Article

Theory of Mind in aging: Comparing cognitive and affective components in the faux pas test

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Abstract

Objectives: Theory of Mind (ToM) is a complex human ability that allows people to make inferences on others' mental states such as beliefs, emotions and desires. Previous studies on ToM in normal aging have provided heterogeneous findings. In the present study we examined whether a mixed calculation of different aspects of ToM may have contributed to these conflicting results. We had two aims. First, we explored the age-related changes in the performance of cognitive vs. affective ToM. Second, we investigated the extent to which the effect of aging on cognitive vs. affective ToM is mediated by age-related differences in executive functions. Method: To address these issues three age groups (young, young-old, and old-old adults) were compared on cognitive and affective ToM using the faux pas test. In addition, participants were tested using a battery of executive function tasks tapping on inhibition, working memory updating, and word fluency. Results: The analyses indicated that young adults outperform both young-old and old-old adults on cognitive ToM but not on affective ToM. Correlations showed that, whereas cognitive ToM was significantly associated with age, working memory updating, and inhibition, affective ToM was not. Finally, analyses revealed that individual differences in working memory updating (but not inhibition) mediated the effect of age on cognitive ToM. Conclusion: Our findings support the view of selective age-related differences on cognitive, but not affective, ToM in normal aging. The distinction between the two ToM components is further supported by a dissociable pattern of correlations with executive functions.

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... In the remaining 10 stories no faux pas is committed [10]. There is no time limit, therefore participants are allowed to read the stories as many times as necessary to fully comprehend them [30]. At the end of each story, the participant is asked whether anything inappropriate was mentioned [31]. ...
... Then, to attribute an emotional state of mind, it must be understood that the person hearing it would feel offended or hurt [33]. Thus, the «Faux Pas» test requires the simultaneous understanding of multiple mental states (i.e., intentions, emotions, beliefs) in everyday social situations [30]. Therefore, the «Faux Pas» test is a good measure of subtle ToM deficits [33]. ...
... Therefore, the «Faux Pas» test is a good measure of subtle ToM deficits [33]. In particular, cognitive ToM is assessed in the false belief question (question #5), which evaluates whether participants understand the false beliefs of the person who committed a faux pas, whereas affective ToM is assessed in the affective question (question #6), which evaluates whether participants understand how the person in the story would feel [30]. ...
Article
Relapsing Remitting Multiple Sclerosis RRMS is characterized by new or recurrent episodes of neurological dysfunction followed by partial or complete recovery.
... In healthy cognitive aging, there is a progressive deterioration of some processes involved in social cognition, but to a lesser extent than in neurocognitive disorders (Fernandes et al., 2021). Several authors have reported a decrease in performance in tests evaluating ToM with advancing age (Baksh et al., 2018;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Cavallini et al., 2013). Indeed, it has been shown that performance in cognitive ToM is negatively associated with age, but that performance in affective ToM remains rather stable in normal aging (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Reiter et al., 2017). ...
... Several authors have reported a decrease in performance in tests evaluating ToM with advancing age (Baksh et al., 2018;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Cavallini et al., 2013). Indeed, it has been shown that performance in cognitive ToM is negatively associated with age, but that performance in affective ToM remains rather stable in normal aging (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Reiter et al., 2017). In addition, aging affects other processes such as the ability to recognize emotions (Ferreira et al., 2021;Quesque et al., 2022). ...
... This finding aligns with the data presented in Table 6, where average recognition scores for fear and sadness were lower compared with joy and surprise, for example. Regarding ToM, the existing scientific literature suggests that performance in affective ToM remains relatively stable during normal aging, while cognitive ToM tends to decline (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Reiter et al., 2017). It is plausible to think that the lack of an age effect in the long and short-FPT subtests could be attributed to the fact that the total scores combine questions related to both cognitive and affective ToM. ...
Article
Objective The mini Social cognition & Emotional Assessment (mini-SEA) is a social cognition battery which assesses theory of mind and emotion recognition. Currently, no psychometrically validated measure of social cognition with adapted normative data exists for the middle-aged and elderly French-Quebec population. This project aims to determine the known-group discriminant validity of a cultural and linguistic adaptation of the mini-SEA between cognitively healthy people, those with mild cognitive impairment (MCI) or living with Alzheimer’s Disease (AD). This study also aims to examine the stability of mini-SEA’s performance over a 3–4-month time period, as well as to produce normative data for French-Quebec people aged 50 years. Normative data are derived for the full and an abbreviated version of the Faux Pas subtest. Method The sample included 211 French-speaking participants from Quebec (Canada) aged 50 to 89 years. Mini-SEA’s performance between a sub-sample of cognitively healthy people (n = 20), those with MCI (n = 20) or with AD (n = 20) was compared. A sub-sample of cognitively healthy people (n = 30) performed the task twice to estimate test–retest reliability. Socio-demographic variables’ effects on scores were examined to produce normative data in the form of regression equations or percentile ranks. Results Significant differences emerged between cognitively healthy people and those with MCI or AD. Moreover, scores were relatively stable over a period of 3 to 4 months. Finally, for the normative data, age, gender, and education were associated with performance on the mini-SEA or its subtests. Conclusions This study improves and standardizes social cognition’s assessment among French–Quebec individuals, which will help characterize their cognitive profile.
... Key evidence for the distinct dimensions of cognitive and affective ToM includes the observation of differential impairments across different age groups (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Sebastian et al., 2012) and clinical populations (Bora et al., 2009;Lin et al., 2021;Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010;Weightman et al., 2014). Regarding ageing research, older adults show deficits in cognitive but not affective ToM compared with younger adults (Bottiroli et al., 2016), while affective but not cognitive ToM impairments have been identified in adolescents compared with healthy adults (Sebastian et al., 2012). ...
... Key evidence for the distinct dimensions of cognitive and affective ToM includes the observation of differential impairments across different age groups (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Sebastian et al., 2012) and clinical populations (Bora et al., 2009;Lin et al., 2021;Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010;Weightman et al., 2014). Regarding ageing research, older adults show deficits in cognitive but not affective ToM compared with younger adults (Bottiroli et al., 2016), while affective but not cognitive ToM impairments have been identified in adolescents compared with healthy adults (Sebastian et al., 2012). Within clinical populations, meta-analytic results have reported more significant cognitive ToM impairments compared with healthy controls in patients with schizophrenia (Bora et al., 2009), while affective ToM is more impaired in patients with traumatic brain injury (Lin et al., 2021), major depressive disorder (Weightman et al., 2014), and psychopathy (Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010). ...
... An important limitation to previous behavioural results supporting ToM being multidimensional is that such evidence primarily relies on identifying dissociations between groups or tasks via statistical tests such as analyses of variance, t tests, or correlations (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010;Warnell & Redcay, 2019). In contrast, state-trace analysis (STA), which tests for any departures from a monotonic relationship between two dependent variables (e.g., performance on cognitive vs. affective ToM tasks), is better suited to test for multiple underlying latent variables (Stephens et al., 2019). ...
Article
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Theory of mind (ToM) has been argued to be a multidimensional construct, with ToM inferences depending on distinct processes across affective and cognitive ToM tasks and across first-order cognitive and second-order cognitive ToM tasks. Behavioural evidence for a multidimensional account has primarily depended on dissociations identified via analysis of variance, a statistical approach insufficient for assessing dimensionality. Instead, state-trace analysis (STA) is a more appropriate statistical technique to uncover dimensionality. The current study first applied STA to two summary datasets that had previously identified key dissociations between cognitive and affective ToM; these reanalyses did not support a multidimensional account of ToM. Next, STA was applied to a more detailed dataset to reveal whether ToM is based on multiple processes in a sample of 115 older adults aged 60–85 years ( M = 68.5, SD = 5.92, 61.7% female) with higher or lower emotion perception ability. Participants made ToM judgements about different social exchanges (e.g., sarcasm or lying). STA results supported a multidimensional account of ToM across first-order cognitive, second-order cognitive, and affective ToM subdomains. These results lay a more rigorous foundation for subsequent studies to further examine the dimensionality of ToM and to apply formal modelling, progressing the field’s understanding and measurement of the cognitive processes driving ToM judgements.
... Theory of mind is generally examined in two subcomponents: cognitive (i.e., understanding beliefs, thoughts, and motivations of others) and affective (i.e., understanding feelings and emotions of others). Older adults tend to perform worse than young adults on cognitive theory of mind tasks (see Henry et al., 2013 for a review) whereas these age differences are attenuated on affective tasks (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Charlton et al., 2009;Duval et al., 2011) or sometimes not present at all (e.g., Castelli et al., 2010;Li et al., 2013). This pattern holds true even in the face of pathological impairments (e.g., Demichelis et al., 2020). ...
... age differences emerged across all variables with young adults outperforming older adults (all ps < .01). The differences are generally consistent with past work in theory of mind and cognitive functioning (e.g., Demichelis et al., 2020;Moran, 2013; c.f. Kynast et al., 2020;Lee et al., 2021 for RMET), although there is mixed evidence regarding the magnitude of age differences in affective theory of mind (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Charlton et al., 2009;Duval et al., 2011). Revisiting the correlations in Table 2, the cognitive and social cognitive variables may appear to be moderately correlated due to the relatively strong age effects across nearly all variables. ...
... Using a twosystems account of theory of mind, inferences about others' feelings operates through relatively automatic sensory channels (e.g., face perception) and effortful processes requiring cognitive resources (Frith & Frith, 2008). Although affective theory of mind seems to be less impacted by aging than cognitive subcomponents (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Charlton et al., 2009;Demichelis et al., 2020;Duval et al., 2011), both young and older adults performed worse on the inferring emotions items from The Office® task relative to all other subcomponents (see Table 3). Given its difficulty, face-name recall may be uniquely associated with this aspect of theory of mind precisely because additional mechanisms are necessary for successful performance. ...
Article
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Poor face-name recall has been associated with age-related impairments in cognitive functioning, namely declines in episodic memory and executive control. However, the role of social cognitive function – the ability to remember, process, and store information about others – has been largely overlooked in this work. Extensive work has shown that social and nonsocial cognitive processes rely on unique, albeit overlapping, mechanisms. In the current study, we explored whether social cognitive functioning – specifically the ability to infer other people’s mental states (i.e., theory of mind) – facilitates better face-name learning. To do this, a sample of 289 older and young adults completed a face-name learning paradigm along with standard assessments of episodic memory and executive control alongside two theory of mind measures, one static and one dynamic. In addition to expected age differences, several key effects emerged. Age-related differences in recognition were explained by episodic memory, not social cognition. However, age effects in recall were explained by both episodic memory and social cognition, specifically affective theory of mind in the dynamic task. Altogether, we contend that face-name recall can be supported by social cognitive functioning, namely understanding emotions. While acknowledging the influence of task characteristics (i.e., lures, target ages), we interpret these findings in light of existing accounts of age differences in face-name associative memory.
... Advanced age is also associated with cognitive decline, which has marked effects on social functioning 1 . For example, there is evidence that healthy older adults may have difficulties in inferring mental states in complex social scenarios 17 and even basic emotion recognition may decline (for review see Arioli et al. 2018). Furthermore, decline of ToM in older age can occur due to changes in brain structure and function: For example, a recent study showed that older adults exhibit weaker intrinsic connectivity between the right temporoparietal junction and right temporal pole that explained their poorer ToM behavioral performance 18 . ...
... Different stages of life pose unique challenges to social interaction and socio-cognitive abilities: as children, we start to develop the abilities to understand and communicate with others' , during puberty, adolescence and adulthood, we are constantly confronted with life changes that challenge our socio-cognitive skills and our ability to adapt these to new circumstances 16 . Finally, as we age, (socio-) cognitive abilities may start to decrease leading so social difficulties and reduced quality of life 17 . Therefore, socio-cognitive training may be helpful at every stage of life to either develop (new) socio-cognitive abilities, adapt our behaviour to new environments and challenges or to maintain a high-level of socio-cognitive functioning. ...
... Because socio-cognitive abilities may start to decline with more advanced age 17 , the aim of socio-cognitive training in individuals over the age of around 60 years was to assist maintenance or improvement of these abilities. Training for older adults mainly comprised practicing specific ToM-tasks (e.g., reading a complex false-belief story that includes misunderstandings, double bluffs or sarcasm and conversations about different perspectives in stories) as well as conversations about mental states (e.g., what do the people in the false-belief story think about the situation and about the mental states of the other characters in the story?). ...
Article
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Socio-cognitive abilities and challenges change across the healthy lifespan and are essential for successful human interaction. Identifying effective socio-cognitive training approaches for healthy individuals may prevent development of mental or physical disease and reduced quality of life. A systematic search was conducted in MEDLINE Ovid, Web of Science Core Collection, CENTRAL, and PsycInfo databases. Studies that investigated different socio-cognitive trainings for healthy individuals across the human lifespan assessing effects on theory of mind, emotion recognition, perspective taking, and social decision making were included. A random-effects pairwise meta-analysis was conducted. Risk-of-Bias was assessed using the Cochrane Risk-of-Bias-2-Tool. Twenty-three intervention studies with N = 1835 participants were included in the systematic review; twelve randomized controlled trials in the meta-analysis (N = 875). Socio-cognitive trainings differed regarding duration and content in different age groups, with theory of mind being the domain most frequently trained. Results of the meta-analysis showed that trainings were highly effective for improving theory of mind in children aged 3–5 years (SMD = 2.51 (95%CI: 0.48–4.53)), children aged 7–9 years (SMD = 2.71 (95%CI: − 0.28 to 5.71)), and older adults (SMD = 5.90 (95%CI: 2.77–9.02). Theory of mind training was highly effective in all investigated age-groups for improving theory of mind, yet, more research on transfer effects to other socio-cognitive processes and further investigation of training effects in other socio-cognitive domains (e.g., emotion recognition, visual perspective taking, social decision making) is needed. Identified characteristics of successful socio-cognitive trainings in different age groups may help designing future training studies for other populations. Registration: www.crd.york.ac.uk/PROSPERO/ (ID: CRD42020193297).
