Folk Theory of Mind: Conceptual Foundations of Social Cognition

The human ability to represent, conceptualize, and reason about mind and behavior is one of the greatest achievements of human evolution and is made possible by a “folk theory of mind” — a sophisticated conceptual framework that relates different mental states to each other and connects them to behavior. This chapter examines the nature and elements of this framework and its central functions for social cognition. As a conceptual framework, the folk theory of mind operates prior to any particular conscious or unconscious cognition and provides the “framing” or interpretation of that cognition. Central to this framing is the concept of intentionality, which distinguishes intentional action (caused by the agent’s intention and decision) from unintentional behavior (caused by internal or external events without the intervention of the agent’s decision). A second important distinction separates publicly observable from publicly unobservable (i.e., mental) events. Together, the two distinctions define the kinds of events in social interaction that people attend to, wonder about, and try to explain. A special focus of this chapter is the powerful tool of behavior explanation, which relies on the folk theory of mind but is also intimately tied to social demands and to the perceiver’s social goals. A full understanding of social cognition must consider the folk theory of mind as the conceptual underpinning of all (conscious and unconscious) perception and thinking about the social world

Toward a second-person neuroscience

LS & BT : equal contributions (shared first-authorship)Peer reviewedPreprin

Music and communication in music psychology

There is a general consensus that music is both universal and communicative, and musical dialogue is a key element in much music-therapeutic practice. However, the idea that music is a communicative medium has, to date, received little attention within the cognitive sciences, and the limited amount of research that addresses how and what music communicates has resulted in findings that appear to be of limited relevance to music therapy. This article will draw on ethnomusicological evidence and an understanding of communication derived from the study of speech to sketch a framework within which to situate and understand music as communicative practice. It will outline some key features of music as an interactive participatory medium – including entrainment and floating intentionality – that can help underpin an understanding of music as communicative, and that may help guide experimental approaches in the cognitive science of music to shed light on the processes involved in musical communication and on the consequences of engagement in communication through music for interacting individuals. It will suggest that the development of such approaches may enable the cognitive sciences to provide a more comprehensive, predictive understanding of music in interaction that could be of direct benefit to music therapy. This is the accepted manuscript version. The final version is available at http://pom.sagepub.com/content/42/6/809.full.pdf+htm

A Thing Is What We Say It Is: Referential Communication and Indirect Category Learning

This study investigates the interaction of referential communication and the structure of perceptual features on the joint processes of inventing a referential lexicon for novel objects and discovering the functional significance of those objects during an indirect category learning activity. During the learning task, participants worked either individually or as cooperative dyads to learn four combinations of orthogonal functional features--nutritive vs. not nutritive and destructive vs. not destructive--that defined four categories of fictional extra-terrestrial creatures. These categories were not specifically identified or labeled; rather, participants had to infer them indirectly as they predicted the functions. Also, these functionally defined categories exhibited a complex perceptual structure: a unidimensional (simple) rule predicted one function, while a family resemblance (complex) sub-structure predicted the other function. The function-learning task yielded function prediction data. In addition, each learner worked individually to sort the creatures (pre- and post-function learning) and to predict their functions in an individual function prediction posttest that also yielded selective attention data.\ud \ud Together, the prediction data, sort data, and selective attention data supported three a priori hypotheses. Referential communication generates conceptual homogeneity (H3) and enhances indirect category learning (H1), though simple rules are learned earlier and better than complex relationships (H2). In explaining the learning advantages observed among dyadic learners, I argue that referential communication may highlight attention to relationships between features (perceptual and functional) and actions as well as render such relationships more memorable. Moreover, communication may foster greater motivation among collaborators and may allow them to take advantage of the differing expectations and heuristics each collaborator brings to the task. In explaining the simplicity advantages observed among dyadic learners, I argue that referential communication may provide explicit "rules" for otherwise implicit (and perhaps more difficult) judgements. Dyads appear to have established reference to simple rules earlier than they established reference to complex rules; thus, they could explicitly (and perhaps more easily) learn the simple rule earlier than the complex rule. Finally, in explaining the conceptual homogeneity between and within dyads, I consider whether communication pushes "public" conceptualizations and publicly-formed "private" conceptualizations towards a limited range of widely shareable conceptual structures

Comment évaluer la théorie de l’esprit? Revue systématique des outils d’évaluation destinés aux enfants d’âge préscolaire

