A Research Of Theory Of Mind, Executive Function And The Relationship Between Them In Rural Preschool Children

Theory of mind (ToM)and executive function(EF) show a striking development in the preschool period. There is a shift from the age of 3 to 5 in children's success on ToM tasks and EF tasks. But there is no accordant conclusion about the relationship between ToM and EF until now.Russell considered that EF is the base of ToM; Perner deemed that meta-representation in ToM is the bedrock of the development of EF, Zelazo thought that the development of EF and ToM is parallel,the basic of them is condition reasoning.This research attempts to explore the relationship between ToM and EF in rural preschool children. It will help us to understand the inner mechanisms and individual differences in children's development of ToM. Meanwhile it can provide us the theoretical guide on how to foster children's ToM competence,improve their social communication skills and treat autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.This study involved five tasks:"unexpected location task","unexpected content task","DCCS task","the day-night stroop task",and"hand game task",the development of ToM"and "EF"of 92 children is investigated,so is the correlations between these tasks.The results of research show:(1) "ToM"and"EF"of preschool children in rural area develop constantly, and 4 years old is the key age in obtaining "ToM" and"EF".(2)The development of children's "ToM"and"EF" does not have gender differences, and the interaction between age and gender doesn't show significance either.(3)Correlations exist between the ToM tasks and between the EF tasks,this indicates that inherent consistency exists among ToM tasks and among EF tasks.(4) "ToM seems to be most significant correlation to "EF" in preschool children, "EF" has most significant regression to "ToM".