Mental-State Reasoning Is Universal Milestone in Child Development
A major social-cognitive achievement of young children is the understanding that other people act on the basis of their own representations of reality rather than on the basis of reality itself. Developmental psychologists have explored the refinement of mental-state reasoning in children, typically by measuring their ability to pass false-belief tasks, such as the example above. Yet previous research has only been conducted in Western cultures, where children pass such tests around the age of 5. New research reveals that children reach this false-belief milestone at about the same age the world over.
Dr. John Grohol is the CEO and founder of Psych Central. He is an author, researcher and expert in mental health online, and has been writing about online behavior, mental health and psychology issues -- as well as the intersection of technology and human behavior -- since 1992. Dr. Grohol sits on the editorial board of the journal Cyberpsychology, Behavior and Social Networking and is a founding board member and treasurer of the Society for Participatory Medicine.Like this author?
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Last reviewed: By John M. Grohol, Psy.D. on 28 Jul 2005
Published on PsychCentral.com. All rights reserved.
Grohol, J. (2005). Mental-State Reasoning Is Universal Milestone in Child Development. Psych Central. Retrieved on May 25, 2012, from http://psychcentral.com/blog/archives/2005/07/28/mental-state-reasoning-is-universal-milestone-in-child-development/