... However, when provided with multimodal stimuli no agerelated deficits were observed (Wieck & Kunzmann, 2017). Likewise, older adults tended to perform poorer than their younger counterparts when asked to make judgments about the thoughts, feelings, and intentions of story characters (Baksh et al., 2018;Biervoye et al., 2018;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Henry et al., 2013;Johansson Nolaker et al., 2018;McDonald et al., 2018;Sun et al., 2018) although not always (Keightley et al., 2006;Sutcliffe et al., 2017). ...
... For example, emotion labeling tasks tax working memory especially as the number of choices increase (Phillips et al., 2008). Cognitive skills (e.g., fluid intelligence, working memory, memory) which decline with age have been associated with ToM, both affective (Keightley et al., 2006;MacPherson et al., 2002;Mahy et al., 2014;Sutcliffe et al., 2017;Ze et al., 2014) and cognitive (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Johansson Nolaker et al., 2018;Sun et al., 2018). This does, however, vary This document is copyrighted by the American Psychological Association or one of its allied publishers. ...
... EMPATHY ACROSS THE AGES across tasks (e.g., Baksh et al., 2018;Bernstein et al., 2011;MacPherson et al., 2002) and highlights the importance of ensuring tasks are not overly taxing of cognitive resources. It is important to note, however, that while some task differences are entirely accounted for by nonsocial cognitive abilities (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;MacPherson et al., 2002;Rakoczy et al., 2012), in others, age differences remain even after accounting for cognitive performance (Baksh et al., 2018;Bernstein et al., 2011;Rakoczy et al., 2012;Schlegel et al., 2017;Sun et al., 2018;Sutcliffe et al., 2017;Ze et al., 2014). One specific aspect of cognitive function that is directly relevant to empathy is that of inhibition. ...
Article
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Objective: Empathy is the ability to understand and respond to another person's experience and is an important skill for maintaining good relationships across the lifespan. Past research has predominately relied on self-report measures of trait empathy in examining the impact of ageing on empathy, potentially contributing to the very mixed findings in this area. We aimed to examine the effects of age on state empathic ability. Method: Two-hundred and thirty-one adults aged 17-94 years were administered behavioral measures of cognitive and affective empathy alongside traditional trait measures. We also examined the potential impact of advancing age on inhibition of self-relevant information and the relationship between this and the cognitive, affective and motivational components of empathic ability. Results: Age was not a predictor of either trait cognitive or affective empathy measured using self-report. Further, older adults did not perform worse than younger adults on a state behavioral measure of affective empathy. Older adults did perform less accurately on some behavioral cognitive empathy tasks and also on self-relevant inhibition. Self-relevant inhibition errors and response times were negatively associated with performance on cognitive empathy tasks, though not associated with self-report or behaviorally measured affective empathy scores. Further, mediation analyses suggested the indirect effect from age-inhibition-cognitive empathy was small but significant, implicating inhibition in cognitive empathy ability in older adulthood. Conclusions: The relationship between advancing age and empathic skills is complex, with age possibly conferring both advantages and disadvantages. Inhibition should be examined alongside other general cognitive skills in future studies investigating empathy using behavioural measures. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved).
... While both arguably fall under the concept of cognitive empathy, they differ in that the faux pas test involves taking the perspective of another person, whereas the RMET does not (Gabriel et al., 2021;Quesque & Rossetti, 2020). In addition, ToM can be further distinguished by placing a focus on either affective or cognitive components (Batson et al., 1997;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Dvash & Shamay-Tsoory, 2014;Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010). The former involves understanding another person's emotions and feelings, whereas the latter entails making assumptions about people's intentions and beliefs (Dvash & Shamay-Tsoory, 2014). ...
... The former involves understanding another person's emotions and feelings, whereas the latter entails making assumptions about people's intentions and beliefs (Dvash & Shamay-Tsoory, 2014). Acknowledging such subtle differences is important, as correlates to other constructs may be specific only to certain aspects of cognitive empathy (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2010). as a function of situational factors. ...
Thesis
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Psychopathy is a personality construct that has witnessed a surge in research interest since its initial conceptualization more than eight decades ago. Throughout this period, a prominent area of focus has been on socio-emotional deficits. Yet, the current body of research exhibits considerable heterogeneity, leaving conflicting results and multiple unanswered questions. In an effort to reconcile contradictory findings, explore socio-emotional deficits more holistically, and advance the conceptualization of psychopathy, this dissertation was conducted along with three studies. The first study (Chapter 2: Study I) within this doctoral thesis is a comprehensive meta-analysis that synthesized the bulk of evidence concerning the relationship between psychopathy and both empathy and alexithymia. A total of 72 articles comprising more than 15,000 participants from 19 different countries were included in the analyses. The results suggest deficits not only in affective and cognitive empathy, but also in the understanding of one’s own emotions, i.e., alexithymia. Notably, the pooled correlations varied across psychopathy factors in terms of magnitude and direction, underscoring the importance of recognizing psychopathy as a multidimensional construct. The second study (Chapter 3: Study II) explored whether alexithymia serves as a mediator in the relationship between psychopathy and empathy deficits, as well as between psychopathy and emotion dysregulation. This was tested across two diverse samples, one drawn from the general population and the other from a German forensic hospital. The results of our path analyses suggest that alexithymia contributes to the lack of empathy and emotion dysregulation in psychopathic individuals. However, these findings were again specific to certain psychopathy factors (i.e., meanness and disinhibition), with boldness indicating adaptive features by being linked to lower levels of alexithymia and fewer socio-emotional deficits overall. In a final study (Chapter 4: Study III), we investigated the potential for overcoming psychopathy-related empathy deficits through explicit instructions to engage in affective perspective taking. To this end, we tested 87 participants from the community, using an experimental paradigm while simultaneously recording their physiological arousal. Although we observed a disconnect between behavioral and physiological measures of empathic concern, our results imply that empathy is not an automatic response in individuals with pronounced levels of meanness, leading to diminished empathic concern. Yet, this can be overcome when individuals are instructed to engage in affective perspective taking. Consequently, psychopathy does not appear to indicate a fundamental inability to empathize, but rather reflects a reduced propensity to do so automatically. Taken together, the findings presented in this dissertation advance our comprehension of the various socio-emotional impairments in psychopathy. Specifically, four key conclusions can be drawn. Firstly, affective deficits in psychopathy are substantial, including not only impairments in sharing the emotions of others, but also in understanding one’s own feelings. Secondly, these deficits extend to cognitive empathy. Thirdly, empathic concern does not appear to be absent in individuals with psychopathy per se, but instead does not occur automatically, which may be due to a lack of motivation. Lastly, psychopathy is a multidimensional personality construct that must be viewed as a constellation of distinct traits in order to truly capture all its intricacies. As such, this dissertation offers significant implications for future research and clinical practice.
... When modeled together, the unique variance associated with dynamic cognitive theory of mind was the only remaining significant predictor of social bridging. This is perhaps unsurprising given that prior work has shown that theory of mind requires that individuals be able to maintain multiple pieces of information in working memory, inhibit incorrect predictions, and/or engage episodic memory to retrieve past experiences to inform judgments (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Fernandes et al., 2021;Laillier et al., 2019;Leslie et al., 2004;Scholl & Leslie, 2001). In the present sample, episodic memory and dynamic cognitive theory of mind were highly correlated (r = .59). ...
... An additional implication of this work is that it further demonstrates that age-related declines in general cognitive function do not fully explain older adults' social-cognitive deficits Kong et al., 2022). Prior work has found that general cognitive function is related to declines in numerous social functions, including avoiding social gaffes (Henry et al., 2009), regulating behavior and reducing prejudice (A. C. Krendl et al., 2009;von Hippel et al., 2000), identifying deception (Spreng et al., 2016), emotion recognition (A. C. Krendl & Ambady, 2010; but see Kong et al., 2022), and theory of mind (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Fernandes et al., 2021;Laillier et al., 2019;Leslie et al., 2004;Scholl & Leslie, 2001). However, though we found that executive function and episodic memory were related to cognitive theory of mind, they did not fully explain the relationship between cognitive theory of mind and bridging. ...
Article
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The mechanisms by which older adults maintain large, complex social networks are not well understood. Prior work has primarily focused on general cognitive ability (e.g., executive function, episodic memory), largely overlooking social cognition—the ability to process, store, and remember social information. Because social cognition plays a key role in navigating social interactions and is distinct from general cognition, we examined whether general and social cognition uniquely predicted the nature of older adults’ personal social networks. Our study leveraged comprehensive measures of general cognition (executive function, episodic memory), social cognition (face memory and dynamic measures of cognitive and affective theory of mind), and a rigorous measure of personal social networks from 143 community-dwelling older adults. We found that, when modeled together and controlling for sociodemographic variables, only executive function and dynamic cognitive theory of mind positively predicted having social networks with relatively unfamiliar, loosely connected others, accounting for 17% of the unique variance in older adults’ social connectedness. Interestingly, having a social network comprised primarily of close, tightly knit relationships was negatively associated with affective theory of mind performance. Findings are discussed in the context of the social–cognitive resource framework—which suggests that social cognition may be more engaged in relatively unfamiliar, versus close, interactions. Specifically, our results show that social–cognitive processes may be relatively automatic for individuals whose primary social relationships are very close but may be more strongly engaged for individuals whose interactions include at least some relatively less close relationships.
... To increase the precision of the psychometric measurement, we decided to use three different measures: the Faux Pas Test, the Hinting Task, and the Emotion Comprehension Test. A Faux Pas Test involves the patient recognizing violations of certain social norms [35], the Hinting Task focuses on the understanding of another person's mental state on the basis of indirect speech [36], and the Emotion Comprehension Test measures the empathetic deduction of the patient [33]. ...
... We hypothesize that this is possibly due to accumulated life experiences and exposure to diverse social contexts, regardless of the presence of deficits in this area. Although some studies found no relationship between ToM and age in the clinical population [27] nor in healthy individuals [35,51,52], it is worth emphasizing that none of them used the same diagnostic tool that was used in our study. Contrary to the results obtained from patients with epilepsy, variables such as education or general cognitive functioning were not associated with the ToM performance in the healthy subjects. ...
Article
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Background: Temporal lobe epilepsy is a common neurological disease that affects many areas of patients’ lives, including social competence. The aim of the study was to assess theory of mind in patients with temporal lobe epilepsy and to investigate the demographic and clinical factors associated with this function. Methods: A total of 65 participants took part in the study, which included 44 patients with epilepsy and 21 demographically matched healthy individuals. The following neuropsychological tests were used to examine theory of mind: the Faux Pas Test, the Hinting Task, the Emotion Comprehension Test, and a cognitive function screen, the Montreal Cognitive Assessment. Results: Patients with epilepsy scored lower on all measures of the theory-of-mind tests. Moreover, in the clinical group, numerous moderate and strong correlations were found between the theory-of-mind tests and education, age at onset of epilepsy, lateralization of epileptic focus, cognitive status, and, to a lesser degree, number of anti-epileptic drugs, frequency of seizures, and age. In contrast, in the control group, significant correlations were found mostly between the theory-of-mind tests and sex, and, to a lesser degree, age. Education and cognitive functioning were not associated. Conclusions: Patients with epilepsy experience difficulties in theory of mind, which may have a negative impact on the quality of their social relationships. The level of theory-of-mind abilities correlates with particular clinical and demographic indicators. Recognizing these issues allows clinicians to implement tailored interventions, potentially improving patients’ quality of life.
... With advancing age, an inverse trend is observed, with an age-related decline starting from the complex ToM tasks such as the secondorder ToM tasks (Maylor et al., 2002;Charlton et al., 2009;Phillips et al., 2011;Cavallini et al., 2013). Multiple studies supported ToM level as a function of age (Duval et al., 2011;Cavallini et al., 2013;Henry et al., 2013;Moran, 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Rosi et al., 2016;Klindt et al., 2017). However, this association seems to be mediated and moderated by education level and cognitive functions (Phillips et al., 2011;Rakoczy et al., 2012;Li et al., 2013), especially executive functions (Charlton et al., 2009;Ibanez et al., 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016). ...
... Multiple studies supported ToM level as a function of age (Duval et al., 2011;Cavallini et al., 2013;Henry et al., 2013;Moran, 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Rosi et al., 2016;Klindt et al., 2017). However, this association seems to be mediated and moderated by education level and cognitive functions (Phillips et al., 2011;Rakoczy et al., 2012;Li et al., 2013), especially executive functions (Charlton et al., 2009;Ibanez et al., 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016). In fact, age-related changes in executive functions may explain the different ToM levels in older adults and clinical conditions (Wade et al., 2018;Chainay and Gaubert, 2020;Otsuka et al., 2021). ...
