BACKGROUND: Recent researches in Theory of Mind (ToM) relate its development to the development of the metacognitive skills "planning," "regulation," and acquisition of "predictive and causal reasoning." These studies reveal the importance of metacognitive training in the development of mentalist skills. METHOD: In the present work, the effects of training were compared in 20 children, aged between 4 and 5 years. RESULTS: Significant within-group differences in the skills of belief attribution and memory attribution were found and a tendency towards significance in the skills of behavior prediction. Significant between-group differences were found in belief attribution, prediction, and memory. CONCLUSIONS: Mentalist skills training improve attribution, prediction and memory skills in ToM tasks.
BACKGROUND: Recent researches in Theory of Mind (ToM) relate its development to the development of the metacognitive skills "planning," "regulation," and acquisition of "predictive and causal reasoning." These studies reveal the importance of metacognitive training in the development of mentalist skills. METHOD: In the present work, the effects of training were compared in 20 children, aged between 4 and 5 years. RESULTS: Significant within-group differences in the skills of belief attribution and memory attribution were found and a tendency towards significance in the skills of behavior prediction. Significant between-group differences were found in belief attribution, prediction, and memory. CONCLUSIONS: Mentalist skills training improve attribution, prediction and memory skills in ToM tasks.
Authors: Stefan G Hofmann; Stacey N Doan; Manuel Sprung; Anne Wilson; Chad Ebesutani; Leigh A Andrews; Joshua Curtiss; Paul L Harris Journal: Cognition Date: 2016-02-20