| Theory of mind refers to individual understanding and be aware of a psychological state of themselves and others by virtue of a certain knowledge systems, and the ability of making causal prediction and interpretation of the behavior of others. Previous research about theory of mind in children mainly focus on ages when children acquire it as well as factors that influence the development of theory of mind. Since 2005, the development of children theory of mind and factors in different cultural backgrounds gradually become a hot topic. Currently, children’s theory of mind in cross-cultural studies relatively focused on comparing eastern culture with western culture, but less investigated differences between subcultures in great cultural background. China is a multi-ethnic country with 56 ethnic. Although both integration in Chinese civilization, but many minorities still retain their unique and intact culture. This offers the possibility is to study the differences between subcultures, and also provides a new perspective for cross-cultural studies of psychological theory. This study was carried out from two aspects. One aspect: examining the developmental level and characters of children’s theory of mind in Han, Bai, Yi, Naxi ethnic, exploring the commonality and specificity of children’s mind of theory in different ethnic. The other aspect:making training programs for improving the development of children’s theory of mind, exploring whether the programs is valid or not.The first research adopted Wellman’s task about theory of mind with five levels-Level 1:different desire. Level 2:knowledge access. Level 3:different beliefs. Level 4:Content false belief. Level 5:hidden emotions, and selecte representative 120 children each from Yi (Li jiang Ning lang), Bai (Nujiang), Naxi(Lijiang), Han ethnics for Experimental studies across the nation, to examine the developmental level and characters of children’s theory of mind. The results are as follows. First, by using measurement models of Guttman and Rasch, we found that children from the four ethnics showed a consistent sequence of development in the developmental levels of theory of mind:different desire> knowledge access> different beliefs> Content false belief> hidden emotions. Second, children from Bai ethnic developed slowly at the age of three to five, then developed quickly after five years old; Children from Yi ethnic developed quickly at the age of three to four, then developed slowly at the age of four and five, finally, developed quickly after five years old; children from Na Xi ethnic developed slowly at the age of three to four, then developed quickly after four years old. Third, the turning point of theory of mind of children from Yi, Bai and Naxi ethnics are are 4-5 years old. Which lagged a year or so Compared with Han children.The second research designed training programs for the development of theory of mind, and selected 30 Bai child whose theory of mind scores is under 30 for intervention Training. The results show that training programs play a important role in improving children’s theory of mind. In addition, There was no significant difference in improving the ability of theory of mind on gender.The whole research shows that children’s theory of mind are improved with age in Bai, Naxi and Han ethnics, and they have the same pattern of development, but the overall development of children with all ages lags behind Han children of about 1 year. Cultural differences, family education and customs are likely to be the important factors which affect the development of children’s theory of mind. This study not only provides data support for practical intervention of children form Yi, Bai,Naxi ethnics as well as develops effective intervention training program, but also offers scientific practice value for Cross-cultural studies of children’s theory of mind to be localized. |
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