Article
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Introduction The Yoni task is a computerized tool assessing first-and second-order affective and cognitive Theory of Mind (ToM), accounting for the multidimensional and multi-level mentalizing features. The Italian Yoni task has been validated and standardized in its 98-item version, and a 48-item short version has been proposed for a quick digital evaluation of ToM in clinical contexts. Methods The present study aimed to test the Yoni-48’s convergent validity, correlating the tool score with the Reading the Mind in the Eyes test (ET) and Gender Test (GT), its items discrimination ability through the Classical Test Theory, and Rash model, its reliability by evaluating the internal consistency (McDonald’s ω , Cronbach’s α , Guttman’s λ ² , and Guttman’s λ ⁶ ) and Spearman-Brown ϱ SP split-half analysis, and to provide standardization and normative data in the Italian population. Results Results suggested a good convergent validity with a statistically significant association with ET ( p < 0.001), while a null correlation was observed with GT ( p = 0.947). The Classical Test Theory and Rash model confirmed a good discrimination ability of the Yoni-48’s second-order affective and cognitive ToM items, while weaker discrimination capacity was registered for the first-order ToM items. The inter-item reliability was optimal for clinical purposes ( ω , α , λ ² , λ ⁶ ≥ 0.90). Also, the split-half reliability was high (Spearman-Brown ϱ SP = 0.90). For standardization, age and education were revealed as significant predictors of Yoni accuracy scores, except for the first-order ToM score. Instead, age was the only predictor of Yoni’s response speed score. The Italian normative data showed a high Yoni accuracy in healthy adults (mean accuracy = 0.85) and speed (mean response time = 0.92). Finally, both accuracy and response time level was balanced between the affective and cognitive components of ToM. Discussion This study supports the psychometric properties of the Yoni-48 and provides normative data for the Italian population. Further studies are needed to test the suitability of this short version for profiling the social cognition neurocognitive phenotype.
... We hypothesised that compared to low schizotypy individuals, relatives and the high mixed schizotypy group would have multiple and prominent ToM alterations, which would be consistent with both the categorical and quantitative models of schizotypy, while positive and negative schizotypy clusters might show milder isolated changes in the cognitive and affective ToM, as well as trends to hyperand hypo-mentalising, respectively. Although somewhat inconsistent, previous studies have shown that neurocognition may to some extent influence ToM in different cohorts (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Cella et al., 2015;Kocsis-Bogár et al., 2017). Specifically, cognitive ToM in the faux pas tasks was found to correlate with working memory updating (Bottiroli et al., 2016). ...
... Although somewhat inconsistent, previous studies have shown that neurocognition may to some extent influence ToM in different cohorts (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Cella et al., 2015;Kocsis-Bogár et al., 2017). Specifically, cognitive ToM in the faux pas tasks was found to correlate with working memory updating (Bottiroli et al., 2016). Given this, we considered the impact working memory has on ToM in our research. ...
Article
Introduction: Clinical and family studies suggest that alterations of theory of mind (ToM) represent a marker of genetic liability to schizophrenia. Findings regarding ToM in schizotypy are less consistent. The study aimed to explore whether this might be due to an insufficient account of the heterogeneity of schizotypy in prior research and/or the fact that in psychometric schizotypy ToM alterations could manifest as subtle peculiarities rather than overt errors of mentalising.Methods: Individuals without a family history of psychosis (n = 150) were assigned to low, positive, negative, and high mixed schizotypy classes based on a cluster analysis of 1322 subjects who completed the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire. The classes were compared on their performance of faux pas tasks with 77 adult first-degree relatives of schizophrenia patients, who represent individuals at genetic risk for schizophrenia. Besides overt errors, subtle alterations in ToM were analysed using expert judgment.Results: The relatives tended to make overt errors and demonstrated specific features of intentional reasoning. None of the schizotypal classes showed similar trends.Conclusions: The results complement the literature on the subjective-objective disjunction in psychometric schizotypes and did not provide evidence that ToM anomalies are a marker of genetic liability to schizophrenia in this cohort.
... Finally, another relevant issue is that the majority of social cognition tools are affected by cognitive function and demographic characteristics. In fact, evidence has reported that many social cognition tests are influenced by the level of cognitive functions, such as intelligence, and executive functions (e.g., Charlton et al., 2009;Ibanez et al., 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016), which results in them assessing both social and non-social skills. Moreover, the majority of social cognition tests are affected by demographic variables, such as sex, age, and educational years Rosi et al., 2016;Chiasson et al., 2017;Isernia et al., 2020), that rarely are considered in statistical analyses or adjusted according to normative data. ...
... The influence of age on social cognition in the literature is reported (Moran, 2013;Bernstein et al., 2017;Klindt et al., 2017;Fernandes et al., 2021). However, although evidence suggests age negatively affects social cognitive abilities Duval et al., 2011;Phillips et al., 2011;Cavallini et al., 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016), education (Li et al., 2013) and the age-related cognitive functions decline might mediate and moderate the performance (Rakoczy et al., 2012). Our finding that sociodemographic variables were the only predictors of I_ESCoT contrasts with other studies that showed an association between social cognition performance and IQ (e.g., Charlton et al., 2009) or cognitive functions, including executive functions or working memory (e.g., Ibanez et al., 2013). ...
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The relevance of social cognition assessment has been formally described in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders-5. However, social cognition tools evaluating different socio-cognitive components for Italian-speaking populations are lacking. The Edinburgh Social Cognition Test (ESCoT) is a new social cognition measure that uses animations of everyday social interactions to assess (i) cognitive theory of mind, (ii) affective theory of mind, (iii) interpersonal social norm understanding, and (iv) intrapersonal social norm understanding. Previous studies have shown that the ESCoT is a sensitive measure of social cognition in healthy and clinical populations in the United Kingdom. This work aimed to adapt and validate the ESCoT in an Italian population of healthy adults. A translation-back-translation procedure was followed to create and refine the Italian version. Then, 94 healthy adults (47 females, mean age 35 ± 15.9) completed the ESCoT, a battery of conventional social cognition tests (Yoni; Reading the Mind in the Eyes Strange Stories, and Social Norm Questionnaire, SNQ) and measures of intelligence and executive functions. Reliability, convergent validity, and predictors of performance on the ESCoT were examined. Results demonstrated good reliability of the ESCoT and an association between the ESCoT scores and some traditional social cognition tests (Yoni cognitive subscale, SNQ). Hierarchical regression results showed that the ESCoT total score was associated with age. Also, the ESCoT subscore (intrapersonal social norm understanding) was associated with education. These findings support the ESCoT as a valid tool testing social norm understanding, a reliable measure of social cognition for an adult Italian population, and provides further evidence that the ESCoT is sensitive to age- and education-related changes in social cognition, and it is a task not affected by general cognitive functioning.
... However, some recent studies found effects of aging were limited to the cognitive ToM and did not occur for the affective ToM (Wang and Su, 2013). A similar study found that age was associated with a decrease in cognitive ToM but not in affective ToM (Bottiroli et al., 2016). ...
... The pattern of decreasing cognitive ToM and increasing affective ToM was more pronounced among older participants than younger adults. Thus, the results are more in line with the studies that have shown a negative effect of aging on the cognitive ToM only (Wang and Su, 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016) instead to those that found effects of aging on both cognitive and affective ToM to be equally strong (Henry et al., 2013). The decline in cognitive ToM performance in older adults has previously been associated with a decrease in executive functioning (Wang and Su, 2013) and a strategic reallocation of scarce cognitive resources. ...
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Mental disorders are associated with difficulties to correctly infer the mental states of other’s (theory of mind; ToM). These inferences either relate to affective states of others (affective ToM) or to their thoughts, intentions, or beliefs (cognitive ToM) and can be associated with mental disorder. The current study explores the influence of individual and situational effects on the measurement of ToM abilities within two clinical samples, to increase generalizability. We analyzed data from 229 in-patients; 103 patients treated for alcohol use disorder and 126 patients treated for a personality disorder. ToM was assessed with the Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC). We analyzed changes in test performance over the course of the test using a logistic linear mixed effects model. Performance on the cognitive ToM items decreased over time, while performance on the affective ToM items increased over time. This difference was more pronounced among older individuals. The results show important moderators of ToM performance that might help to resolve inconsistencies in the current literature about ToM abilities in different clinical or age groups.
... Thus, empathic individuals are likely more effective than less empathic individuals in their investment of energy into social relationships, as they are more likely to avoid interpersonal tensions and to employ good communication skills, warmth, and a positive outlook in their interactions with others (Davis & Oathout, 1987). In terms of changes with age, there is evidence that younger adults outperform older adults on the cognitive tasks associated with ToM but not on the associated emotional tasks (Bottiroli et al., 2016). ...
... In line with this idea that emotional functioning may be spared from age-related changes (Bottiroli et al., 2016), cumulative experiences in social interactions are very likely to improve the effectiveness of time and energy investments into social relationships such that with age, individuals are likely to become more socially skilled (Hess & Kotter-Gruehn, 2011;Hess et al., 2005). In fact, according to the Strength and Vulnerability Integration model (SAVI; Charles, 2010;Rook & Charles, 2017), older adults are particularly effective in handling social relationships, at least in part due to age-related tendencies to utilize strategies that facilitate positive relationships, like the avoidance of conflict (e.g., Blanchard-Fields, 2007) and the reappraisal of interpersonal tensions . ...
Article
Empirical evidence about the development of social relationships across adulthood into late life continues to accumulate, but theoretical development has lagged behind. The Differential Investment of Resources (DIRe) model integrates these empirical advances. The model defines the investment of time and energy into social ties varying in terms of emotional closeness and kinship as the core mechanism explaining the formation and maintenance of social networks. Individual characteristics, acting as capacities, motivations, and skills, determine the amount, direction, and efficacy of the investment. The context (e.g., the living situation) affects the social opportunity structure, the amount of time and energy available, and individual characteristics. Finally, the model describes two feedback loops: (a) social capital affecting the individual’s living situation and (b) different types of ties impacting individual characteristics via social exchanges, social influences, and social evaluations. The proposed model will provide a theoretical basis for future research and hypothesis testing.
... junction-only partially predicts poorer performance in older adults (Hughes et al., 2019). Given that prior research shows differentiation between younger and older adults in ToM as a function of executive-function demands (Bailey & Henry, 2008;Bottiroli et al., 2016;German & Hehman, 2006), it is important to better understand how conflict affects ToM processing more broadly and in aging. We therefore assessed whether there is a psychologically relevant age decline in managing competing self-other perspectives or whether older adults are disproportionately affected by methodological confounds, such as the curse of knowledge and the need to manage competing cued locations. ...
... We predicted that conflicting perspectives would be effortful (Apperly et al., 2008(Apperly et al., , 2011, particularly for older adults (Bottiroli et al., 2016;German & Hehman, 2006), and that managing incongruent self-other perspectives would be more effortful than competing cued locations (Hartwright et al., 2015;Samson et al., 2005Samson et al., , 2015. Our data partially support these predictions, but the findings were more nuanced than expected. ...
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Age-related decline in theory of mind (ToM) may be due to waning executive control, which is necessary for resolving conflict when reasoning about other individuals’ mental states. We assessed how older ( n = 50) and younger ( n = 50) adults were affected by three theoretically relevant sources of conflict within ToM: competing self-other perspectives, competing cued locations, and outcome knowledge. We examined which best accounted for age-related difficulty with ToM. Our data show unexpected similarity between age groups when people are representing a belief incongruent with their own. Individual differences in attention and response speed best explained the degree of conflict experienced through incompatible self-other perspectives. However, older adults were disproportionately affected by managing conflict between cued locations. Age and spatial working memory were most relevant for predicting the magnitude of conflict elicited by conflicting cued locations. We suggest that previous studies may have underestimated older adults’ ToM proficiency by including unnecessary conflict in ToM tasks.
... The finding that older adults showed clear, or even enhanced compared to the younger age groups, affective empathy responses across behavioural and neural measures is in line with research showing relatively spared affective ToM in older age (Pardini and Nichelli 2009, Castelli et al. 2010, Henry et al. 2013, Mahy et al. 2014, Bottiroli et al. 2016). There are a number of potential explanations for these results. ...
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Empathy is a critical component of social interaction that enables individuals to understand and share the emotions of others. We report a pre-registered experiment in which 240 participants, including adolescents, young adults and older adults, viewed images depicting hands and feet in physically or socially painful situations (vs. non-painful). Empathy was measured using imagined pain ratings and EEG mu suppression. Imagined pain was greater for physical vs. social pain, with young adults showing particular sensitivity to social pain events compared to adolescents and older adults. Mu desynchronisation was greater to pain vs. no-pain situations, but the physical/social context did not modulate pain responses. Brain responses to painful situations increased linearly from adolescence to young and older adulthood. These findings highlight shared activity across the core empathy network for both physical and social pain contexts, and an empathic response that develops over the lifespan with accumulating social experience.
