Model of a person’s mental state

The term “mental state model” refers to the ability to attribute independent representations to oneself and other people in order to explain one’s and others’s behavior. These ideas should be independent of both the real state of affairs (since people can expect something that is not really) and the ideas of other people (because people can expect and desire different things). As the philosopher Daniel Dennett pointed out, the full model of the mental state can only be used in explaining and predicting behavior, which is based on false expectations, because if the explanation of behavior requires the involvement of only the real state of affairs (or one's own beliefs), reasoning about ideas another person is not required at all ^[1] .

The English term theory of mind (literally “theory of reason”) stems from the impossibility of directly observing the mental processes of another living being ^[2] . Each person can verify the existence of their own thinking only through introspection . No one has direct access to the psyche of other people. Accordingly, the assumption that others also have intelligence is only an assumption (one of the meanings of English theory is 'assumption, hypothesis'). As a rule, each person believes that other people have thinking similar to his own, based on such signs as bilateral social interaction , joint attention ^[3] , communicative use of speech ^[4] and understanding of other people's emotions and actions ^[5] . The mental state model allows us to imagine the thoughts, feelings and aspirations of other people and to guess their intentions. As indicated above, this gives us the opportunity to understand the fact that intrapsychic processes can be the cause of other people's behavior. Thus, we can predict and explain the actions of others ^[2] . The ability to attribute different thoughts and feelings to other people and treat them as the reason for the corresponding behavior allows us to consider human consciousness as a “generator of representations ” ^{[6] [7]} . The absence of a holistic model of the mental state may be a sign of a mental disorder in the process of ontogenesis .

“Understanding of someone else’s consciousness” is another name for this phenomenon (or another translation of theory of mind ). A “concept" (or understanding) is defined as the result of the totality of all perceptions of an object that allows us to abstract from the object. In the internal plan, one can operate with concepts, but not objects, which is ensured by the complex structure of the human brain. By “consciousness” is meant the entire totality of internal brain (psychic) ​​phenomena that are the cause of behavior that another individual can perceive, that is, consciousness is knowledge together with someone, co-knowledge (according to P.V.Simonov). Then “understanding of another’s consciousness” can be defined as the ability to perceive the behavior of another individual and its internal causes (intentions, emotions, thoughts, etc.). ^[eight]

The model of the mental state, apparently, is a natural ability of a person, but for its full development requires many years of experience in social interaction. Different people can develop more or less effective models of their mental state. Empathy is a close concept, meaning the ability to recognize and directly experience the desires, beliefs and experiences of other people - which corresponds to the commonly used expression "to get into someone else's skin."

The mental state model is not limited to only one level (order). For example, the question “What is Vasya thinking about?” Implies the construction of a model of the first-order mental state. The statement based on the second-order mental state model in our example will sound like this: “He thinks that Petya does not like him.” The statement based on the third-order mental model: “Petya knows that Vasya thinks that Petya does not like him.” Thus, the order of representation of internal representations can increase indefinitely.

Over the past 30 years, since the publication of an article by David Primack and Guy Woodruff " Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?" ^[9] , many researchers conducted an active study of the mental state model in various populations of subjects (people and animals, adults and children, participants with normal and abnormal development). The emergence of such a field of science as social neurobiology , enriched the study of this problem through visualization of the brain during tasks that require an understanding of the intentions, emotions or beliefs of others.

The modern concept of the model of mental state originates from philosophical discussions of the past. In particular, the question was raised in “Reflections on the First Philosophy” by Rene Descartes ^[10] - the work that determined the further development of the science of the human mind. To date, two basic approaches to the model of mental state have been distinguished in philosophical literature: theory of theory and theory of simulation . According to the theory of theories, a model is used to conceptualize the psyche of other people, which is a true theory - “folk psychology”. Such a model arises instantly and its construction is genetically determined: only application points are socially determined. ^[eleven]