Essai doctoral présenté en vue de l’obtention du grade de doctorat en psychologie, option neuropsychologie clinique (D.Psy.)La Théorie de l’Esprit (TDE), soit l’habileté à inférer des états mentaux à soi-même et à autrui, est un domaine de recherche ralliant plusieurs disciplines, incluant la psychologie sociale et développementale, la neuropsychologie, les neurosciences sociales et l’orthophonie. Les habiletés de la TDE ont été maintes fois reliées à plusieurs marqueurs d’adaptation sociale, telles des compétences relationnelles et communicationnelles de meilleure qualité. Par ailleurs, la TDE est altérée dans le contexte de nombreuses conditions cliniques. Malgré l’énorme quantité d’études dédiées à la TDE, identifier des outils de mesures appropriés destinés aux enfants d’âge préscolaire demeure un défi. Cet essai a pour but de faciliter l’identification d’outils de mesures de la TDE pour les enfants de 0-5 ans en créant un inventaire de ceux-ci et de leurs caractéristiques. Une introduction positionne l’importance de la TDE à titre d’habileté sociocognitive, la définit et la distingue de construits socio-cognitifs apparentés, survole sa trajectoire développementale et soulève les défis reliés à son évaluation. Une revue systématique de la littérature, sous forme d’article scientifique, présente ensuite la méthodologie utilisée et l’inventaire des outils de mesures réalisé, et permet de souligner la grande variété d’outils évaluant la TDE, mais également de nombreux écueils méthodologiques et psychométriques associés à la création et au choix d’outils appropriés, incluant le nombre limité de sous-habiletés visées, le manque de standardisation et la pauvreté des informations psychométriques disponibles. Une discussion générale est ensuite fournie et relève les apports théoriques, méthodologiques et cliniques de cette recherche pour le domaine de la TDE.Theory of mind (TOM), the ability to infer mental states to self and others, has been a pervasive research theme across many disciplines including developmental, neuro-, and social psychology, social neuroscience and speech therapy. TOM abilities have been consistently linked to markers of social adaptation, such as better communication skills and quality social relationships, and are affected in a broad range of clinical conditions. Despite the wealth and breadth of research dedicated to TOM, identifying appropriate assessment tools for the preschool population remains challenging. This work aims to facilitate the choice and use of adequate measures for children aged 0 to 5 years by generating a comprehensive inventory of TOM measures and listing their characteristics. The introduction highlights the importance of TOM as a social-cognitive ability, defines TOM and distinguishes it from related yet distinct sociocognitive constructs, provides information on its developmental trajectory and raises challenges associated with TOM assessment. A systematic review of the literature is then presented in the form of an article and provides details on the methods used and the inventory of TOM measures generated. The remarkable variety of measures that have been created to assess TOM is highlighted, but also the numerous methodological and psychometric challenges associated with developing and choosing appropriate measures, including issues related to the limited range of sub-abilities targeted, lack of standardisation across studies and paucity of psychometric information provided. Finally, a general conclusion provides the opportunity to discuss the theoretical, methodological and clinical contributions of this project

DEECD Early Childhood Intervention Reform Project

This literature review was commissioned by the Office for Children and Early Childhood Development, Department of Education and Early Childhood Development (DEECD), as part of its Early Childhood Intervention Services (ECIS) Reform Project (Stage 2): Developing Options and Next Steps. This Project aims to significantly enhance the efficiency, effectiveness and sustainability of Victoria’s ECIS system and improve outcomes for children with a disability or developmental delay and their families. Early childhood intervention services (ECIS) support children with a disability or developmental delay from birth to school entry and their families. ECIS provides special education, therapy, counselling, service planning and coordination, assistance and support to access services such as kindergarten and child care. The services funded through DEECD are provided by government Specialist Children\u27s Services teams and non-government Early Childhood Intervention agencies. In addition to the services provided by ECIS teams and agencies, the state and federal governments fund a range of complementary programs to support young children with developmental disabilities and their families. These include initiatives to support families (My Time parent groups, Family Support Packages), services to support inclusion (Preschool Field Officers, Inclusion Support Facilitators), and funding to support particular disability groups (Helping Children with Autism packages). These additional services and supports, together with the ECIS teams and agencies, make up the totality of early childhood intervention provision for young children with disabilities. The focus of the literature review is research on contemporary Australian and international evidence-based service delivery models for children with a disability, developmental delay or additional needs aged 0-8 years

Acta kinesiologiae Universitatis Tartuensis. 7(Supplement)

http://www.ester.ee/record=b1227224*es

Conceptualising Learner Agency: A Socio-Ecological Developmental Approach.Conceptualising Learner Agency: A Socio-Ecological Developmental Approach

This paper addresses the interactions between a developing person and a changing social context shaping the acquisition of new skills and competences. It introduces a socio-ecological developmental approach for conceptualising learner agency, which is informed by expectancy-value models of human behaviour, theories of developmental regulation and ecological theories of life course development. Learner agency is understood to reflect the active and lifelong processes of inquiry, engagement and participation in the world around us. It involves the ability to act intentionally, to make things happen, to be a product as well as a producer of the social world. It is argued that learner agency is not a personality characteristic, but a relational process that emerges through interaction with others, and that its manifestations are shaped by the wider socio-cultural context. As such it is learnable and malleable through experience