... Child versions of the test show longitudinal bidirectional relationships with peer acceptance and popularity (Banerjee & Watling, 2005;Banerjee et al., 2011), showing the real-life validity of the measure. The FPT is particularly sensitive at detecting age-related ToM distinctions, revealing ToM differences across children (Tenenbaum & Leonard, 2020), adolescents (Banerjee et al., 2011), adults (Pearson & Pillow, 2016), and the elderly (Bottiroli et al., 2016). Its sensitivity across age groups may be because, unlike simpler false belief tasks, each FPT story asks participants to consider ToM as it operates across a variety of settings and social relationships. ...
... Importantly, a partial dissociation between first-and second-order affective and cognitive ToM has been observed in healthy aging [17,19] and neurological and neuropsychiatric conditions including localized brain lesions [20], schizophrenia [21], multiple sclerosis [22][23][24], Parkinson's disease [25][26][27], Alzheimer's disease [28], and Mild Cognitive Impairment [27,29]. Especially, greater impairment in affective compared to cognitive ToM has been reported in multiple sclerosis [30], while second-order ToM tasks seem to be first affected in age-related pathological processes [31][32][33][34]. ...
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Background: The evaluation of Theory of Mind (ToM) in the clinical setting remains limited due to the lack of valid instruments for a quick and reliable assessment. In this study, the psychometric properties of the Yoni-36 task were tested, and correction grids, equivalence scores, and normative data were computed. Methods: In total, 318 healthy subjects (169 females; mean age = 42.22 ± 18.11 years; mean education = 15.01 ± 3.43 years) were enrolled and administered the Yoni-36 task. Results: Statistical analysis showed good-to-high internal consistency, split-half reliability, and discrimination ability (especially for the second-order items) of the Yoni-36 task. Regression models highlighted the predictive role of age and education on second-order, affective, cognitive accuracy, and response time scores. Education influenced the first-order ToM response time score as well. Based on β values of the regressions, raw scores of the Yoni task were adjusted for sex, age, and education, and correction grids were computed. The equivalent scores indicated an accuracy index score < 0.69 and a response time index score < 0.83 as cut-off points for ToM competence. Normative data reported a mean accuracy and response time index score of 0.90 ± 0.11 and 0.91 ± 0.05 in the Italian population, respectively. Conclusions: The Yoni-36 proved to be a valid instrument for a quick and reliable ToM assessment, suitable to be included in neuropsychological batteries and to be used in routine clinical practice.
... A decline of ToM skills during aging has been reported (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Charlton et al., 2009;Ruitenberg et al., 2020). A relationship between ToM skills and the ability to appropriately use language in context, which is pragmatic ability (Levinson, 1983), is well established in the literature (Nilsen et al., 2011;Sperber & Wilson, 2002;Tirassa & Bosco, 2008). ...
... www.nature.com/scientificreports/ by two main aspects: cognitive and affective 23,24 . Cognitive ToM is the ability to make inferences on others' thoughts and beliefs, whereas affective ToM is the individual's ability to make inferences on emotions and feelings. ...
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Theory of Mind (ToM) is the ability to infer one's own and others' mental states. Growing research indicates that ToM is impaired in Chronic Migraine with Medication Overuse (CM + MO). However, the research in this field has been conducted using static scenario-based tasks, often failing to test mentalization in everyday situations and measuring only performance accuracy. We filled this gap by administering the Movie for the Assessment of Social Cognition (MASC) to subjects with CM + MO compared to episodic migraine (EM). This test allows us to assess both affective and cognitive ToM and which, in addition to being accurate, also analyzes the type of error in attribution of mental states, distinguishing between hypo-mentalization and hyper-mentalization. Thirty patients suffering from CM + MO and 42 from EM were enrolled. Results showed that CM + MO patients were less accurate in mental state attribution than EM. In addition, compared to EM, CM + MO individuals were more impaired in the affective ToM dimensions and committed more errors of hypo-mentalization. In conclusion, the application of MASC in patients with CM + MO allowed for the detection of an alteration in their ability to correctly draw conclusions about other people's mental states. This latter contributes critically to appropriate social reactions and also, possibly, to satisfactory social interactions.
... In so doing, it involves key executive functions (EF) like shifting, updating, and inhibition [44][45][46][47][48][49], also required for word production in VF tasks [50]. In line with this, decline of cognitive ToM and further EF-related capacities was identified as a coupled lifespan effect of physiological aging [51], and across the participants of the current study, ToM and VF performances also correlated with each other. In contrast to FPRT performance, the RMET results did not significantly differ between the groups. ...
Article
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Introduction. Cervical dystonia (CD) is viewed as a circumscribed movement disorder. However, beyond motor symptoms, it can imply subtle cognitive change, among others with respect to theory of mind (ToM) capacities. Here, affective and cognitive ToM performances and potential relations to other mental functions were investigated to refine the concept of social cognitive dysfunction in CD. Methods. 20 persons with CD were clinically assessed, together with 20 healthy controls engaged in overview cognitive testing, executive function (EF) tasks, and the Faux Pas Recognition Test (FPRT) as well as the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Tests (RMET) addressing cognitive and affective ToM functions, respectively. Results. Persons with CD showed lower cognitive, but not affective ToM performance than controls. Further, they had abnormally low word production in verbal fluency (VF) tasks, imposing high EF demands. Generally, ToM performance correlated with VF and, further, with the decreased quality of life score in persons with CD. Conclusion. Cognitive ToM deficits seem to occur in the context of executive dysfunction in CD. They belong to an underrecognized spectrum of nonmotor symptoms of likely clinical relevance.
... In line with this, associations between EF and cognitive rather than affective ToM performance have been reported, particularly in the context of the age-related decline of mental functions [39][40][41][42]. ...
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Background and purpose Although chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy (CIDP) is understood as a disease affecting the peripheral nervous system, mild cognitive dysfunction, particularly in the executive domain, has been described to form part of the condition. Here our interest lay in CIDP‐related theory of mind (ToM) capacities as an aspect of social cognition relevant for many aspects of everyday life. Methods Twenty‐nine patients with CIDP and 23 healthy controls participated in this study. They were subjected to overview cognitive testing, different executive function (EF) tasks, as well as to the Faux Pas Recognition Task (FPRT) for assessing cognitive ToM and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET) with respect to affective ToM. Results Persons with CIDP and controls did not differ with respect to their overall cognitive state. However, in the German verbal fluency standard, the digit span forward and the digit span backward tests used as EF tasks patients performed significantly worse than controls. Further, performance was abnormally low in the FPRT, whilst the groups did not differ with respect to RMET results. The FPRT and digit span backward results correlated with each other. Conclusions Patients with CIDP showed deficits in cognitive ToM performance together with EF dysfunction, whilst affective ToM was preserved. Altogether, the results suggest that low cognitive ToM capacities in patients with CIDP arise as a particular aspect of disease‐related executive dysfunction.
... This work has demonstrated that social development continues through adolescence and well into our twenties (e.g., Blakemore, 2008;Dumontheil et al., 2010), that even healthy adults can experience difficulties considering another person's point of view when that view conflicts with their own (e.g., Apperly et al., 2008;Birch & Bloom, 2007;Keysar et al., 2000), and that specific impairments in these abilities emerge with increasing age (e.g., Bailey & Henry, 2008;German & Hehman, 2006;Phillips et al., 2011). However, there is uncertainty regarding the task or domain-specificity of age-related social impairments, with affective ToM appearing to be relatively spared in older adults (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Castelli et al., 2010;Henry et al., 2013;Mahy et al., 2014;Pardini & Nichelli, 2009), and subjective experience of ToM showing no effects of age (which suggests an age-related impairment in metacognition; Duval et al., 2011). It is therefore likely that early studies have overlooked key stages in the development of social interaction skills that extend beyond the childhood years. ...
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Taking another person's perspective provides a means to infer their beliefs and intentions (known as Theory of Mind), which is an essential part of social interaction. In this article, we examined how different subcomponents of perspective-taking change beyond childhood in a large sample (N = 263) of adolescents, young adults, and older adults, and tested the degree to which age-related changes in perspective-taking are mediated by executive functions. Participants completed three tasks that assessed: (a) the likelihood of making social inferences, (b) judgments about an avatar's visual and spatial perspective, and (c) their ability to use an avatar's visual perspective to assign reference in language. Results revealed that while the likelihood of correctly inferring others' mental states increased linearly between adolescence and older adulthood (likely reflecting accumulating social experience over the lifespan), the ability to judge an avatar's perspective and use this to assign reference was subject to developmental changes from adolescence to older age, with performance peaking in young adulthood. Correlation and mediation analyses incorporated three measures of executive functioning (inhibitory control, working memory, and cognitive flexibility) and revealed that executive functions contribute to perspective-taking ability in these tasks (particularly during development), but largely do not mediate the effect of age on perspective-taking. We discuss how these results fit with models of mentalizing that predict distinct patterns of social development depending on the maturation of cognitive and language mechanisms. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved).
... The RMET, in which participants inferred emotional states, predominantly assessed affective ToM and was not related to age in a few studies (Li et al., 2013;Ziaei et al., 2021). The disassociation between the cognitive and affective aspects of ToM in past studies offers an explanation for the mixed results of the relationship between ToM and age: aging might affect cognitive ToM ability, but the affective ToM may be preserved (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Li et al., 2013;Wang & Su, 2013). In addition, the association between cognitive empathy and emotional processing was only observed in males but not in female participants. ...
Article
The ability to recognize others' emotions is vital to everyday life. The goal of this study was to assess which emotions show age-related decline in recognition accuracy of facial emotional expressions across the entire adult lifespan and how this process is related to cognitive empathy (Theory of Mind [ToM]), alexithymia traits, and amygdala subnuclei volumes in a large cohort of healthy individuals. We recruited 140 healthy participants 18-85 years old. Facial affect processing was assessed with the Penn Emotion Recognition task (ER40) that contains images of the five basic emotions: Neutral, Happy, Sad, Angry, and Fearful. Structural magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) datasets were acquired on a 4.7T MRI system. Structural equation modeling was used to test the relationship between studied variables. We found that while both sexes demonstrated age-related reduction in recognition of happy emotions and preserved recognition of sadness, male participants showed age-related reduction in recognition of fear, while in female participants, age-related decline was linked to recognition of neutral and angry facial expressions. In both sexes, accurate recognition of sadness negatively correlated with alexithymia traits. On the other hand, better ToM capabilities in male participants were associated with improvement in recognition of positive and neutral emotions. Finally, none of the observed age-related reductions in emotional recognition were related to amygdala and its subnuclei volumes. In contrast, both global volume of amygdala and its cortical and centromedial subnuclei had significant direct effects on recognition of sad images.
... , self-report scales (Khanjani et al., 2015;Sun et al., 2018;Ze et al., 2014), story tasks where participants are asked to attribute a mental state from contextual cues given in a written story (Bottiroli et al., 2016) or a video film story (Johansson Nolaker, Murray, Happé, & Charlton, 2018;Lecce, Ceccato, & Cavallini, 2019;Olderbak, Wilhelm, Hildebrandt, & Quoidbach, 2019;Sun et al., 2018), auditory vocal prosody measures where participants are asked to attribute a mental state based on auditory cues expressing emotion (Halberstadt, Ruffman, Murray, Taumoepeau, & Ryan, 2011;Lima, Alves, Scott, & Castro, 2014), and body language measures where participants are asked to attribute an emotional state from body cues expressing emotion (Halberstadt et al., 2011). This previous literature strongly suggests that the ability to attribute emotional mental states diminishes in late adulthood, and some studies show age-related declines beginning in middle adulthood (Demenescu et al., 2014;Johansson Nolaker et al., 2018;Olderbak et al., 2019;Pardini & Nichelli, 2009). ...
Article
Background Age-related declines in adult affective theory of mind (AToM) have been discovered. However, AToM measures have not accounted for emotional state complexity involved in AToM. Measures have also not accounted for different types of relationships – friends versus strangers – for which AToM is employed, which is important considering the limited social networks of aging adults. Objective We address these issues and examine the emotion complexity, social-relatedness, and contextual relevance in AToM across adult ages (18–89 years) using a new task and two well-established measures. Results The new task displayed good structural fit and internal construct validity. Overall, an age-related decline in AToM was found along with an interaction between age and emotion complexity. For all ages, AToM performance was best for complex emotions. However, as age increased, there was more rapid decline in AToM for more complex emotions than for less complex ones. Surprisingly, AToM performance for strangers was better than for social companions. Conclusion The findings suggest age-related AToM declines are more nuanced than previously understood given that adult age differences are related to emotional state complexity. They indicate that the emotion complexity levels of basic, complex, and self-conscious should be included in AToM assessments. Implications for AToM tasks and development are discussed.
... While the Triangles task evaluates the extent to which people spontaneously attribute mental states to geometric shapes based on their physical movements, the RMET assesses the ability to attribute the correct mental state to a corresponding image of the eye region. Existing studies in developmental (e.g., Bottiroli et al., 2016;Wellman et al., 2001), clinical (e.g., Shamay-Tsoory et al., 2007, 2010, lesional (e.g., Corradi-Dell'Acqua et al., 2020), and neuroimaging (Schlaffke et al., 2015) fields show that these two tasks are not significantly related to one another, supporting the view considering them as reflecting two (partially) independent components of the more general ToM skills. These two tasks differ on many dimensions, and some of these differences are crucial in predicting which should be associated with performance in the DRM task. ...