Simulation theory, on the contrary, proceeds from the assumption that the model of a mental state is by its nature - not just a theory. Two types of simulation are proposed ^[12] . One version (proposed by Alvin Goldman ) emphasizes that the subject must first recognize his own state of mind before assigning another state through simulation. Another version of the theory of simulation implies that for the awareness of thoughts and emotions (both ours and others), we need a special logical procedure, called Robert Gordon (Robert Gordon) "transition procedure" (ascent routine). The implication is the receipt of an answer to a question about the state of mind by paraphrasing a regular question into a metaphysical. For example, if Zoya asks Masha: “Do you think that dog wants to play with you?”, Masha, to answer this question, will first need to ask herself: “Does that dog want to play with me?” That is, people, as a rule, learn about the inner life of other creatures, trying to put themselves in their place.

At the moment, the most studied side of the mental state model is ontogenesis . Studies of perception in children have shown that the most important aspects of modeling the mental state are formed by the age of 3-5 years. Here you can draw a parallel with Piaget's research, which revealed the end of the egocentric stage in 3-4 years.

At the moment, the question of the existence of a model of the mental state in children under the age of 3-4 remains open. Indeed, it is difficult to evaluate the system of internal representations in a child who has not yet mastered the speech sufficiently. At the same time, there are many experimental methods for determining the ability to represent internal representations in older children and adults.

Tasks for Understanding False Beliefs

The classic false belief task, or the Sally — Anne task, was proposed by Wimmer and Perner in 1983 ^[13] and is still one of the most common tests for studying the mental state model. . In this assignment, the child is shown two dolls, Sally and Ann; Sally has a basket and Ann has a box. The child sees Sally putting her ball in a basket and leaving. While Sally is gone, mischievous Anne shifts the ball from the basket into her box and also leaves. Now Sally is back. The child is asked: “Where will Sally look for her ball?” According to research using tasks for understanding false beliefs, children under 4 years old, as a rule, cannot correctly solve this problem. It should be noted that according to Baron-Cohen et al. (1985) ^[14] , while most children of the corresponding age, including children with Down syndrome, cope with the task, up to 80% of autistic children are not able to understand the fallacy of Sally's expectations.

Tasks for understanding the falsity of one’s own beliefs

The problem of understanding the falsehood of one’s own beliefs (own false belief task), or the task of “seemed-turned out” (appearance-reality task), was first proposed by American scientists A. Gopnik and JW Astington ^[15] . The essence of the test they developed is as follows. The child is asked to guess what is in the candy box. When the child says “candy,” they open the box, showing that in fact there is a pencil. Then the experimenter closes the lid again and says: “When Petya arrives, I will show him this box closed, as you have. I will ask him what's inside. What will he say? ”Four-year-old children can easily cope with this task. Younger children, as well as autists, often cannot correctly answer the question.

Tasks for Understanding True Beliefs

A test of this kind was proposed by Leslie and Frith in 1988 ^[16] . It consists of the following: a dollhouse with two rooms is shown to the child - one has a table, the other has a wardrobe. There is a ball on the table, and exactly the same ball lies in the closet, which is shown to the child. Then they say to him: “Vasya went for a walk and left his ball on the table. He did not see the ball in the closet. When he comes, where will he look for his ball? ”It was shown that children with autism (allegedly unable to build an adequate model of their mental state) equally often point to both the first and second rooms. That is, they are guided not by Vasya’s beliefs (in this case, true - the ball really is where he left it), but by the real state of things.

Theory of Theory

The so-called “theory-theory” ( English theory-theory ) is a concept of organization not only “theory of mind”, but also cognition of a person in general. According to her, the prediction, explanation and interpretation occurs in accordance with the internal structure of knowledge - the so-called folk psychology ( English folk psychology ). A child is considered as a scientist, and, accordingly, a parallel can be drawn between the development of the child and the evolution of science: a change in scientific paradigms allows us to explain an increasing number of phenomena, just as, as an adult, a child begins to cope with a large number of tasks. There are three stages in the development of “theory of mind”:

