Theory of mind and empathy: The predictive effect of parenting

In this study of low income Head Start preschoolers, several Theory of Mind (ToM) tasks were employed to explore the validity of the age norms in the literature. Preschoolers passed the ToM tasks at lower rates than is generally reported, casting doubt on the universality of the age norms. The children were passing simpler quasi-ToM tasks and could be viewed as being in transition from no understanding to full ToM. This study also looked at prosocial behaviors as a measure of empathy in the same group of children. It was demonstrated that empathy and ToM might be separate constructs. Children's total ToM scores were, for the most part, unrelated to children's empathy scores. The fact that child age, child verbal IQ and caregiver's level of education related to ToM but not to empathy suggests that ToM is primarily a cognitive ability whereas empathy is more emotionally based. It was also demonstrated that responsive caregiver-child interactions at age three were associated with higher Theory of Mind scores at age four to five. In addition, concurrent responsive parenting was predictive of better performance on the ToM tasks and on prosocial behaviors over and above responsive parenting at baseline, child age, child verbal ability, mothers' ethnicity and education.