Using Fiction to Assess Mental State Understanding: A New Task for Assessing Theory of Mind in Adults

• DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0081279
• Publication Date: 2013-11-07T22:03:18Z
• Authors: David Dodell-Feder; Sarah Hope Lincoln; Joseph P. Coulson; Christine I. Hooker
• Keywords: Rubric; Ceiling effect

Social functioning depends on the ability to attribute and reason about mental states of others – an known as theory mind (ToM). Research in this field is limited by use tasks which ceiling effects are ubiquitous, rendering them insensitive individual differences ToM instances subtle impairment. Here, we present data from a new task Short Story Task (SST) - intended improve upon many aspects existing measures. More specifically, SST was designed to: (a) assess full range without suffering effects; (b) incorporate differing complexity, including epistemic states, affective intentions be inferred first- second-order level; (c) stimuli representative real-world social interactions; (d) require participants utilize context when making state inferences; (e) exhibit adequate psychometric properties; (f) quick easy administer score. In task, read short story were asked questions that assessed explicit reasoning, spontaneous inference, comprehension non-mental story. Responses scored according rubric assigned greater points for accurate attributions included multiple characters’ states. Results demonstrate sensitive variation ability, can accurately raters, exhibits concurrent validity with other cognitive tasks. The results support effectiveness measure study cognition. findings also consistent studies demonstrating significant relationships among narrative transportation, ToM, reading fiction. Together, indicate fiction may avenue improving ability.