Theory of mind
Theory of Mind
From "Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science"
Theory of mind refers to the everyday psychology that we use to understand and explain our own and others’ actions by reference to mental states, such as ‘desiring’, ‘knowing’ and ‘believing’.
INTRODUCTION
The expression ‘theory of mind’ (ToM) was introduced into psychology by David Premack and Guy Woodruff in 1978. Asking,
‘Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?’, they described experiments to assess whether the primate most closely related to us shares our tendency to interpret others’ actions by attributing to them ‘states of mind’ (or ‘mental states’). Premack and
Woodruff referred to these attributions as an everyday ‘theory’ because they are rather like scientific theories, first in being about theoretical entities – mental states, in this case – that are not directly observable; and second, in generating testable predictions about how others will behave, according to the state of mind they are presumed to be in.
These authors’ attempts to investigate whether chimpanzees construe others as ‘wanting’ or ‘intending’ things are now generally seen as inconclusive, but they laid the foundations for what is now a large and influential area of research. Psychologists realized that the question of how humans – let alone chimpanzees – achieve ‘everyday mindreading’ remained largely unanswered.
Developmental psychologists in particular saw that the growth of the child’s ToM was a topic ripe for investigation, and during the 1990s they completed hundreds of experimental investigations. Meanwhile, the topic continued to preoccupy those studying our closest primate relatives, and also became a natural focus for new work by philosophers. As a result, ToM has become a topic of highly productive interdisciplinary debate and investigation in several branches of the cognitive sciences.
FOLK PSYCHOLOGY
Various terms have been used as rough synonyms for ToM, sometimes with slightly different
From "Encyclopedia of Cognitive Science"
Theory of mind refers to the everyday psychology that we use to understand and explain our own and others’ actions by reference to mental states, such as ‘desiring’, ‘knowing’ and ‘believing’.
INTRODUCTION
The expression ‘theory of mind’ (ToM) was introduced into psychology by David Premack and Guy Woodruff in 1978. Asking,
‘Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?’, they described experiments to assess whether the primate most closely related to us shares our tendency to interpret others’ actions by attributing to them ‘states of mind’ (or ‘mental states’). Premack and
Woodruff referred to these attributions as an everyday ‘theory’ because they are rather like scientific theories, first in being about theoretical entities – mental states, in this case – that are not directly observable; and second, in generating testable predictions about how others will behave, according to the state of mind they are presumed to be in.
These authors’ attempts to investigate whether chimpanzees construe others as ‘wanting’ or ‘intending’ things are now generally seen as inconclusive, but they laid the foundations for what is now a large and influential area of research. Psychologists realized that the question of how humans – let alone chimpanzees – achieve ‘everyday mindreading’ remained largely unanswered.
Developmental psychologists in particular saw that the growth of the child’s ToM was a topic ripe for investigation, and during the 1990s they completed hundreds of experimental investigations. Meanwhile, the topic continued to preoccupy those studying our closest primate relatives, and also became a natural focus for new work by philosophers. As a result, ToM has become a topic of highly productive interdisciplinary debate and investigation in several branches of the cognitive sciences.
FOLK PSYCHOLOGY
Various terms have been used as rough synonyms for ToM, sometimes with slightly different