Development of Theory of Mind in Emotional Context and in Pretending
AUTHOR : 이종숙
INFORMATION : page. 93~116 / 2001 Vol.8 No.1
ABSTRACT
This study was conducted to examine whether emotional cues or pretending could facilitate children\'s understanding of theory of mind and whether their understanding of pretending involved meta- representationl conceptualization on pretending. Standard theory of mind tasks with or without emotional cues were presented to 3- to 5-year-olds. The results from these tasks showed that performance with emotional cues was higher than that without them. Children\'s understanding of pretending was examined by using stories revised from Lillard\'s(1993a) in terms of the context of reality and providing an alternative in the questions. Performance on pretending tasks was higher in a real context than in a hypothetical one. Performance of 4- and 5-year-olds was significantly higher than probability of coincidence(50%) in conceiving pretending as others\' state of mind. Children validated their responses more frequently in terms of thought than action. These results imply that these children can understand pretending based on other\'s mind as well as on acting. The theory of mind in pretending seemed to develope earlier than in the standard tasks(appearance-reality and false belief tasks).