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To What Extent Is Theory of Mind Innate?

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To what extent is Theory of Mind innate? Critically discuss with reference to genetic, social and cultural evidence.
Theory of mind refers to an individual’s ability to understand the mental states of others (Baron-Cohen, 1989b). According to Buttelmann et al. (2008) over the years; psychological practice has seen an increase in research, debating whether theory of mind is innate. This apparent increase stems from controversial standard false-belief tasks and its influence on a person’s ability to have an operative theory of mind (Chandler, Fritz & Hala 1989). The connotations of these standard false-belief tasks act as an indicator for specific age boundaries, in which children are meant to start attributing mental states to others, through their understanding of false belief (Perner and Ruffman, 2005; Fodor, 1992; Mitchell,1996). The implications of these standard false-belief tasks will steer this discussion to focus on the extent at which theory of mind can be considered as innate with reference to genetic, social and cultural evidence.

According to Whiten, (1993 pg. 3) “a theory of mind remains one of the quintessential abilities that makes us human” .Yet prior to Baron-Cohen’s (1989a) study, the traditional view held by most child developmental psychologists, (Piaget, 1983) was based on the idea that, any understanding of what goes on in another person’s mind has to be a calculated and difficult thing (Appleton and Reddy, 1996). Hence, in order to work out this complicated concept, an individual would need a sophisticated set of intellectual skills which is not found in infancy and develops around the ages of 3-4years (Mitchell, 1996). However as Reddy (2007; p.122) states, “Babies get self-conscious earlier than expected...they experience positive embarrassment...positive shyness”. The fact that they can recognise themselves in the mirror (Lewis and Brooks-Gunn, 1979), tease, deceive, imitate, joke and play with their caregivers, long before they can speak (Leslie, 1994; Carpenter, Akhtar & Tomasello, 1998; Reddy, 2003; Jarrett, 2005) shows that they have an idea of themselves and what the other person is expecting; if not how can they display shy and coy emotional reactions to other individuals who look and interact with them (Reddy, 2007).
Reddy (2008, p.40) also stresses that an infants’ ability to learn what responses do and learn that they can elicit them is a “mechanical association”. She argues that learnt responses are not the opposite of understanding. This means that in order to be able to elicit desired responses, some form of comprehension is required. Reddy (2008) takes a philosophical view that the mind can be readable in behaviour. If the mind can be viewed as perceivable, it should not be considered a mystery that infants possess the ability to explore aspects of their own mentality through learning to elicit and perform responses they find pleasant (Bloom, 2000). The issue with Reddy’s (2008) argument is that; inferring mental ability from behaviour is always fraught with potential problems due to the complexities and difficulty in correct interpretation and the risk of bias affecting results.
On the other hand, Hammond (2012; cited in Burgess., 2012) rejects the principle that Theory of mind is innate because she argues that, young infants (under 3year olds) do not understand the mental states of others, but rather, these emotional reactions they display are just learnt instances. Tager-Flusberg (2011, p.1), provides more evidence to disprove theory of mind as innate by stating that, standard false-belief tasks (Wimmer and Perner, 1983; Baron-Cohen et al, 1985) “provides unequivocal evidence that children understand that a person can be mistaken about something they themselves understand”. However this could be because children younger than 3 years, who participate in these tasks, have limited access to “computational mechanisms” (access to the human mind can be understood as a computer software programme) which direct the way children predict the behaviours of the characters in each particular false belief story (Edmond and Ferres, 2001, p.1). These false belief tests examine theory of mind as a cognitive process rather than an innate skill.
Bloom and German (2000), support the view that theory of mind is innate and reinstate the idea that classifying theory of mind, should not be solely based on an individual’s ability to pass standard false-belief tasks. For example, Hart and Risley’s, (1999) study provides support that if a child has a good rapport with its caregivers, in regards to the content and frequency of the conversations they engage in; this influences the child’s development of an already innate theory of mind. Furthermore recent evidence has shown that due to the difficulty of these false belief tasks, several aspects have been simplified to make it more practical and natural (Lewis & Osborne, 1991; Moses, 1993; Carlson, Moses & Hix, 1998; Zaitchik, 1991; German & Leslie, 2000; Mitchell & Lacoheae, 1991). Yet even with these simplified alternatives, false-belief tasks are still not appropriate for testing theory of mind in different social contexts (Bloom and German, 2000).
According to Fodor, (1992, p.133) theory of mind is an “innate modularized database” (theory that states through evolution, the mind is composed of separate innate structures, that have been developed to have different functional purposes) found in most young children. Therefore failure of false belief tasks can be deemed irrelevant, because young children naturally understand that the mind is innately given, due to their awareness of self. Consequently, when children younger than three, fail these tasks, this occurs due to the fact that they lack “access to the computational mechanisms required to predict the behaviour of others” (Edmond and Ferres, 2001, p.1). Mc Cann et al. (2007) argues that regardless of false belief tasks, the majority of high functioning autistic children, only suffer because of their deficits with aspects of language. Pyers and Senghas (2009) have shown, language has an effect on the development of theory of mind. This is relevant to a wider social debate regarding theory of mind. However, impoverished people who have had little exposure to language do not succeed at standard false-belief tasks, but yet, still possess a theory of mind, even though its development is delayed (Pyers et al. 2010). This occurs because, if an individual has not been exposed to appropriate mental state vocabularies, with verbs such as, “think” and “know” and has not acquired complex syntax needed for talking; this inhibits their ability to answer the false-belief questions (Tager-Flusberg and Joseph, 2005; Doherty, 2009). The issue with these arguments is that Pyers et al. (2010) study lacks replicable evidence showing how exactly how theory of mind can be tested without the appropriate measures and sufficient verbal communication, needed to test for an innate theory of mind. Some psychologists reject this opinion because according to Gopnik and Meltzoff, (1997, p.54) theory of mind cannot be seen as innate because ‘modularity’ (a view which states that the entire mind divides into highly specialized modules) and the environment play a much more crucial role in developing the mind. Without these two components, theory of mind could be described as an “anti-development”. For instance, if children younger than 3, do demonstrate an understanding of mental states (through thinking), this understanding will not be in sync with how the world really is (with reference to pretence, dreams and abstract images). Gopnik and Meltzoff’s, (1997) argument, disproves the idea that mental states and thinking are evidence of an innate theory of mind. Furthermore as Gopnik (2003) states, a child’s “representational aspects of desire are understood before representational aspects of belief” (Scholl and Leslie, 1999, p. 5.) In order words, this means that, subconsciously a child can have desires, yet not know about them. However when the child tries to access it, the child will need a feature of desire (want), which is only found after theory of mind has been attained.

