Top

Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders

Gepubliceerd in:

15-09-2021 | Original Paper

Second-Order False Beliefs and Linguistic Recursion in Autism Spectrum Disorder

Auteurs: Irina Polyanskaya, Inge-Marie Eigsti, Torben Brauner, Patrick Blackburn

Gepubliceerd in: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders | Uitgave 9/2022

Abstract

This study investigates the role of recursive language and working memory (WM) in second-order false belief skills in Danish-speaking children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD; n = 62; 8 females) and typical development (n = 41; 15 females), ages 6–16. Second-order false belief skills correlated with receptive grammar, vocabulary, and age; sentential complement production predicted second-order false beliefs, controlling for age, receptive grammar and WM. Regressions showed that second-order false belief was associated with age across groups, but with sentential complements in the ASD group only. Second-order false belief skills improved in children who received training in either recursive phrases (d = 0.21) or WM (d = 0.74), compared to an active control group. Results suggest that false belief skills are entwined with both linguistic and executive functions.

vorige artikel General Education Teachers’ Perceptions of Autism, Inclusive Practices, and Relationship Building Strategies

volgende artikel Family Experiences of Decreased Sound Tolerance in ASD

Alleen toegankelijk voor geautoriseerde gebruikers

To test whether differences in teachers, classroom structure, geographical location, etc., might influence results, school district was added as a covariate; the interaction of district and time was not significant, F(1, 23) = 0.20, p = 0.88, partial η² = 0.001, and the pattern of results was unchanged.

Arslan, B., Hohenberger, A., & Verbrugge, R. (2017). Syntactic recursion facilitates and working memory predicts recursive theory of mind. PLoS ONE, 12(1), e0169510. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0169510CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Arslan, B., Verbrugge, R., Taatgen, N., & Hollebrandse, B. (2015). Teaching children to attribute second-order false beliefs: A training study with feedback. In Proceedings of the 37th annual meeting of the Cognitive Science Society (pp. 108–113).

Astington, J. W., & Baird, J. A. (2005). Why language matters for theory of mind. Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195159912.001.0001CrossRef

Astington, J. W., Pelletier, J., & Homer, B. (2002). Theory of mind and epistemological development: The relation between children’s second-order false-belief understanding and their ability to reason about evidence. New Ideas in Psychology, 20(2–3), 131–144.CrossRef

Baron-Cohen, S. (1989a). Perceptual role taking and protodeclarative pointing in autism. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 7, 113–127. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-835x.1989.tb00793.xCrossRef

Baron-Cohen, S. (1989a). The autistic child’s theory of mind: a case of specific developmental delay. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 30(2), 285–297. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.1989.tb00241.xCrossRefPubMed

Baron-Cohen, S. (2000). Theory of mind and autism: A fifteen year review. In Understanding other minds: Perspectives from developmental cognitive neuroscience (2nd ed., pp. 3–20). Oxford University Press.

Baron-Cohen, S., O’Riordan, M., Stone, V., Jones, R., & Plaisted, K. (1999). Recognition of faux pas by normally developing children and children with Asperger syndrome or high-functioning autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 29(5), 407–418. https://doi.org/10.1023/a:1023035012436CrossRefPubMed

Baron-Cohen, S., Spitz, A., & Cross, P. (1993). Do children with autism recognise surprise? A research note. Cognition and Emotion, 7(6), 507–516. https://doi.org/10.1080/02699939308409202CrossRef

Bishop, D. (2009). Test for Reception of Grammar—Version 2, Dansk Version. Pearson.

Blijd-Hoogewys, E. M., van Geert, P. L., Serra, M., & Minderaa, R. B. (2008). Measuring theory of mind in children. Psychometric properties of the ToM storybooks. The Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38(10), 1907–1930. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-008-0585-3CrossRefPubMed

Boeg-Thomsen, D. (2016). Linguistic perspective marking and mental-state reasoning in children with autism: A training study with complement clauses. University of Copenhagen.

Bogaerds-Hazenberg, S. T. M., & Hendriks, P. (2016). Complex language, complex thought? Linguistics in the Netherlands, 33(1), 28–40.

