The Characteristics And Otherness Of The College Students’ Development Level Of The Theory Of Mind And The Relationship Between Field Cognitive Style And Theory Of Mind

Research on theory of mind is the third main research direction in the field ofcognitive psychology, after Piaget’s research on cognitive development and theresearch on metacognition. Based on previous studies of theory of mind, thepsychologist proposed several theories to explain theory of mind. Among them, theorytheory and modularity theory are the most popular. Theory theory contains thatexperience plays an important role in promoting the development of theory of mind,but modularity Theory contains that experience doesn’t promote the development oftheory of mind. The experience of field-independent people is different withfield-dependent people. Though comparing the development level of the theory ofmind of field-independent people with field-dependent people, this paper explores ifexperience has promoting effect on the development of theory of mind.There are three parts in this paper，Researches of theory of mind and fieldcognitive style are reviewed in the first part. This paper describes the differentperspectives of these two theories about the experience and the researches about thedifference between people with field-dependent and field-independent cognitive styles.The study raises the following assumptions based on the analyses of the past research:1、the score of the theory of mind of field-dependent people is significantly better thanfield-independent people.2、the score of the theory of mind of field-dependent peopleis at the same with field-independent people.Take the case of students in Jiangxi Normal University. The second part of thispaper consists of two sections. The first section used a series of standardized means torevise reading the mind in the eyes test. The Cronbach’s Alpha of the revised readingthe mind in the eyes test is0.652, the reliability reach statistical requirements.The second section use the revised Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test to prove upthe characteristics and otherness of the theory of mind between different subjects,genders and grades of undergraduate students. The second section also uses theEmbedded Figure Test to prove up the characteristics and otherness of field cognitivestyle between different subjects, genders and grades of undergraduate students. In theend, the study proves up the relationship between field cognitive style and theory ofmind.The result shows:1. The development level of the theory of mind of female is at the same withmale.2. The development level of the theory of mind of undergraduate is at the samewith postgraduates.3. The development level of the theory of mind of arts students is at the samewith science students. 4. The development level of field cognitive style of female is at the same withmale.5. The development level of field cognitive style of undergraduate is at the samewith postgraduates.6. The development level of field cognitive style of arts students is at the samewith science students.7. The development level of the theory of mind of field-independent people is atthe same with field-dependent people.8. The result supports the perspective of the modularity theory.In the end，the whole study is reviewed and the practical values are pointed out.Then the deficiency in this study and the expectation in the future are put forward.