Topic Summaries

Development of social cognition

A-Level > Psychology > AQA > A-Level Psychology Topic Summaries > Cognition and development > Development of social cognition
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  • 👥 Selman’s (1971) level of perspective talking: perspective talking is the cognitive abilities take on the viewpoint or perspective of another person in both physical and social situations. Selman developed a series of stages each characterised by a fault in reasoning. He assessed 60 children using perspective taking tasks. This included the ‘Holly and her kitten’ task which presents children with a scenario of a child called Holly whose father makes her promise not to climb trees, then later finds a kitten stuck in a tree. The purpose of the task is to assess children’s understanding of conflicting perspectives (e.g. Holly wants to help the kitten but doesn’t want to make her father upset).
    • Level 0: undifferentiated (3–6 years old): children are socially egocentric and confuse their own feelings for others (e.g. a child saying ‘Holly’s father would be angry if she climbed the tree’ without considering if her father might understand of her motivations).
    • Level 1: socially informational (6 to 8 years) where children can take on only a single perspective at each time (e.g. a child might say ‘Holly’s father would be angry because he doesn’t know about the kitten’).
    • Level 2: self-reflective (8 to 10 years) children can fully identify with and take on the viewpoint of another person but only identify with one perspective at a time (e.g. a child saying ‘Holly might think her father will understand if she explains she is rescuing a kitten’).
    • Level 3: mutual role taking (10 to 12 years) children can fully identify with and take on multiple perspective at a time (e.g. a child explaining both Holly and her father’s points of view).
    • Level 4: societal (12+ years) children can now understand that social rules are needed to maintain order and taking on one person’s perspective is not enough (e.g. a child saying ‘Holly’s father would approve of Holly knowing when it is okay to break rules for the greater good of helping others’).
  • Social cognition: theory of mind and the Sally-Anne test: theory of mind is the ability to understand what other people are thinking and feeling. 👥 Baron-Cohen et al.’s (1985) Sally-Anne test is a false belief task where participants are asked to identify where Sally would look for her marble after it had been moved without her knowledge. 80% of the control group (including 14 with Down syndrome and 27 neurotypical children) correctly answered, compared to 20% of the autistic group.
  • The mirror neuron system:
    • Mirror neurons are a set of specialised neurons that are theorised to be located in the premotor cortex, the supplementary motor area, and the primary somatosensory cortex. These neurons are activated when we see the motor actions of others but are also activated when we perform motor actions ourselves.
    • There’s a strong link between mirror neurons and understanding intention in others. 👥 Gallese et al. (1996) suggested that by identifying and reenacting the observed behaviours using our motor system, mirror neurons can then be used to understand the intentions behind actions. Understanding intention is a key part of perspective taking.
    • 👥 Ramachadran (2000) examined the role of mirror neurons in the development of humanity as a social species.He believed that the evolution of mirror neurons gave our ancestors evolutionary advantages by increasing likelihood of survival. Mirror neurons aided the learning of language and advanced practical skills (e.g.hunting and cooking).
    • 👥 Oberman and Ramachadran (2006) found that neurological deficits involving mirror neurons are a potential cause for an autistic spectrum disorder. If someone has a faulty mirror neuron system, they are unable to understand intention behind actions. This is referred to as the broken mirror neuron hypothesis. This may lead to an autistic person being more socially awkward as they struggle to read other people.
      • Most of the research conducted into the mirror neuron hypothesis is purely correlational. Increase activity in one brain area while completing task is assumed to be mirror neurons; however, we cannot pinpoint it and can only indirectly study such phenomena. Some psychologists question whether mirror neurons even exist at all.
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