What Is the Theory of Mind?

The ability to understand the mental states of others is referred to as theory of mind. In other words, your theory of mind is your ability to recognize that there are other minds out there, each with its own set of feelings, opinions, beliefs, and impulses. Learn more about this concept in cognitive science.

What Exactly Is the Theory of Mind?

Theory of mind is a concept in behavioral and brain sciences that refers to a person's ability to accurately understand the mental states of others. Consider it the cognitive and rational equivalent of the more emotional processes of empathy and sympathy. A person's theory of mind is also related to their ability to pay attention and perform executive functions.

Mental States and Theory of Mind

Young children who develop a theory of mind become more adept at detecting mental states in both their parents and peers. This type of cognitive development improves to a greater and greater extent over time. People learn to understand how others can have opposing opinions or worldviews despite sharing the same basic origins. This is associated with an increase in perspective-taking and empathy.

While most theory of mind researchers concentrate on human social interactions, others have turned to the animal kingdom to see if these mental states can be found in nonhuman mammals. David Premack and Guy Woodruff demonstrated that chimps can understand the thoughts and feelings of other chimps in their orbit. Vittorio Gallese and colleagues demonstrated the same with rhesus monkeys.

Origins of the Theory of Mind

Different psychologists hold opposing views on the origins of the theory of mind during childhood development. Most psychologists believe that children do not have a theory of mind until they are three or four years old. While a three-year-old may have some ability to understand the thoughts and emotions of others, this ability will inevitably be refined to a much more sophisticated degree as they grow older.

Gillian Baird and Simon Baron-Cohen of Cambridge University deserve credit for recognizing the importance of play in children developing an adequate theory of mind. Another meta-analysis, this time led by neuroscience experts Andrew Meltzoff and Jean Decety, focuses on the importance of mirror neurons in facilitating this type of skill acquisition.

Stages of Theory of Mind

Theory of mind abilities can develop sequentially or concurrently. Learn how these stages of theory of mind development can help improve a person's social cognition:

Understanding desire: Children's understanding of other people's wants and needs serves as the starting point for their mental theories. A two-month-old infant can only understand their own immediate desires, but as children grow older, they realize that other people's actions are motivated by similar desires to their own. This serves as a foundation for more advanced understanding of others.

Understanding diversity of thought: When you are a child, it is surprising to you that anyone sees the world differently than you do. Nonetheless, in developmental psychology, acknowledging diversity of thought is an important stage. It becomes easier to profit from these individual differences in thought as you get older.

Understanding knowledge access: Just because you know something does not mean that others will. For example, if you grew up in New York City but a visitor did not, you would have to teach them how to navigate the city. Different stimuli produce different types of knowledge, and different people have surpluses and deficits in different types of information.

Understanding misguided beliefs: According to Janet Wilde Astington, researchers believe that children's understanding of false beliefs allows them to develop an adequate theory of mind. As children grow older, they realize that other people may have a false belief about certain things due to either accidental or willful ignorance.

Understanding obfuscated emotions: When you realize that people may be hiding their true feelings, you reach the pinnacle of your theory of mind. Picking up on subtle cues (such as nonverbal communication or body language) can be a form of mind reading in which you make inferences about what's really going on in the mind of another person. Understanding others' hidden intentions allows you to achieve peak social competence.

False-Belief Task Example

False-belief tests are theory of mind tasks that show how people can reach different conclusions when presented with different stimuli.

Consider the Sally-Anne test as an example. Consider two preschoolers, Sally and Anne, in this thought experiment. Sally leaves the room after placing a marble in a basket. Anne then walks into the room and transfers the marble from Sally's basket to her own box. Sally will still believe the marble is in her basket when she returns; Anne, on the other hand, knows it's in the box and knows Sally believes the marble is still in the basket.

This is a very simple example of how theory of mind varies depending on the amount of information available. Researchers such as Rebecca Saxe have developed far more advanced false-belief tests that use neuroimaging to better test subjects' ability to put their theories of mind to the test.

Problems With the Theory of Mind

A person's theory of mind can be hampered by a variety of neurological disorders and issues. Here are a few examples to think about:

Autism spectrum disorders (ASDs): A child with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) may have difficulty understanding the behavior and thought patterns of others. In contrast, a child with Down syndrome will frequently complete a false-belief test correctly, whereas an autistic child will not. Early interventions can aid in the development of a functional theory of mind in children with ASDs, including Asperger Syndrome.

Brain damage: Damage to the prefrontal cortex or the temporoparietal junction can severely impair your theory of mind. Longitudinal studies conducted by professionals such as Glyn W. Humphreys and Ian Apperly examine how theory of mind correlates to these specific areas of the brain. This is just one example of the link between the biological health of the brain and the cognitive processes of the mind.

Schizophrenia: While advances in psychiatry can assist a schizophrenic person in retaining or regaining cognitive abilities, they may still struggle with their overall theory of mind capacity. According to social psychology research, people with schizophrenia tend to withdraw from those around them and regress into a more isolated state of mind.