Bosco, F. M., & Gabbatore, I. (2017). Sincere, deceitful, and ironic communicative acts and the role of the theory of mind in childhood. Frontiers in Psychology, 8, 21. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2017.00021CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Braüner, T., Blackburn, P., & Polyanskaya, I. (2020). Being deceived: Information Asymmetry in second-order false belief tasks. Topics in Cognitive Science, 12(2), 504–534. https://doi.org/10.1111/tops.12422CrossRefPubMed

Brynskov, C., Krøjgaard, P., & Eigsti, I. M. (2015). Language and communication in children with autism: A critical look at three assumptions and their clinical implications. Nordic Psychology, 68(2), 100–113. https://doi.org/10.1080/19012276.2015.1071199CrossRef

Buttelmann, D., Carpenter, M., & Tomasello, M. (2009). Eighteen-month-old infants show false belief understanding in an active helping paradigm. Cognition, 112(2), 337–342. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2009.05.006CrossRefPubMed

Caillies, S., & Le Sourn-Bissaoui, S. (2013). Nondecomposable idiom understanding in children: recursive theory of mind and working memory. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 67(2), 108–116. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0028606CrossRefPubMed

Carlson, S. M., Moses, L. J., & Claxton, L. J. (2004). Individual differences in executive functioning and theory of mind: An investigation of inhibitory control and planning ability. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 87(4), 299–319.CrossRef

Clemmensen, L., Bartels-Velthuis, A. A., Jespersen, R. A. F., van Os, J., Blijd-Hoogewys, E. M. A., Ankerstrøm, L., Væver, M., Daniel, P. F., Drukker, M., Jeppesen, P., & Jepsen, J. R. M. (2016). A psychometric evaluation of the Danish version of the theory of mind storybook for 8–14 year-old children. Frontiers in Psychology, 7, 330–330. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2016.00330CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Constantino, J. N. (2003). Social Responsiveness Scale (SRS). Western Psychological Services.

de Villiers, J. G. (2007). The interface of language and theory of mind. Lingua, 117(11), 1858–1878. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lingua.2006.11.006CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

de Villiers, J., Hobbs, K., & Hollebrandse, B. (2014). Recursive Complements and Propositional Attitudes. In T. Roeper & M. Speas (Eds.), Recursion: Complexity in Cognition (pp. 221–242). Dordrecht: Springer. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-05086-7_10CrossRef

de Villiers, J. G., & Pyers, J. (2002). Complements to cognition: A longitudinal study of the relationship between complex syntax and false-belief-understanding. Cognitive Development, 17, 1037–1060.CrossRef

Dennis, M., Francis, D. J., Cirino, P. T., Schachar, R., Barnes, M. A., & Fletcher, J. M. (2009). Why IQ is not a covariate in cognitive studies of neurodevelopmental disorders. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 15, 1–13.CrossRef

Durrleman, S., Burnel, M., De Villiers, J. G., Thommen, E., Yan, R., & Delage, H. (2019). The impact of grammar on mentalizing: A training study including children with autism spectrum disorder and developmental language disorder. Frontiers in Psychology, 10, 2478. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2019.02478CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Durrleman, S., Burnel, M., Thommen, E., Foudon, N., Sonié, S., Reboul, A., & Fourneret, P. (2016). The language cognition interface in ASD: Complement sentences and false belief reasoning. Research in Autism Spectrum Disorders, 21, 109–120.CrossRef

Durrleman, S., & Franck, J. (2015). Exploring links between language and cognition in autism spectrum disorders: Complement sentences, false belief, and executive functioning. Journal of Communication Disorders, 54, 15–31. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jcomdis.2017.03.005CrossRefPubMed

Edwards, K., & Low, J. (2017). Reaction time profiles of adults’ action prediction reveal two mindreading systems. Cognition, 160, 1–16. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2016.12.004CrossRefPubMed

Farrar, M. J., & Maag, L. (2002). Early language development and the emergence of a theory of mind. First Language, 22(2), 197–213.CrossRef

Filippova, E., & Astington, J. W. (2008). Further development in social reasoning revealed in discourse irony understanding. Child Development, 79(1), 126–138. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01115.xCrossRefPubMed

