Measuring advanced theory of mind: Do story-based tasks work?

Abstract

Introduction: Although much is known about theory of mind (ToM) development during childhood, data on how these skills develop in adolescence is scarce. This cavity is due in part to the limited knowledge about measures of advanced theory of mind.

Methods: The study examined the relation among six common story-based tasks designed to measure advanced ToM in two age groups of Polish adolescents: early (13-year-olds; 78 girls) and late (16-year-olds; 143 girls) adolescents.

Results: Factor models for individual tasks were constructed, followed by an examination of the underlying structure that explained the variability of factor scores. Only in half of the tasks, the results revealed an age-related increase in advanced ToM. Contrary to expectation, results showed a lack of correlations among story-based advanced ToM tasks in the two adolescent groups.

Conclusions: The results suggest a lack of coherence among advanced story-based ToM tasks and the need for further development of reliable and valid advanced ToM measures which are sensitive enough to show increasingly complex social reasoning abilities in adolescence.

Keywords: Adolescence; Advanced theory of mind; Social understanding.