1. Psychology of desires (2 years) . The psychology of desire, which appears in a child at the age of two, is a conceptualization of desires, emotions, and cognitive experience. Although this conceptualization is not representative, the object of desire is an object of the real world: the desire of the object exists and dominates, while the internal representation of the object is absent. A two-year-old child can predict the emotions or actions of a hero who either finds the desired object, or does not find it, or finds a replacement for it.
2. Psychology of desires and beliefs (3 years) . By the age of three, children are already aware of the presence of not only desires, but also beliefs, but they more often explain actions in terms of desires rather than beliefs. It is likely that three-year-olds are beginning to realize that beliefs, like internal representations, may turn out to be false.
3. Psychology of desires and beliefs (4 years) . By about four years old, children imagine that a person’s desires and beliefs determine his behavior and that a person’s beliefs are an interpretation of reality; This is evidenced by the successful completion of the task of understanding the falsity of beliefs.

An alternative structure for the development of “theory of mind” is the division into two stages: situational and representative; transition point - this is just the solution to the problem of understanding the falsity of beliefs.

Imitation Theory

According to the theory of imitation ( Eng. Simulation theory ), children are aware of their mental state and can draw conclusions about the mental state of other people by imitation. So, in the task of understanding the falsity of beliefs, a child can predict the beliefs of another, mentally imagining what he would think himself if he were in the place of another. This process, which is actually a prediction, may be unconscious. Thus, the development of “theory of mind” boils down to improving the ability to make more precise imitations. Besides the fact that imitation is necessary in predicting and explaining the behavior of other people, it is required in the assimilation of social and cognitive knowledge and skills. In the theory of imitation, the key role is given to experience, since imitation skills improve only during practice. The theory was created by G. Tarde . The experiments on this theory were somewhat cruel.

Modular Theory

Modular theory ( English modular theory ) arose by analogy with the modular theories of language and perception ( Eng. ) It postulates the presence of a special brain mechanism for determining the mental states of people, which is either congenital or appears in the early stages of human development. Children do not learn the theory of internal representations, because beliefs are a relationship of judgments, not representations; the development of “theory of mind” in ontogenesis is due to the neural development of this module ( Theory of Mind Module (ToMM)), and there are two sections of the module: for agents and for objects. Although experience is necessary to launch these mechanisms, it is not decisive in the structure of the theory of mind.

The most active parts of the brain, associated with the theory of mind activity, are the prefrontal cortex and the border of the prefrontal and premotor cortex , the brain regions responsible for voluntary actions.

Small information processing capabilities

The reason that children cannot cope with the solution of some “theory of mind” problems is the limited ability of memory and the inability to suppress the dominant ready-made solution. Accordingly, with the development of the brain and its capabilities, the volume of episodic memory increases, which is considered the main type of memory in issues of “theory of mind”.

A new impetus to the development of “theory of mind” was received after the discovery of a special type of visual-motor neurons - the so-called “mirror” ones , which are activated both during the execution of an action on their own and during the observation of an agent (most often conspecific) performing the same action, for example, offering a hand to the mouth or grabbing a small object. Initially, mirror neurons were found in anthropoid apes , then in humans and subsequently in some bird species.

Thus, mirror neurons are an argument in favor of the theory of imitation and, to some extent, combine it with the modular theory. Perhaps mirror neurons are the basis of the complex imitation mechanism that underlies the theory of imitation.

The history of studies of the animal's mental state model begins with an article by D. Premack and G. Woodruff, “Are chimpanzees capable of building a mental state model?” ^[17] . The chimpanzees showed Sarah a video in which a person with a puzzled face tries to get a branch of bananas that is outside the cage, after Sarah was provided with two images, one of which showed the solution (bananas were obtained with a stick) - Sarah chose this picture. Researchers thought this was evidence that chimpanzees could be aware of mental conditions.

Povinelli suggested more convincing arguments of "theory of mind" among monkeys. ^[18] There are four opaque buckets in the room, one of the two experimenters is blindfolded, the other hides a treat under one of the buckets imperceptibly for the monkey. As an informant, the monkey chose one of the experimenters who could really know.