2-136 - Social cognition beyond preschool: Advances and issues in measuring advanced theory of mind

Session Type: Paper Symposium

Integrative Statement

Theory-of-mind (ToM) development has traditionally been studied in preschool children. Only recently has interest grown in later, more advanced aspects of ToM, with researchers addressing such important questions as: What are the continuities between early ToM in preschool and later, more advanced ToM? How relevant is advanced ToM for human social competence, including our understanding of others and ourselves? And perhaps most importantly, how can advanced ToM be measured in a developmentally sensitive way?

This symposium will present three longitudinal studies that employ conceptually different measures of advanced ToM. These measures are as diverse as advanced human social cognition is, and they include assessments of higher-order false belief, understanding of nonliteral speech, such as irony or jokes, or measures of emotion and social understanding.

Paper 1 investigates the developmental and conceptual continuities between first order and advanced ToM, and it finds evidence for these continuities in 4- to 8-year-olds.

Paper 2 studies the developmental continuities between first order and advanced ToM in 5- to 7-year-olds, and it shows that the continuities fall away when children’s general cognitive abilities are considered.

Paper 3 investigates the relation between advanced ToM and adolescents’ sense of self in 12- and 13-year-olds, and it finds that advanced ToM is predictive of adolescents’ self understanding. 

An international expert on ToM and lifespan cognitive development will discuss the three papers and highlight advances and current issues in the measurement of advanced ToM. The symposium will pave new directions for investigating this critical aspect of human social cognition.

Sub Unit

• Social Cognition

Chair

• Christopher Osterhaus, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München

Discussant

• Daniel Bernstein, Kwantlen Polytechnic University

Individual Presentations

• Scaling of (advanced) ToM and modeling children’s ToM competencies: Longitudinal findings in 4- to 8-year-olds - Presenting Author: Christopher Osterhaus, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; Non-Presenting Author: Daniela Kloo, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; Non-Presenting Author: Susanne Kristen-Antonow, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München; Non-Presenting Author: Beate Sodian, LMU Munich

• Longitudinal links between advanced theory-of-mind and earlier false-belief, verbal and non-verbal abilities and social competence - Presenting Author: Elian Fink, University of Cambridge

• ToM, self-knowledge, and drawings of play in emerging adolescents - Presenting Author: Sandra Bosacki, Brock University; Non-Presenting Author: Flavia Pissoto-Moreira, Brock University; Non-Presenting Author: Valentina Sitnik, Brock University; Non-Presenting Author: Victoria Talwar, McGill University