Article
Although long-term memory and Theory of Mind (ToM) are closely related across the whole lifespan, little is known about the relationship between ToM and semantic memory. Clinical studies have documented the co-occurrence of ToM impairments and semantic memory abnormalities in individuals with autism or semantic dementia. However, to date no study has directly investigated the existence of a relationship between ToM and semantic memory in the typical population. We addressed this gap on a sample of one hundred three healthy adults (M age = 22.96 years; age range = 19-35 years). Participants completed a classical false memory task tapping on semantic processes, the DRM task, and two ToM tasks, the Triangles and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes task. They also completed the vocabulary scale from the WAIS. Results showed that participants' semantic performance in the DRM task was significantly related with that in the Triangles task. Specifically, the higher participants' ToM, the higher participants' reliance on semantic memory while making false memories in the DRM task. Our findings are consistent with the Fuzzy Trace Theory and the Weak Central Coherence account and suggest that a (partially) common cognitive process responsible for global vs. detailed-focus information processing could underlie these two abilities.
... Other studies argued that there is a difference between different aspects of TOM in healthy ageing. Bottiroli et al. [82], for example, distinguished between cognitive TOM (concluding about other's thoughts and be-liefs) and affective TOM (concluding about other's feelings); they found that healthy older adults performed significantly lower than young adults in cognitive TOM, but with no difference in affective TOM. In the current study, we examined the performance of healthy older adults in various aspects of TOM. ...
Article
Introduction: Life expectancy has been increasing in recent decades. Therefore, it is important to understand the functional changes during healthy ageing. Most research has mainly focused on one linguistic domain at a time. The current study aimed at investigating whether changes in language performance in healthy ageing occur in some language domains more than in others. Methods: Twenty-three older healthy Hebrew-speaking adults, exhibiting no cognitive decline, were examined on tasks aimed at testing their performance in different language and cognitive domains: lexical retrieval, complementation information, syntax, Theory of Mind (a domain related to pragmatic aspects of language) and short-term memory. We compared their performance at both the group and the individual levels. Comparisons were made between the performance of the older adults and control data of young adults, and between the older adults' performance in the different linguistic domains. In addition, correlations between the older adults' phonological short-term memory abilities and their performance in various linguistic domains were examined. Results: A decline was found in several linguistic domains among the older adults, while in other domains no decline was found. However, no unequivocal decline in linguistic functioning was found due to relatively large variance in their performance. Conclusion: Not all linguistic domains are equally vulnerable in ageing, and not all older adults are equally affected. The research has both clinical and theoretical implications.
... Indeed, only one recent study (Yildirim et al., 2020) compared healthy individuals and individuals diagnosed with SCD and reported comparable performance between those groups. However, this study did not differentiate between cognitive and affective components of the task that was used, which would have been of interest to investigate potential early decline of cognitive ToM (Fault-Pax Task, (Bottiroli et al., 2016)). With regard to MCI, insufficient data precluded investigating different diagnostic subgroups, but ToM was impaired in 7 of 9 studies including patients diagnosed with (a)MCI. ...
Article
Background Trajectories of decline across different socio-cognitive domains in healthy older adults and in pathological aging conditions have not been investigated. This was addressed in the present systematic review and meta-analysis. Methods MEDLINE, Web of Science Core Collection, CENTRAL, and PsycInfo were searched for studies investigating social cognition across four domains (Theory of Mind, ToM; emotion recognition, ER; Social-decision making, SD; visual perspective taking, VPT) in healthy older individuals, individuals with subjective and mild cognitive impairment (SCD, MCI) and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). Random-effects meta-analyses were conducted. Results Of 8,137 screened studies, 132 studies were included in the review. ToM and ER showed a clear progression of impairment from normal aging to AD. Differential patterns of decline were identified for different types of ToM and ER. Conclusion This systematic review identified progression of impairment of specific socio-cognitive abilities, which is the necessary pre-requisite for developing targeted interventions. We identified a lack of research on socio-cognitive decline in different populations (e.g., middle age, SCD and MCI-subtypes) and domains (SDM, VPT). Registration CRD42020191607, https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/
... Affective ToM is essential for inferring, responding to, or caring about how the other person feels (59,60). This socioaffective ability is known to predict an individual's level of social functioning and quality of life independent of neurocognitive function (61)(62)(63). This study aimed to explore the neural correlates of affective ToM in medication-free individuals engaged in NSSI and determine its relationship with the clinical features of NSSI. ...
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Emerging evidence indicates that emotion processing deficits are associated with nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI). However, limited attention has been paid to the socio-affective functions of NSSI. In this study, we aimed to investigate the affective theory of mind (ToM) in medication-free individuals engaging in NSSI at both behavioral and neural levels. Twenty-eight individuals (mean age = 22.96 years) who engaged in NSSI and 38 age-, sex-, and IQ-matched controls (mean age = 22.79 years) underwent functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing the “Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test” (RMET). All participants also completed the Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale (DERS), Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20), and Beck Scale for Suicide Ideation (BSI). Although we did not find significant group differences in the RMET performance, the NSSI group, relative to the controls, exhibited significantly greater left medial superior frontal lobe activation and decreased right angular gyrus activation than did the control group. Reduced right angular gyrus activity was related to higher DERS and TAS scores across all participants. Our findings provide new evidence for aberrant neural processing of affective ToM in self-injurers. Future studies in developing intervention protocols for NSSI should focus on the multifaceted phases of socio-affective processing.
... Two hundred and thirty-eight healthy individuals participated in this study. They were grouped according to adulthood stage [28,37,38] into five age bands: the group of young adults consisted of 50 participants aged from 18 to 40 years old; the group of youngest-middle adults consisted of 50 participants aged from 41 to 50 years old; the group of middle adults consisted of 50 participants aged from 51 to 60 years old; the group of youngest-old adults consisted of 50 participants aged from 61 to 70 years old; and the group of middle-old adults consisted of 38 participants aged from 71 to 80 years old. Each age group was composed of 50 participants including 25 females and 25 males, but the middleold adult group was composed of 18 females and 20 males. ...
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Background: Theory of mind (ToM) is a fundamental aspect of social cognition. Previous studies on age-related changes in mentalizing processes have provided conflicting results. This study aims to investigate the age-related changes in the cognitive and affective components of ToM throughout adulthood. Methods: Two hundred and thirty-eight healthy participants divided into five age groups (18-40 years old; 41-50 years old; 51-60 years old; 61-70 years; 71-80 years old) underwent tasks assessing the cognitive (ToM Picture Sequencing Task, TMPS, and the Advanced Test of ToM, ATT) and affective (Reading the Mind in the Eyes Task, RMET, and the Emotion Attribution Task, EAT) components of ToM, in both verbal and nonverbal modality. Results: Regarding affective ToM, both the youngest- and middle-old adult groups (61 to 80 years) performed worse than the young and youngest-middle adult groups (18 to 50 years) in the RMET, but no significant differences were found in the EAT. Regarding cognitive ToM, the middle-old adult group (71 to 80 years) performed worse than the young adult group (18 to 40 years) only in the TMPS, but no significant differences were found in the ATT. Conclusion: Rather than a general decline in ToM, our results provide evidence regarding selective changes in ToM in older adults, further confirming the dissociation of cognitive and affective ToM.
... First, emotion recognition is classically described as being lower in older adults, especially when participants are asked to identify negative emotions (e.g., Ruffman et al., 2008;Birmingham et al., 2018;Visser, 2020). Considering ToM, although findings are equivocal (e.g., Happé et al., 1998;MacPherson et al., 2002;Wang and Su, 2013), most of the previous studies showed that increasing age results in decreased performance on ToM tasks, especially when assessing cognitive ToM (Duval et al., 2011;Henry et al., 2013;Bottiroli et al., 2016;Laillier et al., 2019). Thus, older adults show reduced levels of cognitive empathy (see Beadle and de la Vega, 2019 for a recent review). ...
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Although previous studies have suggested that some component processes of social cognition decline in normal aging, several methodological limitations can be pointed out. Traditional sociocognitive tasks assess processes separately and lack ecological validity. In the present study, the main aim was to propose an integrative social cognition assessment in normal aging using an original computer-based task developed in non-immersive virtual reality. Forty-five young adults (YA) and 50 older adults (OA) were asked to navigate in a simulated city environment and to judge several situations that they encountered. These situations investigated social norms by displaying control or (conventional/moral) transgressions. Following each situation, the participants were asked several questions in order to assess their ability to make moral judgments, affective and cognitive theory of mind, emotional reactivity and empathy, and the propensity to act in a socially appropriate or inappropriate way. The main results showed (i) a preserved ability to detect moral and conventional transgressions with advancing age; (ii) participants’ preserved cognitive ToM abilities; (iii) an age-related decline in affective ToM, that disappeared when the victim was a senior; (iv) preserved emotional reactivity and emotional empathy in normal aging; (v) an increase in inappropriate behavioral intentions in normal aging. Offering more naturalistic conditions, this new task is an interesting integrative measure of sociocognitive functioning to better reflect social behavior in daily living.
... Another hypothesis is that the role of the cerebellum in the cognitive ToM task is in controlling the sensorimotor aspects of ToM. Indeed, it was reported that Cognitive but not affective ToM deficit was also related to working memory performance 64 . Our group has shown that the role of the cerebellum in executive function is supportive since it appears to primarily compute the motor component of working memory 47 . ...
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Theory of Mind (ToM) is a social-cognitive skill that allows the understanding of the intentions, beliefs, and desires of others. There is a distinction between affective and cognitive ToM, with evidence showing that these processes rely on partially distinct neural networks. The role of the cerebellum in social cognition has only been rarely explored. In this study, we tested whether the cerebellum is necessary for cognitive and affective ToM performance. We investigated adults with traumatic brain injury (n = 193) and healthy controls (n = 52) using voxel-based lesion-symptom mapping (VLSM) and by measuring the impact on functional connectivity. First, we observed that damage to the cerebellum affected pure Cognitive ToM processing. Further, we found a lateralization effect for the role of the cerebellum in cognitive ToM with participants with left cerebellar injury performing worse than those with right cerebellar injury. Both VLSM and standard statistical analysis provided evidence that left cerebellar Crus I and lobule VI contributed to ToM processing. Lastly, we found that disconnection of the left thalamic projection and the left fronto-striatal fasciculus was associated with poor cognitive ToM performance. Our study is the first to reveal direct causal neuropsychological evidence for a role of the cerebellum in some but not all types of ToM, processing. It reinforces the idea that social cognition relies on a complex network functionally connected through white matter pathways that include the cerebellum. It supports evidence that the neural networks underpinning the different types of ToM can be differentiated.
... Taken together, this suggests that although social tolerance can promote the maintenance of high levels of general social attention into old age (see also Almeling et al., 2016), age-related declines in more sophisticated responses may occur regardless of social system. That is, older monkeys struggle to flexibly integrate contextual information (such as the presence of a barrier) into their gaze-following response, similar to the decline observed in human theory of mind abilities (Bottiroli et al., 2016;Moran, 2013). An important goal for future research is to examine whether this pattern holds up for other social-cognitive abilities and to characterize the specific cognitive abilities that may decline versus be preserved across different social contexts. ...
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Complex social life is considered important to the evolution of cognition in primates. One key aspect of primate social interactions concerns the degree of competition that individuals face in their social group. To examine how social tolerance versus competition shapes social cognition, we experimentally assessed capacities for flexible gaze-following in more tolerant Barbary macaques (Macaca sylvanus) and compared to previous data from despotic rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta). Monkeys experienced one of two possible conditions. In the barrier condition, they observed an actor look upwards into an overheard barrier, so they could not directly see the target of the actor's gaze without reorienting. In the no barrier condition, they observed an actor look upwards without a barrier blocking her line-of-sight, so they could observe the target of the actor's gaze by also looking upwards. Both species (N = 58 Barbary macaques, 64 rhesus macaques) could flexibly modulate their gaze responses to account for the demonstrator's line of sight, looking up more often when no barrier was present, and this flexible modulation declined with age in both species. However, neither species preferentially approached to look inside the barrier when their view of the target location was obscured, although rhesus macaques approached more overall. This pattern suggests that both tolerant and despotic macaques exhibit similar capacities to track other's line of sight and do not preferentially reorient their bodies to observe what an actor looks at in this situation. This contrasts with other work indicating that competitive primates are especially adept at some aspects of theory of mind. Thus, it is important to understand both the similarities and differences in the social-cognitive abilities of primates with different social styles. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved).
... Theory of Mind is the ability to explain other people's behaviors based on their minds naturally and understand that belief will determine their behaviors when there is a conflict between belief and reality [29]. In a study on ToM, researchers believe that emotional ToM is less susceptible to neurodegeneration or brain damage than cognitive ToM [29,30,31]. Therefore, ToM appearing in older individuals with schizotypal-schizoid personality disorder (SSPD, which is a special type of ScPD) defects may suffer greater impairment in cognitive tasks rather than emotion recognition. ...
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... In ToM, evidence on protective age-related effects has been observed using a composite score of several ToM measures, but only when assessing age categorically (i.e., younger vs. older than 50 years; Zivrali Yarar et al., 2020). As no general effect of age was observed in the current study, and age effects are still debated in ToM also in non-autistic adults (Bottiroli, 2016;Charlton, Barrick, Markus, & Morris, 2009;Happé & Winner, 1998;Moran, 2013), longitudinal research seems a vital next step to further investigate the aging patterns on this domain. ...
