Poster #124 - To see or not to see: Conceptual replications of the VOE false belief paradigm

• In Event: Poster Session 09

Abstract

Whether infants can understand and attribute false beliefs to others is still highly debated. Contradicting evidence has been found in the field, with some finding evidence as early as 15 months (Onishi & Baillargeon, 2005) and others questioning the validity of implicit measures when investigating infants’ ToM (Kulke & Hinrichs, 2021; Poulin-Dubois et al., 2020). The present set of studies adds to the literature and provides additional evidence regarding whether infants can attribute false belief to agents. Two conceptual replications of the VOE false belief task were conducted, both expanding on previous studies by manipulating how the agent missed the change of location during the induction trial.
In both studies, infants were presented with a classic false-belief paradigm using the violation-of-expectation (VOE) paradigm. First, infants saw an animated video of an agent playing with a cup (center) in between a yellow and green box. For half of the infants, the green box was on the right, and the yellow box was on the left. After playing, the agent placed the cup in one of the two boxes. A belief induction trial then followed with the object changing location with the agent missing this event. Infants then saw two types of test trial events (see Figure 1). In the test trial, the agent searches into the original box (Congruent) or into the other box Incongruent). In Study 1, (N = 50, Mage = 16.42 months, SD = 0.97) the agent’s face was obscured with a veil, which resulted in them not witnessing the transfer between boxes. In Study 2, (N = 50, Mage = 17.16 months, SD = 1.91) to lighten the potential cognitive load and to clarify the fact that the actor was looking away the belief induction trial, the agent fully turned around and faced the back of the stage during the transfer. The prediction for both studies was that infants would look longer at the incongruent event, as they did when the agent disappeared behind an occlude in the original study.
Contrary to the original findings, both experiments produced null results. Both groups looked equally long during the familiarization and induction trials in each experiment. Importantly, children’s looking time did not significantly differ between the Congruent and Incongruent test trials whether the agent’s face was covered with a veil (Congruent: M = 10.79 seconds, SD = 7.16, Incongruent: M = 10.86, SD = 5.32, F(1) = 0.002, p = .97) or fully turned away (Congruent: M = 14.99, SD = 9.69, Incongruent: M = 12.07, SD = 8.42, F(1) = 1.30, p = .26). In sum, the present set of studies suggests that infants do not yet display a mature theory of mind. If infants do possess ToM, the effect may be small and non-robust. Further research is needed, and experimental methods, other than or in addition to VOE, should be considered when testing false belief in infants (Paulus, 2022).

Authors

• Anna-Elisabeth Baumann, Concordia University

• Elizabeth Jessica Goldman, Concordia University

• Ariane Lalonde, Concordia University

• Gal Zohar, Concordia University

• Elaine Psaradellis

• Diane Poulin-Dubois, Concordia University
  Presenting Author