As Baron-Cohen (1989a) states, theory of mind can only be achievable when a child has developed mind reading skills to understand the mental states of others. Since autistic children do not possess these mind-reading skills, it is accepted that these children do not have a theory of mind (Baron-Cohen et al, 1985) and continually fail false belief tasks (Bloom and German, 2000). According to Wimmer and Weichbold (1994, p.47) this failure “speaks for the validity of the false belief task, since social and communicative impairments are among the defining characteristics of autism.”
Nevertheless in other cultures, this presumption cannot be applicable. For instance Bickerton, (1981) found that in Creoles, young children are never corrected when they make a linguistic mistake whilst learning their language; hence new forms of pidgin is always being developed. This contentious argument disproves the idea that language solely influences theory of mind, because if creoles do not follow a strict syntax needed for talking, they do not need strict mental state vocabularies to understand how another person is thinking. These findings gain support from Premack and Woodruff’s (1978) study on chimpanzees, which found that theory of mind is achieved through a genetic endowment and not solely by language. Premack and Woodruff’s (1978) findings showed that chimpanzees, without the use of any language syntax showed awareness of the perceptions, goals, intensions and knowledge of others, which are traits associated with understanding the mental states of others in theory of mind.
According to findings by Peterson and Siegal’s (2000) children who are born with impaired senses are delayed in developing a theory of mind. Every individual needs physiological capacities for perception; for instance, eyes for seeing different perspectives in a cultural manner and ears for hearing the syntax and linguistic aspects of language. These sensory organs enable individuals to imitate and adopt the motor acts of others (Spradlin and Brady, 2008). Therefore until imitation is achieved a person cannot acquire and understand the mental states of others, hence the development of theory of mind will be delayed (Brandsborg, 2002; McAlpine & Moore, 1995).
Gopnik (1993, p.1) rejects the view of theory of mind as an innate genetic endowment, as she states, “at about the age of 4, there is an important developmental shift to a representational model of the mind”. This shift occurs, because after a certain period young children begin to gain insight into systematic observation, (Piaget, 1953) by losing their egocentric way of thinking and adopting an alternative approach towards the way they perceive the outcomes of certain situations (Somerville and Wellman, 1987). When this happens, young children obtain information which reject certain possibilities and accept the rest (Bryant, 1997; Shultz 1982; Fabricius et al. (1987). This process shows that theory of mind does not have a genetic endowment, because it is through the social factor of systematically observing their surroundings that young children learn to adopt a different thinking pattern.
O ‘Neil (1996) however supports the idea of the innateness of theory of mind through his findings, which showed toddlers have increased understanding of other people’s mental states if their caregivers are around. Additionally, in regards to the deaf Nicaraguan people in Pyers and Senghas (2009) study; evidence shows that individuals who are deficit in their ability to reason and understand the mental states of others, can show improvement, once aided with the appropriate mental state vocabulary (Tager-Flusberg, 2011). Which in effect provides support that theory of mind can be considered innate, because most people are born with a set of cognitions which help them perceive the mental states of others; however if they do not have the resources to communicate and express themselves, theory of mind will not manifest (Bloom, 2000).

There is considerable proof that genetic, social and cultural factors play some role towards the development of theory of mind. However the extent at which theory of mind can be considered solely innate or not innate remains a complex issue with compelling arguments. For the most part, babies do show basic early signs of theory of mind (Fodor, 1992), however they need a sophisticated set of intellectual skills to develop it (Reddy, 2008). As the infant matures, frequent and contextual conversations with their caregivers stimulate their development of theory of mind. However it could be concluded that after a while, a developmental shift occurs in a child’s understanding of the mental states of others. Hence as children begin to gain insight into systematic observation (Piaget, 1953) by losing their egocentric way of thinking and adopting an alternative approach towards the way they perceive the outcomes of certain situations differently (Somerville and Wellman, 1987). But if the child has impairments with their sense organs, this will lead to deficits in understanding the mental states of others; hence there will be a delay in their development of theory of mind. In conclusion, theory of mind can only be considered innate with the unified use of social, genetic and cultural factors.

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Reference

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