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Findings on age-related cognitive effects in autism in adulthood are inconsistent across studies. As these studies substantially differ in their methodology, replication studies are needed. In this replication study frequentist (i.e., null-hypothesis significance testing), and Bayesian statistics were used to investigate the hypothesis that in autistic adults compared to non-autistic adults mostly parallel, but also protective age-related cognitive effects can be observed. Participants were 88 autistic adults, and 88 non-autistic matched comparisons (age range: 30–89 years, mean age: 55 years). Cognitive measures were administered on the following six domains: verbal memory, visual memory, working memory, Theory of Mind (ToM), verbal fluency, and processing speed, and self-reported cognitive failures. Non-autistic adults outperformed autistic adults on ToM, verbal fluency, and verbal memory, but only the first two were confirmed with Bayesian replication analyses. Also, more cognitive failures were reported by autistic adults. No interactions between group and age were observed, suggesting a parallel age-related effect on all cognitive domains. In sum, previously observed difficulties in ToM and verbal fluency were replicated which seem to persist at older age. Previously reported parallel age-related cognitive patterns were replicated, yet no evidence for protective age-related patterns was found. Lay summary We investigated whether our previous findings on cognitive aging in autism could be confirmed in a new study measuring the cognitive effects of age in autistic and non-autistic adults. As expected, tasks that younger autistic adults had difficulties with (theory of mind, fluency) were also difficult for older autistic adults, and the effect of age itself was similar in autistic and non-autistic adults. Unexpectedly, we observed no protective effects (less cognitive aging) in autism.
... Cette capacité parait plus importante pour inférer un état mental émotionnel Bailey & Henry, 2008). Les fonctions exécutives en général semblent plus impliquées pour l'inférence d'états mentaux émotionnels que pour des états mentaux cognitifs (Bottiroli et al., 2016). La mémoire de travail, permettant de maintenir en mémoire la perspective d'autrui et de manipuler les informations nécessaires à l'élaboration d'inférences, est une autre capacité exécutive indispensable corrélée aux performances de TDE affective (Bora et al., 2006;Eddy & Hansen, 2020). ...
Thesis
La cognition sociale regroupe plusieurs capacités, comme la reconnaissance des émotions faciales (REF), la Théorie de l’Esprit (TDE) et l’empathie. Celles-ci sont sévèrement altérées dans la variante comportementale de la Dégénérescence Fronto-Temporale (DFT-c) et plus légèrement dans la Maladie d’Alzheimer (MA) et la Maladie de Parkinson (MP), avec pour conséquences des troubles du comportement (TDC), désinhibition et apathie en particulier, qui conduisent à l’épuisement de l’aidant familial. Dans ces trois maladies une diminution des capacités top-down et une modification des capacités bottom-up de guidage de l’attention lors de la recherche d’informations visuelles sont aussi observées. Or, la REF, la TDE et l’empathie s’appuient sur la détection visuelle d’indices sociaux, sur le visage en particulier. Enfin, de nombreux chevauchements existent entre les structures, les faisceaux et les réseaux cérébraux impliqués dans la cognition sociale et dans l’exploration visuelle. A travers trois études expérimentales, cette thèse a pour premier objectif de mettre en évidence que l’atteinte de la cognition sociale dans la DFT-c, la MA et la MP, et les TDC qui en découlent, sont liés à une modification des stratégies d’exploration visuelle. L’objectif secondaire est de montrer qu’une remédiation des stratégies d’observation des visages exprimant une émotion chez les personnes atteintes de maladie neurodégénératives permet une amélioration de la REF, entraine une diminution des TDC et un allègement du fardeau de leurs aidants familiaux. Nos résultats confirment le triple lien entre stratégies de regard, cognition sociale et TDC. Les difficultés de REF sont associées à une perturbation des mécanismes d’orientation de l’attention sur les régions saillantes du visage liées à chaque émotion. Dans la DFT-c l’altération de ces mécanismes est sévère, le pattern d’exploration des visages exprimant une émotion étant similaire à celui d’un visage neutre. Pour la MA et la MP, cela concerne une perte d’attractivité de la région des yeux et une capture attentionnelle accrue de la région de la bouche. La TDE quant à elle est principalement impactée par une altération des stratégies top-down de recherche d’indices visuels permettant de prendre la perspective d’autrui et d’inférer ses états mentaux. Là aussi c’est dans la DFT-c que le pattern d’observation est le plus perturbé, avec une perte de stratégies d’observations et une insensibilité aux informations données qui conduisent à une prise de perspective d’autrui décalée dans le temps. Ces types d’observations de scènes sociales sont corrélés à la production de TDC. Enfin, la remédiation de la REF menée auprès d’un groupe MA montre que l’amélioration des performances est conjointe à une modification des stratégies d’observation des visages, avec une observation plus importante de la région des yeux, et entraîne une diminution des TDC et du fardeau de l’aidant. Nos résultats suggèrent donc une forte participation des mécanismes attentionnels dans le déficit de cognition sociale dans les maladies neurodégénératives. Par conséquent une prise en charge des TDC axée sur une remédiation des stratégies de recherche d’indices visuels sociaux semble être une piste intéressante afin de prévenir l’épuisement de l’aidant familial et de retarder l’institutionnalisation.
Article
There has been a recent surge of naturalistic methodology to assess complex topics in psychology and neuroscience. Such methods are lauded for their increased ecological validity, aiming to bridge a gap between highly controlled experimental design and purely observational studies. However, these measures present challenges in establishing construct validity. One domain in which this has emerged is research on theory of mind: the ability to infer others’ thoughts and emotions. Traditional measures utilize rigid methodology which suffer from ceiling effects and may fail to fully capture how individuals engage theory of mind in everyday interactions. In the present study, we validate and test a novel approach utilizing a naturalistic task to assess theory of mind. Participants watched a mockumentary-style show while using a joystick to provide continuous, real-time theory of mind judgments. A baseline sample’s ratings were used to establish a “ground truth” for the judgments. Ratings from separate young and older adult samples were compared against the ground truth to create similarity scores. This similarity score was compared against two independent tasks to assess construct validity: an explicit judgment performance-based paradigm, and a neuroimaging paradigm assessing response to a static measure of theory of mind. The similarity metric did not have ceiling effects and was significantly positively related to both the performance-based and neural measures. It also replicated age effects that other theory of mind measures demonstrate. Together, our multimodal approach provided convergent evidence that dynamic measures of behavior can yield robust and rigorous assessments of complex psychological processes.
Article
Objectives: Aging is associated with declines in theory of mind - the ability to infer the mental states of others. We examined whether priming theory of mind mindsets actively (Study 1) and passively (Study 2) improved older adults' performance. Method: Across two studies, participants completed a novel question-and-answer theory of mind task using the television show Nathan for You® in a mindset or no mindset condition. In Study 1, participants (N = 324, 18-84 years) completed a similar task related to a different show prior to the Nathan for You task (active mindset). In Study 2, young (N = 235; MAge = 20.47) and older (N = 193, MAge = 74.48) adults made continuous ratings of awkwardness of different episodes of Nathan for You before completing the question-and-answer task (passive mindset). We also measured executive function and episodic memory. In both studies, the same tasks were performed in reverse order for the control conditions (no mindset). Results: Mindsets were associated with small-to-medium increases in theory of mind performance. Cognitive ability did not explain these improvements. Conclusion: These findings suggest that theory of mind performance can be improved through motivation (e.g. mindsets); cognitive function (e.g. ability) does not moderate this relationship.
Article
Objectives: Financial exploitation of older adults results in devastating economic, social, and psychological losses to older adults, their families, and society at large. This study examined the relationship between reflective functioning and financial exploitation vulnerability (FEV) and whether relationship status moderated the association. Methods: A community-based sample of 156 Israeli older adults age 60 and over responded to demographic questions and questionnaires assessing reflective functioning and FEV. Results: A hierarchical linear regression analysis covarying for age, sex, education, income, and sum of illnesses, revealed that higher reflective functioning was associated with lower FEV (p = .011). A main effect of relationship status was not found, but a significant interaction of reflective functioning × relationship status was discovered (p = .008), adding 4.2% to the total variance of the model. Probing the interaction revealed that the reflective functioning-FEV association was significant only for older adults not in a relationship. Conclusions: Findings suggest that low reflective functioning may be associated with increased risk of financial exploitation, specifically in certain populations of older adults. Clinical implications: Care providers of older adults may consider assessing for, and identifying older adults with low reflective functioning, in order to prevent or intervene in the event of a potentially exploitative situation.
Thesis
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Social cognition refers to the range of skills and abilities that enable humans to detect and process information from one’s social environment, formulate a mental understanding of one’s social situation, and behave in socially appropriate ways. These include abilities such as theory of mind (ToM; also referred to as cognitive empathy), affective empathy, and social perception, as well as social behaviour. A growing body of research has sought to gain an understanding of how these phenomena manifest in the ageing process, as opposed to younger adults. The general aim of this thesis was to study the changes in social cognition with ageing, examine its relationship with other cognitive functions, and determine its association with genetic, neuroanatomical, and socioenvironmental factors. The first study explored the effect of polymorphisms of the oxytocin receptor gene on empathy using meta-analysis of existing studies including novel data from the Sydney Memory and Ageing Study (Sydney MAS). The second study developed a short-form version of the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test (RMET), an assessment for theory of mind, via machine learning algorithms using Sydney MAS data. The third study explored social cognitive performance in Sydney MAS participants with subjective cognitive decline, mild cognitive impairment, and dementia. The fourth study identified key neuroimaging regions associated with empathy using volumetric analysis. The fifth study comprehensively indexed social cognition in nondemented community-dwelling older adults, and identified which subdomains were related to the ageing process and to other factors. This thesis found that normal ageing saw mild changes in ToM and social perception, and executive function somewhat compensated for this performance. Neurocognitive disorders were associated with far-reaching changes in these subdomains and some changes in social behavior. Empathy was related to volumes of the insula, supramarginal gyrus, and frontal lobe small vessel disease, and was not related to genetic sensitivity to oxytocin. A short-form version of the RMET was also developed. These findings improve on the understanding of social cognitive abilities in older adults, and facilitate the adoption of social cognition measures in clinical settings involving older adults.
Chapter
Much has been discussed about the Theory of Mind (ToM) and language. Some authors suggest that activating one enlightens the other, while others view language merely as a tool for developing the most distinctly human ability known. When it comes to speech and communication disorders, tracing ToM can be challenging since patients lack the tools to demonstrate their cognitive performance. This chapter delves into the biological foundations of ToM (anatomical and neurochemical). It also explores the evolution of ToM and neuroplasticity along our lifespan so that the reader can understand that nothing is static, that our brain engages in an everlasting dynamic relationship to keep us healthy and safe. This understanding has significant implications in how we approach language pathologies and the cognitive decline they might hinder. Additionally, the chapter examines the pragmatic side of language, offering insights into the right hemisphere and its role in emotion and affective communication. It considers the production-perception loop in communication, acknowledging that language and cognition cannot always be solely measured from production or perception alone. Social, cultural, and pathological factors may intervene and disrupt this loop, prompting the need for careful consideration in ToM theories and methods, particularly in the context of language pathologies. All these considerations should not be considered as preliminary or complementary, but central in understanding the implications of language in ToM, what language must really entail, so that the best clinical assessment and intervention is possible for patients with language pathologies. Finally, the chapter blends all these analyses into offering a review of crucial aspects of ToM in patients with aphasia.
Article
Yaşlı yetişkinlerin aktif sosyal yaşamı sürdürmesine imkan veren mekanizmalar, ileri yaşlara kadar sağlığı ve iyi oluşu teşvik etmek için umut verici bir yol olarak görülmektedir. Zihin Kuramı (ZK) etkili ve uyumlu sosyal işleyişin devamı için en önemli sosyal bilişsel becerilerden biridir. Sağlıklı yaşlanmada ZK’deki değişiklikler aydınlatılırken araştırmaların patolojik yaşlanma ile ortaya çıkan değişiklikleri de değerlendirmesi ve ulaşılan sonuçların göz önünde bulundurulmasının gerekliliği üzerinde durulmaktadır. ZK araştırmaları, bozulmaların hastaların yaşam kalitesini kötüleştirdiği ve hastaların sosyal izolasyonunu artırabileceği için önemlidir. Yaşlı yetişkinlerde çoğu klinik durumun temel bir özelliğini temsil eden bozulmuş ZK çeşitli nörolojik ve psikiyatrik hastalıklarda tanımlanmış, en kapsamlı araştırmalar demans ve şizofreni için yapılmıştır. Bu derleme çalışmasında, diğerlerinin davranışlarını anlamlandırma ve sosyal olarak uygun eylemleri planlama becerisinde etkili süreçlerin rolüne aracılık eden mekanizmalar temelinde nörodejeneratif ve psikiyatrik hastalıklarla ilişkili bilişsel işlevleri içeren yaşlı yetişkinlerde derinleşen ZK araştırmaları ele alınmıştır. Konuyla ilgili mevcut durum hala netleşmediği için bu derleme sınırlılıkları keşfetme olanağı sunabilir ve gelecekteki araştırmalar için bir başlangıç noktası olabilir.