Frith, U. (2004). Emanuel Miller lecture: Confusions and controversies about Asperger syndrome. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, and Allied Disciplines, 45(4), 672–686. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.2004.00262.xCrossRefPubMed

Fu, G., Xiao, W. S., Killen, M., & Lee, K. (2014). Moral judgment and its relation to second-order theory of mind. Developmental Psychology, 50(8), 2085–2092. https://doi.org/10.1037/a0037077CrossRefPubMed

Gordon, A. C., & Olson, D. R. (1998). The relation between acquisition of a theory of mind and the capacity to hold in mind. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 68(1), 70–83. https://doi.org/10.1006/jecp.1997.2423CrossRefPubMed

Grueneisen, S., Wyman, E., & Tomasello, M. (2015). “I know you don’t know I know…” children use second-order false-belief reasoning for peer coordination. Child Development, 86(1), 287–293. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.12264CrossRefPubMed

Guajardo, N. R., & Watson, A. C. (2002). Narrative discourse and theory of mind development. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 163(3), 305–325. https://doi.org/10.1080/00221320209598686CrossRefPubMed

Hale, C. M., & Tager-Flusberg, H. (2003). The influence of language on theory of mind: A training study. Developmental Science, 6(3), 346–359. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-7687.00289CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Happé, F. (1995). The role of age and verbal ability in the theory of mind task performance of subjects with autism. Child Development, 66(3), 843–855.CrossRef

Happé, F. (2003). Theory of mind and the self. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1001, 134–144.CrossRef

Hasselhorn, M., Mähler, C., & Grube, D. (2005). Theory of mind, working memory, and verbal ability in preschool children: The proposal of a relay race model of the developmental dependencies. In Young children's cognitive development: Interrelationships among executive functioning, working memory, verbal ability, and theory of mind (pp. 219–237). Lawrence Erlbaum Associates Publishers.

Hillier, A., & Allinson, L. (2002). Beyond expectations: Autism, understanding embarrassment, and the relationship with theory of mind. Autism, 6(3), 299–314. https://doi.org/10.1177/1362361302006003007CrossRefPubMed

Hollebrandse, B., Hobbs, K., de Villiers, J., & Roeper, T. (2008). Second order embedding and second order false belief. In A. Gavarró & M. J. Freitas (Eds.), Language acquisition and development: Proceedings of GALA 2007. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Hollebrandse, B., & van Hout, A. (2015). Comprehension and production of double-embedded structures: A kindergarden path in long-distance dependencies in Dutch school-aged children? In C. Hamann & E. Ruigendijk (Eds.), Proceedings of GALA 2013 (pp. 190–204). Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Hollebrandse, B., van Hout, A., & Hendriks, P. (2014). Children’s first and second-order false-belief reasoning in a verbal and a low-verbal task. Synthese, 191(3), 321–333. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11229-012-0169-9CrossRef

Hughes, C. (1998). Executive function in preschoolers: Links with theory of mind and verbal ability. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 16(2), 233–253.CrossRef

Hughes, C., & Ensor, R. (2007). Executive function and theory of mind: Predictive relations from ages 2 to 4. Developmental Psychology, 43(6), 1447–1459.CrossRef

Jackendoff, R. (1990). Semantic structures. MIT Press.

Janssen, T. M. V. (2020, Fall). Montague semantics. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Spring 2020 ed.). https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2020/entries/montague-semantics.

Kaland, N., Callesen, K., Moller-Nielsen, A., Mortensen, E. L., & Smith, L. (2008). Performance of children and adolescents with Asperger syndrome or high-functioning autism on advanced theory of mind tasks. The Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38(6), 1112–1123. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-007-0496-8CrossRefPubMed

Keenan, T., Olson, D. R., & Marini, Z. (1998). Working memory and children’s developing understanding of mind. Australian Journal of Psychology, 50(2), 76–82.CrossRef

Kovács, Á. M., Téglás, E., & Endress, A. D. (2010, Dec 24). The social sense: susceptibility to others' beliefs in human infants and adults. Science, 330(6012), 1830–1834. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1190792

