), Current themes and perspectives in social psychology (pp. 3-26). St. Augustine, Trinidad: SOCS, The University of the West Indies.

At the heart of morality lies folk psychology (2009)

by Bertram Malle

Guglielmo, S., Monroe, A. E., & Malle, B. F. (2009). At the heart of morality lies folk psychology. Inquiry, 52, 449-466.

Can unpredicted outcomes be intended? The role of outcome-beliefs in children's judgments of intention

by Gedeon Deák

Liao, Y., Li, H., & Deák, G. O. (2011). Can unpredicted outcomes be intended? The role of outcome-beliefs in children's judgments of intention. Cognitive Development, 26, 106-117.

An adult-like concept of intention includes a deliberate action to achieve a goal and a belief that one's action (if... more An adult-like concept of intention includes a deliberate action to achieve a goal and a belief that one's action (if successful) will cause the desired outcome. For example, good outcomes caused by accident or by chance are not believed to be caused intentionally. In two experiments, we asked whether children understand this connection between intentions and outcomes. Children played two games in which actions could produce unintended outcomes (i.e., causes were unplanned). Children sometimes received a desirable reward independent of intention. In Experiment 1, 4- and 5-year-olds mistakenly claimed they had intended the desirable outcome even when it was unexpected. Four-year-olds judged that they had not intended a deliberate action if it did not yield a rewarding outcome. Experiment 2 demonstrates that 6-year-olds seldom make these errors. The results suggest that 4- and 5-year-old children have not yet attained an adult-like concept of intention. Their inaccurate judgments regarding their intentions, given a rewarding yet unexpected outcome, can be explained by a positivity bias.

The social and moral cognition of group agents (2010)

by Bertram Malle

Malle, B. F. (2010). The social and moral cognition of group agents.  Journal of Law and Policy, 20, 95-136.