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Background Whilst traditionally considered a movement disorder, it is now generally accepted that cervical dystonia (CD) presents with additional non-motor symptoms which significantly impact quality of life. Our study primarily aimed to explore social cognition and levels of psychological distress in individuals with CD, in comparison to age- and sex-matched healthy controls. Methods 20 participants with CD attending a specialist movement disorders clinic were recruited. 20 age and sex matched neurologically healthy controls were recruited in parallel. Participants completed the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale, and two novel social cognition tasks: The Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery (CAFMB) and the Edinburgh Social Cognition Test (ESCoT). Results Participants with CD exhibited poorer complex emotion recognition abilities for visual and auditory stimuli, compared to controls on the CAFMB task. Participants with CD did not differ significantly from controls on performance on cognitive or affective Theory of Mind tasks, or interpersonal or intrapersonal understanding of social norms, as measured by the ESCoT. The proportion of depressive symptoms was significantly higher for participants with CD than controls. 40% of participants with CD reported clinically elevated depressive symptoms, and 60% reported clinically elevated anxiety. Poorer understanding of emotional facial expressions was associated with higher levels of depression in the CD group. Conclusions Significant between-group differences between participants with CD and controls suggests socio-cognitive dysfunction is an important aspect of the non-motor syndrome of CD. Findings highlight the need for assessment of and intervention for both social cognitive difficulties and psychological distress in individuals with CD.
Article
Zihin kuramı, diğer bireylerin duygularını ve zihinsel durumlarını anlama yetisini ifade eder ve sosyal etkileşimde bulunabilmek için gerekli olan temel bir sosyal bilişsel yetidir. Uluslararası alan yazınla paralel olarak ülkemizde zihin kuramının çocukluk döneminde ele alındığı oldukça çalışma olmasına rağmen, yetişkinlik ve yaşlılık dönemindeki bireylerde zihin kuramını ele alan sınırlı sayıda araştırma bulunmaktadır. Bu bağlamda bu derlemede öncelikle zihin kuramının tanımı ve türlerine değinilerek yetişkinlerde zihin kuramı ile ilgili yapılan ilk çalışmalardan bir tanesi olan Happé ve arkadaşları (1998) ile diğer araştırmacıların sıklıkla kullandıkları zihin kuramı görevleri ile ilgili bilgi verilmiştir. İzleyen bölümlerde ise genç ve yaşlı bireylerin zihin kuramı açısından karşılaştırıldığı güncel araştırma bulgularına yer verilmiştir. İncelenen araştırma bulgularının sonuçları, zihin kuramının afektif ve bilişsel olmak üzere iki bileşene ayrıldığını ve yetişkin bireylerin zihin kuramı performanslarını ölçmek amacıyla bu bileşenlere yönelik çeşitli test ve görevlerin kullanıldığını göstermektedir. Ayrıca pozitron emisyon tomografisi başta olmak üzere çeşitli nöro görüntüleme tekniklerinin kullanıldığı çalışmalar zihin kuramının sol medial frontal girus gibi beynin bazı spesifik bölgeleri ile ilişkili olduğunu ortaya koymuştur. Bununla birlikte, alan yazında zihin kuramı yetisinin değerlendirmek amacıyla en sık kullanılan test ve görevlerin hikâyeler, gözlerden zihin okuma testi, videolar, yanlış inanç ve gaf yapma testi olduğu görülmüştür. Ayrıca, zihin kuramını değerlendirmek amacıyla 9 Eylül Zihin Teorisi Ölçeği gibi ülkemizde geliştirilmiş zihin kuramı ölçeklerinin de olduğu görülmüştür. Son olarak, zihin kuramının türlerine göre değişmekle birlikte genç ve yaşlı bireylerin karşılaştırıldığı birçok çalışma yaşla birlikte zihin kuramındaki performansının genel olarak azaldığına işaret etmektedir.
Article
Objective Theory of mind – the ability to infer others’ mental states – declines over the lifespan, potentially due to cognitive decline. However, it is unclear whether deficits emerge because older adults use the same strategies as young adults, albeit less effectively, or use different or no strategies. The current study compared the similarity of older adults’ theory of mind errors to young adults’ and a random model. Methods 120 older adults (MAge = 74.68 years; 64 female) and 111 young adults (MAge = 19.1; 61 female) completed a novel theory of mind task (clips from an episode of the sitcom The Office®), and a standard measure of cognitive function (Logical Memory II). Monte Carlo resampling estimated the likelihood that older adults’ error patterns were more similar to young adults’ or a random distribution. Results Age deficits emerged on the theory of mind task. Poorer performance was associated with less similarity to young adults’ response patterns. Overall, older adults’ response patterns were ~2.7 million times more likely to match young adults’ than a random model. Critically, one-fourth of older adults’ errors were more similar to the random distribution. Poorer memory ability contributed to this relationship. Discussion Age deficits in theory of mind performance may be driven by a subset of older adults and be related to disparities in strategy use. A certain amount of cognitive ability may be necessary for older adults to engage similar strategies to young adults’ during theory of mind.
Article
Successful social interaction depends (among others) on one's ability to understand other people's emotional states (known as "affective-Theory-of-Mind"; aToM). A decline in this ability could be associated with changes in awareness with age. Awareness can be estimated by comparing one's subjective and objective abilities. Here we explored the sequence of changes in aToM with age, with reference to objective and subjective capacities. One hundred and eight participants were divided into three age groups: young (18-39), adults (60-69), and elders' group (70-86). Objective aToM performance was assessed using the Frith-Happé animation task (including meaningful and meaningless interactions). The subjective performance was evaluated by a Short Subjective ToM Questionnaire (sToM10). The results in the animation task showed reduction in the ability to correctly categorize meaningless interaction among the adult participants (compared to young) and a further decrease in the ability to correctly categorize meaningful interactions among the elderly participants (compared to young participants). Subjective aToM results revealed that while older participants reported a reduction in general ability to infer feelings in others, they could not report a decrease in their ability to recognize specific feelings. Our results may indicate a unique characteristic of aToM decline, which may start in adults (60-69; only reflected when the social demands are high) and further aggravates as people grow older (70th and above). In addition, results of the self-report questionnaire may indicate that while the elders are fully aware of their general decline in aToM ability, awareness of their capability to identify specific emotions is impaired.
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Socioeconomic status (SES) negatively impacts cognitive and executive functioning in older adults, yet its effects on socioemotional abilities have not been studied in this population. Also, evidence on neurocognitive processes associated with ageing primarily comes from Western, educated, industrialized, rich, and democratic (WEIRD) populations, hindering the generalization of findings to persons from upper-middle- and low‐middle‐income countries, such as those of Latin America. Here, we compared the performance of low- and high-SES older adults from Argentina in cognitive state, executive functions, social cognition (emotion recognition and theory of mind), and counter-empathic social emotions (envy and Schadenfreude; displeasure at others’ fortune and pleasure at others’ misfortune, respectively). Subsequently, we developed a path analysis to test the relationship among those variables in a theoretically plausible model and tested the main paths via multiple regression analyses. Relative to the high-SES group, low-SES older adults showed poorer performance on all assessed domains. Convergent evidence from covariance analysis, path analysis, and linear regressions suggested that low-SES impact on socioemotional processes was not primary but mediated by cognitive and executive impairment. These findings offer the first characterization of SES impacts on cognitive and socioemotional processes in a non-WEIRD population and have relevant equity-related implications for brain health.
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In this article, we attempt to distinguish between the properties of moderator and mediator variables at a number of levels. First, we seek to make theorists and researchers aware of the importance of not using the terms moderator and mediator interchangeably by carefully elaborating, both conceptually and strategically, the many ways in which moderators and mediators differ. We then go beyond this largely pedagogical function and delineate the conceptual and strategic implications of making use of such distinctions with regard to a wide range of phenomena, including control and stress, attitudes, and personality traits. We also provide a specific compendium of analytic procedures appropriate for making the most effective use of the moderator and mediator distinction, both separately and in terms of a broader causal system that includes both moderators and mediators. (46 ref) (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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ABSTRACT Links between young children's everyday use of mindful conversational skills and their success on laboratory tests of theory of mind understanding (ToM) were evaluated. Using published scales, teachers rated the conversational behavior and shyness of 129 children aged 60 to 101 months (M = 78·8 months) who were in their first years of primary school. The children also took batteries of first- and second-order false-belief tests along with tests of emotion understanding and general language ability. Correlational and regression analyses showed that performance on false-belief tests of ToM significantly predicted children's competence at reading others' minds in their everyday conversational interactions. Furthermore, these links transcended individual differences in language ability, shy personality, emotion understanding, and age. These findings augment and extend a growing body of evidence linking performance on laboratory ToM tests to socially competent real-world behavior.
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This paper reports the results of two studies which investigated whether aging is associated with a differential deficit in executive function, compared with deficits in general cognitive ability (Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale-Revised performance). Further, the studies investigated the specificity of the executive decline hypothesis of memory and aging by examining whether declines in executive function mediate age-related memory decline over and above the variance in memory accounted for by general cognitive ability. The results of Study 1 showed no consistent evidence of a differential decline in executive function among a sample of participants aged between 18 and 75 years. The results of Study 2 indicated a differential decline in one indicator of executive function, the Modified Card Sorting Test, among an older sample aged between 60 and 89 years. Both studies demonstrated that measures of executive function accounted for age-related variance in free recall, recognition, and serial recall, even after controlling for general cognitive ability. However, in Study 1, once variance attributed to speed of processing was taken into account, executive function did not contribute further to the age-related variance.
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Theory of mind (ToM) refers to humans' ability to recognize the existence of mental states, such as beliefs, emotions, and desires. The literature on ToM in aging and on the relationship between ToM and other cognitive functions, like executive functions, is not homogenous. The aim of the present study was to explore the course of ToM and to investigate the role of working memory, inhibition, and language on the possible age differences in ToM. To address these issues, we examined ToM using the Strange Stories task and executive function task in three age groups. Results showed that young adults outperform both old groups on the ToM stories. This difference remains significant also when controlling for working memory and inhibitory control. Our findings suggest a specific impairment in inferring mental states starting from 60 years of age that seems to be independent of changes in executive functions.
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Lying is common among adults and a more complex issue in children. In this article, I review two decades of empirical evidence about lying in children from the perspective of speech act theory. Children begin to tell lies in the preschool years for anti- and prosocial purposes, and their tendency to lie changes as a function of age and the type of lies being told. In addition, children's ability to tell convincing lies improves with age. In the article, I highlight the central roles that children's understanding of mental states and social conventions play in the development of lying. I also identify areas for research to be done to develop a more comprehensive picture of the typical and atypical developmental courses of verbal deception in children.
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ABSTRACT The primary aim of this study was to examine the impact of an inhibition manipulation on the effect of age on theory of mind (ToM) in an ecologically valid, affective ToM task. Participants were 30 young and 30 old adults. The Cambridge Mindreading Face-Voice Battery was used to measure ToM; in addition, measures of fluid and crystallized intelligence were taken. Participants were subjected to three levels of inhibitory demand during ToM reasoning: emotional inhibition, non-emotional inhibition, and no inhibition. Old adults performed worse than young adults. The emotional and non-emotional inhibition conditions resulted in worse ToM performance compared to the no inhibition condition. There were no differences in the impact of the inhibition conditions on old and young adults. Regression analyses suggested that old adults' crystallized intelligence was a significant predictor of ToM performance, whereas it did not predict young adults' ToM performance. Results are discussed in terms of verbal ability as a possible compensatory mechanism in coping with verbal inhibitory load in ToM reasoning.
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Objectives: Social intelligence is the ability to understand others and the social context effectively and thus to interact with people successfully. Research has suggested that the theory of mind (ToM) and executive function may play important roles in explaining social intelligence. The specific aim of the present study was to test with structural equation modeling (SEM) the hypothesis that performance on ToM tasks is more associated with social intelligence in the elderly than is performance on executive functions. Methods: One hundred and seventy-seven participants (age 56-96) completed ToM, executive function, and other basic cognition tasks, and were rated with social intelligence scales. Results: The SEM results showed that ToM and executive function were strongly correlated (0.54); however, only the path coefficient from ToM to social intelligence, and not from executive function, was significant (0.37). Conclusions: ToM performance, but not executive function, was strongly correlated with social intelligence among elderly individuals. ToM and executive function might play different roles in social behavior during normal aging; however, based on the present results, it is possible that ToM might play an important role in social intelligence.
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Previous studies that focused on age-related changes in the performance of theory of mind (ToM) in older adults have provided conflicting results. ToM consists of cognitive and affective mentalizing processes. Mixed calculation of different aspects of ToM may have contributed to the conflicting results and fails to detect the specific age effects on ToM. The current study investigated the age-related changes on stories tasks that specifically assess cognitive versus affective ToM in 42 young-old adults and 32 old-old adults, compared to 32 young adults. A factor analysis revealed that the ToM stories tasks could be classified into three components. Both of the two older adult groups performed worse than young adult group on cognitive ToM stories tasks (p < .001). However, older adults performed nearly the same as young adults on affective ToM stories tasks (p > .05). Moreover, performance on executive inhibition, measured by the Hayling test, was only correlated with cognitive ToM tasks (β = -0.318, R2 = 0.101), but not with affective ToM tasks. The results reveal a greater age effect on cognitive compared to affective ToM. Rather than a general decline of ToM, older adults show selective compromised performance on cognitive ToM tasks, while relatively intact performance on affective ToM stories tasks. The dissociable correlation between cognitive versus affective ToM with inhibitive control further confirms the dissociation of cognitive and affective ToM. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).