Leslie, A. M. (1987). Pretense and representation: The origins of “theory of mind.” Psychological Review, 94(4), 412–426. https://doi.org/10.1037/0033-295X.94.4.412CrossRef

Lind, S. E., & Bowler, D. M. (2009). Language and theory of mind in autism spectrum disorder: The relationship between complement syntax and false belief task performance. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39(6), 929–937. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0702-yCrossRefPubMed

Lockl, K., & Schneider, W. (2007). Knowledge about the mind: Links between theory of mind and later metamemory. Child Development, 78(1), 148–167. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.00990.xCrossRefPubMed

Lohmann, H., & Tomasello, M. (2003). The role of language in the development of false belief understanding: A training study. Child Development, 74(4), 1130–1144. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-8624.00597CrossRefPubMed

Low, J. (2010). Preschoolers’ implicit and explicit false-belief understanding: Relations with complex syntactical mastery. Child Development, 81(2), 597–615. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01418.xCrossRefPubMed

Low, J., & Perner, J. (2012). Implicit and explicit theory of mind: state of the art. British Journal of Developmental Psychology, 30(Pt 1), 1–13. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.2044-835X.2011.02074.xCrossRefPubMed

Memosyne Ltd. (2008). Jungle Memory. Memosyne Ltd.

Miller, C. A. (2006). Developmental relationships between language and theory of mind. American Journal of Speech and Language Pathology, 15(2), 142–154. https://doi.org/10.1044/1058-0360(2006/014)CrossRef

Milligan, K., Astington, J. W., & Dack, L. A. (2007). Language and theory of mind: Meta-analysis of the relation between language ability and false-belief understanding. Child Development, 78(2), 622–646. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01018.xCrossRefPubMed

Perner, J. (1988). Higher-order beliefs and intentions in children's understanding of social interaction. In Developing theories of mind (pp. 271–294). Cambridge University Press.

Perner, J., & Lang, B. (1999). Development of theory of mind and executive control. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 3(9), 337–344. https://doi.org/10.1016/s1364-6613(99)01362-5CrossRefPubMed

Perner, J., & Wimmer, H. (1985). “John thinks that Mary thinks that…”: Attribution of second-order beliefs by 5- to 10-year-old children. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 39(3), 437–471. https://doi.org/10.1016/0022-0965(85)90051-7CrossRef

Peskin, J., & Astington, J. W. (2004). The effects of adding metacognitive language to story texts. Cognitive Development, 19(2), 253–273. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cogdev.2004.01.003CrossRef

Peterson, C. C., Wellman, H. M., & Liu, D. (2005). Steps in theory-of-mind development for children with deafness or autism. Child Development, 76(2), 502–517. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2005.00859.xCrossRefPubMed

Polyanskaya, I. (2019). Second-order false belief reasoning by children with autism: A correlation and training study. Roskilde University.

Rubio-Fernandez, P. (2019). Jan). Memory and inferential processes in false-belief tasks: An investigation of the unexpected-contents paradigm. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 177, 297–312. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jecp.2018.08.011CrossRefPubMed

Russell, J. (1997). Autism as an Executive Disorder. In J. Russell (Ed.), How executive disorders can bring about an adequate ‘theory of mind’ (pp. 256–304). Oxford University Press.

Schick, B., de Villiers, P., de Villiers, J., & Hoffmeister, R. (2007). Language and theory of mind: A study of deaf children. Child Development, 78(2), 376–396. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2007.01004.xCrossRefPubMed

Scott, R. M., & Baillargeon, R. (2009). Which penguin is this? Attributing false beliefs about object identity at 18 months. Child Development, 80(4), 1172–1196. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2009.01324.xCrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Shah, P., & Miyake, A. (1999). Models of working memory: An introduction. In A. Miyake & P. Shah (Eds.), Models of working memory: Mechanisms of active maintenance and executive control (pp. 1–27). Cambridge University Press.

