Intuitive physics and intuitive psychology ("theory of mind") in offspring of mothers with psychoses

Abstract

Offspring of individuals with psychoses sometimes display an abnormal development of cognition, language, motor performance, social adaptation, and emotional functions. The aim of this study was to investigate the ability of children of mothers with schizophrenia (n = 28) and bipolar disorder (n = 23) to understand mental states of others using the Eyes Test (folk psychology or "theory of mind") and physical causal interactions of inanimate objects (folk physics). Compared with healthy controls (n = 29), the children of mothers with schizophrenia displayed significantly impaired performances on the Eyes Test but not on the folk physics test when corrected for IQ. The children of mothers with bipolar disorder did not differ from the controls. The folk physics test showed a significant covariance with IQ, whereas the Eyes Test did not exhibit such covariance. These results suggest that the attribution of mental states, but not the interpretation of causal interaction of objects, is impaired in offspring of individuals with schizophrenia, which may contribute to social dysfunctions.

Keywords: Bipolar disorder; Folk psychology; Schizophrenia; Social cognition; Theory of mind.

Figure 1. Experimental stimuli.

Examples of stimuli used in the folk psychology (“theory of mind”, Eyes Test) (A) and folk physics (B) experiments (Baron-Cohen et al., 2001).

Figure 2. Results of the experiments.

Mean performances on the folk psychology (“theory of mind”, Eyes Test) and folk physics tests. Error bars indicate 95% confidence intervals. CONT, children with negative family history for psychotic disorders (controls); BPD, children of mothers with type I bipolar disorder; SCZ, children of mothers with schizophrenia. ^∗p < .005, F test, significant after controlling for IQ (SCZ < CONT).