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Age-related difficulties in understanding basic emotional signals are now well established, but less clear is how aging affects theory of mind (ToM), which refers to the understanding of more complex emotions and mental states. A meta-analysis of 23 datasets involving 1462 (790 younger and 672 older) participants was conducted in which six basic types of ToM task were identified (Stories, Eyes, Videos, False belief-video, False belief-other, and Faux pas). Each ToM task was also categorized according to domain (affective, cognitive, or mixed) and modality (verbal, visual-static, visual-dynamic, verbal and visual-static, or verbal and visual-dynamic). Overall, collapsed across all types of task, older adults were found to perform more poorly than younger adults, with the degree of ToM difficulty they experienced moderate in magnitude (r = −.41). The results also provide evidence for increased ToM difficulties in late adulthood regardless of specific task parameters, with deficits evident across all task types, domains, and modalities. With few exceptions, age deficits for ToM tasks were larger in magnitude compared with matched control tasks. These data have implications for our understanding of mental state attribution processes in late adulthood, suggesting that ToM difficulties are not simply secondary to non-ToM related task demands.
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Children with conduct disorder show problems in social interaction. In individuals with autism, social impairments have recently attracted a great deal of research, with the suggestion that children with autism lack a "theory of mind." This hypothesis has been successful in explaining many of the social difficulties these individuals manifest, both in laboratory tests and in everyday life. The present study investigated whether the social impairments in conduct disorder might have a similar root. Standard false belief tasks and the Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales (VABS), with additional items specially designed to assess understanding of other minds in everyday life, were used with 8 normally developing children (aged 7–9 yrs) and 18 children with conduct disorder (aged 6–12 yrs). The VABS documented extensive and widespread social impairment in this clinical group. There was also evidence of impairment in social insight, not dissimilar to that found in able individuals with autism. Children with conduct disorder were markedly different from children with autism, however, in terms of type of maladaptive activity. They showed more antisocial behavior and very little bizarre (e.g. stereotyped, self-stimulatory) behavior. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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Executive function (EF) accounts have now been offered for several disorders with childhood onset (e.g., attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder, autism, early-treated phenylketonuria), and EF has been linked to the development of numerous abilities (e.g., attention, rule use, theory of mind). However, efforts to explain behavior in terms of EF have been hampered by an inadequate characterization of EF itself. What is the function that is accomplished by EF? The present analysis attempts to ground the construct of EF in an account of problem solving and thereby to integrate temporally and functionally distinct aspects of EF within a coherent framework. According to this problem-solving framework, EF is a macroconstruct that spans 4 phases of problem solving (representation, planning, execution, and evaluation). When analyzed into subfunctions, macroconstructs such as EF permit the integration of findings from disparate content domains, which are often studied in isolation from the broader context of reasoning and action. A review of the literature on the early development of EF reveals converging evidence for domain-general changes in all aspects of EF. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved)
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An individual has a theory of mind if he imputes mental states to himself and others. A system of inferences of this kind is properly viewed as a theory because such states are not directly observable, and the system can be used to make predictions about the behavior of others. As to the mental states the chimpanzee may infer, consider those inferred by our own species, for example, purpose or intention, as well as knowledge, belief, thinking, doubt, guessing, pretending, liking, and so forth. To determine whether or not the chimpanzee infers states of this kind, we showed an adult chimpanzee a series of videotaped scenes of a human actor struggling with a variety of problems. Some problems were simple, involving inaccessible food – bananas vertically or horizontally out of reach, behind a box, and so forth – as in the original Kohler problems; others were more complex, involving an actor unable to extricate himself from a locked cage, shivering because of a malfunctioning heater, or unable to play a phonograph because it was unplugged. With each videotape the chimpanzee was given several photographs, one a solution to the problem, such as a stick for the inaccessible bananas, a key for the locked up actor, a lit wick for the malfunctioning heater. The chimpanzee's consistent choice of the correct photographs can be understood by assuming that the animal recognized the videotape as representing a problem, understood the actor's purpose, and chose alternatives compatible with that purpose.
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Baron and Kenny's procedure for determining if an independent variable affects a dependent variable through some mediator is so well known that it is used by authors and requested by reviewers almost reflexively. Many research projects have been terminated early in a research program or later in the review process because the data did not conform to Baron and Kenny's criteria, impeding theoretical development. While the technical literature has disputed some of Baron and Kenny's tests, this literature has not diffused to practicing researchers. We present a nontechnical summary of the flaws in the Baron and Kenny logic, some of which have not been previously noted. We provide a decision tree and a step-by-step procedure for testing mediation, classifying its type, and interpreting the implications of findings for theory building and future research. (c) 2010 by JOURNAL OF CONSUMER RESEARCH, Inc..
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For researchers and practitioners interested in social relationships, the question remains as to how large social networks typically are, and how their size and composition change across adulthood. On the basis of predictions of socioemotional selectivity theory and social convoy theory, we conducted a meta-analysis on age-related social network changes and the effects of life events on social networks using 277 studies with 177,635 participants from adolescence to old age. Cross-sectional as well as longitudinal studies consistently showed that (a) the global social network increased up until young adulthood and then decreased steadily, (b) both the personal network and the friendship network decreased throughout adulthood, (c) the family network was stable in size from adolescence to old age, and (d) other networks with coworkers or neighbors were important only in specific age ranges. Studies focusing on life events that occur at specific ages, such as transition to parenthood, job entry, or widowhood, demonstrated network changes similar to such age-related network changes. Moderator analyses detected that the type of network assessment affected the reported size of global, personal, and family networks. Period effects on network sizes occurred for personal and friendship networks, which have decreased in size over the last 35 years. Together the findings are consistent with the view that a portion of normative, age-related social network changes are due to normative, age-related life events. We discuss how these patterns of normative social network development inform research in social, evolutionary, cultural, and personality psychology. (PsycINFO Database Record (c) 2012 APA, all rights reserved).
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Previous studies of theory of mind (ToM) in old age have provided mixed results. We predicted that educational level and cognitive processing are two factors influencing the pattern of the aging of ToM. To test this hypothesis, a younger group who received higher education (mean age 20.46 years), an older group with an education level equal to that of the young group (mean age 76.29 years), and an older group with less education (mean age 73.52 years) were recruited. ToM tasks included the following tests: the second-order false-belief task, the faux-pas task, the eyes test, and tests of fundamental aspects of cognitive function that included two background tests (memory span and processing speed) and three subcomponents of executive function (inhibition, updating, and shifting). We found that the younger group and the older group with equally high education outperformed the older group with less education in false-belief and faux-pas tasks. However, there was no significant difference between the two former groups. The three groups of participants performed equivalently in the eyes test as well as in control tasks (false-belief control question, faux-pas control question, faux-pas control story, and Eyes Test control task). The younger group outperformed the other two groups in the cognitive processing tasks. Mediation analyses showed that difficulties in inhibition, memory span, and processing speed mediated the age differences in false-belief reasoning. Also, the variables of inhibition, updating, memory span, and processing speed mediated age-related variance in faux-pas. Discussion focused on the links between ToM aging, educational level, and cognitive processing. Supported by Chinese National Natural Science Foundation (number: 30870766) and Anhui Province Natural Science Foundation (number: 11040606M166).
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A sizeable number of studies have implicated the default network (e.g., medial prefrontal and parietal cortices) in tasks that require participants to infer the mental states of others (i.e., to mentalize). Parallel research has demonstrated that default network function declines over the lifespan, suggesting that older adults may show impairments in social-cognitive tasks that require mentalizing. Older and younger human adults were scanned using functional magnetic resonance imaging while performing three different social-cognitive tasks. Across three mentalizing paradigms, younger and older adults viewed animated shapes in brief social vignettes, stories about a person's moral actions, and false belief stories. Consistent with predictions, older adults responded less accurately to stories about others' false beliefs and made less use of actors' intentions to judge the moral permissibility of behavior. These impairments in performance during social-cognitive tasks were accompanied by age-related decreases across all three paradigms in the BOLD response of a single brain region, the dorsomedial prefrontal cortex. These findings suggest specific task-independent age-related deficits in mentalizing that are localizable to changes in circumscribed subregions of the default network.
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Theory of mind – the ability to attribute independent mental states and processes to others – plays an important role in our social lives. For one, it facilitates social cooperation, for two, it enables us to manipulate others in order to reach our own goals. In our study, we intend to analyze some basic aspects of the complex relationship between adult theory of mind and social behavior that had not been researched in depth so far. Our results show (1) a strong negative correlation between Machiavellianism and social cooperative skills; (2) a connection between the extent of cooperative tendency and the level of mindreading; and (3) a lack of significant correlation between theory of mind and Machiavellianism. For the interpretation of the results – especially for our third finding – we used the concepts of “hot” and “cold” empathy, the lack of representation of moral emotions, as well as other cognitive explanatory models.
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In this study the authors investigated whether training preschool children in the use of mental state lexicon plays a significant role in bringing about advanced conceptual understanding of mental terms and improved performance on theory-of-mind tasks. A total of 70 participants belonging to two age groups (3 and 4 years old) were randomly assigned to experimental and control conditions. All participants were pretested and posttested with linguistic and cognitive measures. Analyses of pretest data did not show any significant differences between experimental and control groups. During a 2-month period of intervention, children were read stories enriched with mental lexicon. After listening to a story, the experimental group took part in language games and conversations aimed at stimulating children to use mental terms. In contrast, the control group did not participate in any special linguistic activities. The results show that training had a significant effect on emotion understanding and metacognitive vocabulary comprehension in the 3-year-old group and on false-belief understanding and metacognitive vocabulary comprehension in the 4-year-old group.
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This paper reviews findings in three subcomponents of social cognition (i.e., Theory of Mind, facial emotion recognition, empathy) during ageing. Changes over time in social cognition were evaluated in normal ageing and in patients with various neurodegenerative pathologies, such as Alzheimer's disease, mild cognitive impairment, frontal and temporal variants of frontotemporal lobar degeneration and Parkinson's disease. Findings suggest a decline in social cognition with normal ageing, a decline that is at least partially independent of a more general cognitive or executive decline. The investigation of neurodegenerative pathologies showing specific deficits in Theory of Mind in relation to damage to specific cerebral regions led us to suggest a neural network involved in Theory of Mind processes, namely a fronto-subcortical loop linking the basal ganglia to the regions of the frontal lobes.
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Theory of mind (ToM), or the ability to understand mental states, is a fundamental aspect of social cognition. Previous research has documented marked advances in ToM in preschoolers, and declines in ToM in older-aged adults. In the present study, younger (n=37), middle-aged (n=20), and older (n=37) adults completed a continuous false belief task measuring ToM. Middle-aged and older adults exhibited more false belief bias than did younger adults, irrespective of language ability, executive function, processing speed, and memory. The authors conclude that ToM declines from younger to older adulthood, independent of age-related changes to domain-general cognitive functioning.
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Theory of mind, the ability to attribute mental states, has been little explored beyond the early school years. Yet, later development, including possible patterns of breakdown, has important implications for current debate concerning the modularity/domain-specificity of the cognitive and neurological systems underlying theory of mind. This article reports a first study of theory of mind in normal aging. The results suggest that although performance on tasks with nonmental content may decrease with age, performance on theory of mind tasks remains intact and may even improve over the later adult years. The implications of these findings for the cognitive processes underlying theory of mind are discussed.
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Young (<36 years) and older (>59) adults viewed videos in which the same individual committed a faux pas, or acted appropriately, toward his coworkers. Older participants did not discriminate appropriate and inappropriate behaviors as well as young participants. Older participants also scored lower than young participants on an extensive battery of emotion recognition tests, and emotion performance fully mediated age differences in faux pas discrimination. The results provide further evidence for the role of emotion perception in a range of important social deficits.
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Summary A key aspect of social cognition is the ability to infer other people’s mental states, thoughts and feelings; referred to as ‘theory of mind’ (ToM). We tested the hypothesis that the changes in personality and behaviour seen in frontal variant frontotemporal dementia (fvFTD) may reflect impairment in this cognitive domain. Tests of ToM, executive and general neuropsychological ability were given to 19 fvFTD patients, a comparison group of Alzheimer’s disease patients (n = 12) and matched healthy controls (n = 16). Neuropsychiatric assessment was undertaken using the Neuropsychiatric Inventory (NPI). Patients with fvFTD were impaired on all tests of ToM (first-order false belief; second-order false belief; faux pas detection; and Reading the Mind in the Eyes), but had no difficulty with control questions designed to test general comprehension and memory. By contrast, the Alzheimer’s disease group failed only one ToM task (second-order false belief), which places heavy demands on working memory. Performance on the faux pas test revealed a double dissociation, with the fvFTD group showing deficits on ToM-based questions and the Alzheimer’s disease group failing memory-based questions only. Rank order of the fvFTD patients according to the magnitude of impairment on tests of ToM and their degree of frontal atrophy showed a striking concordance between ToM performances and ventromedial frontal damage. There was a significant correlation between the NPI score and more sophisticated tests of ToM in the fvFTD group. This study supports the hypothesis that patients with fvFTD, but not those with Alzheimer’s disease, are impaired on tests of ToM, and may explain some of the abnormalities in interpersonal behaviour that characterize fvFTD.