Abstract
While there is a steady increase in research examining growth of theory of mind (ToM) over middle childhood and adolescence, there remains a paucity of studies on how older children employ ToM to interpret the behaviors of others. We conducted two studies and used a new task – the Mr Bean task – based on a wordless video to examine understanding of a variety of mental states and a preference for mental state reasoning in children and adults. Study 1 examined 131 children (5–13 years) and 418 adults in New Zealand and included open-ended questions requiring participants to explain agents’ behaviors. Study 2 also used a Mr Bean video and tested 80 children (6–16 years) and 49 young adults in New Zealand but asked multiple-choice questions, each with a correct mental state option, a correct general reasoning option, and an incorrect version of each option. Our study provided the following novel findings. First, children’s ToM continued to progressively improve from middle childhood to adolescence, and through to adulthood in that, relative to adults, children erred more frequently when they reasoned using mental states. Second, explanations referring to emotions, intentions and cognitions were used more frequently with age. Third, children were less likely to use mental state reasoning and more likely to use general reasoning compared to adults; only adults preferred to use mental state rather than general reasoning. Fourth, the advantage in adult ToM was related to their superior vocabulary but not fluid intelligence. Our findings provide clear evidence that not just ToM accuracy, but also preference for mental state reasoning continue to evolve from middle childhood through to adulthood.