Sodian, B., & Frith, U. (1992). Deception and sabotage in autistic, retarded and normal children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 33(3), 591–605. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.1992.tb00893.xCrossRefPubMed

Sodian, B., Taylor, C., Harris, P. L., & Perner, J. (1991). Early deception and the child’s theory of mind: False trails and genuine markers. Child Development, 62(3), 468–483. https://doi.org/10.2307/1131124CrossRef

Southgate, V., Chevallier, C., & Csibra, G. (2010). Seventeen-month-olds appeal to false beliefs to interpret others’ referential communication. Developmental Science, 13(6), 907–912. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-7687.2009.00946.xCrossRefPubMed

Sullivan, K., Zaitchik, D., & Tager-Flusberg, H. (1994) Preschoolers can attribute second-order beliefs. Developmental Psychology, 30, 395–402. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.30.3.395CrossRef

Surian, L., Caldi, S., & Sperber, D. (2007). Attribution of beliefs by 13-month-old infants. Psychological Science, 18(7), 580–586. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9280.2007.01943.xCrossRefPubMed

Szabó, Z. G. (2020). Compositionality. In E. N. Zalta (Ed.), The Stanford encyclopedia of philosophy (Fall 2020 ed.). https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/fall2020/entries/compositionality.

Tager-Flusberg, H. (2001). A re-examination of the Theory of Mind hypothesis of autism. In J. Burack, T. Charman, N. Yirmiya, & P. R. Zelazo (Eds.), Development in autism: Perspectives from theory and research (pp. 173–193). Erlbaum.

Tager-Flusberg, H., & Joseph, R. M. (2005). How language facilitates the acquisition of false-belief understanding in children with autism. In Why language matters for theory of mind (pp. 298–318). Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780195159912.003.0014.

Tager-Flusberg, H., & Sullivan, K. (1994a). Predicting and explaining behavior: A comparison of autistic, mentally retarded and normal children. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 35(6), 1059–1075. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1469-7610.1994.tb01809.xCrossRefPubMed

Tager-Flusberg, H., & Sullivan, K. (1994b). A second look at second-order belief attribution in autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 24(5), 577–586. https://doi.org/10.1007/bf02172139CrossRefPubMed

Talwar, V., Gordon, H. M., & Lee, K. (2007). Lying in the elementary school years: Verbal deception and its relation to second-order belief understanding. Developmental Psychology, 43(3), 804–810. https://doi.org/10.1037/0012-1649.43.3.804CrossRefPubMedPubMedCentral

Tiede, G. M., & Walton, K. M. (2020). Social endophenotypes in autism spectrum disorder: A scoping review. Developmental Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1017/s0954579420000577CrossRef

Wechsler, D. (2003). Wechsler intelligence scales for children (4th ed.). Psychological Corporation.

Wellman, H., Cross, D., & Watson, J. (2001). Meta-analysis of theory of mind development: The truth about false belief. Child Development, 72, 655–684.CrossRef

Williams, D. M., & Happé, F. (2009). What did I say? Versus what did I think? Attributing false beliefs to self amongst children with and without autism. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 39(6), 865–873. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-009-0695-6CrossRefPubMed

Titel: Second-Order False Beliefs and Linguistic Recursion in Autism Spectrum Disorder
Auteurs: Irina Polyanskaya
Inge-Marie Eigsti
Torben Brauner
Patrick Blackburn
Publicatiedatum: 15-09-2021
Uitgeverij: Springer US
Gepubliceerd in: Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders / Uitgave 9/2022
Print ISSN: 0162-3257
Elektronisch ISSN: 1573-3432
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-021-05277-1

Bohn Stafleu van Loghum

Deel dit onderdeel of sectie (kopieer de link)

Abstract

Log in om toegang te krijgen

Andere artikelen Uitgave 9/2022

Exploring Sensory Subgroups in Typical Development and Autism Spectrum Development Using Factor Mixture Modelling

Adults With Autism Should be Considered a Priority in COVID-19 Immunization Programs

Comparing Early Pragmatics in Typically Developing Children and Children with Neurodevelopmental Disorders

Biases, Barriers, and Possible Solutions: Steps Towards Addressing Autism Researchers Under-Engagement with Racially, Ethnically, and Socioeconomically Diverse Communities

The Impact of Birth Order on Language Development in Autistic Children from Simplex Families

From Someone Who May Cause Trouble to Someone You Can Play With: Stakeholders' Perspectives on Preschool Program Quality for Autistic Children