Children's use of triadic eye gaze information for "mind reading."

Kang Lee, Michelle Eskritt, Lawrence A. Symons, Darwin Muir
1998 Developmental Psychology  
Five experiments examined children's use of eye gaze information for "mind-reading" purposes, specifically, for inferring another person's desire. When presented with static displays in the first 3 experiments, only by 4 years of age did children use another person's eye direction to infer desires, although younger children could identify the person's focus of attention. Further, 3-year-olds were capable of inferring desire from other nonverbal cues, such as pointing (Experiment 3). When eye
more » ... e was presented dynamically with several other scaffolding cues (Experiment 4), 2-and 3-yearolds successfully used eye gaze for desire inference. Scaffolding cues were removed in Experiment 5, and 2-and 3-year-olds still performed above chance in using eye gaze. Results suggest that 2year-olds are capable of using eye gaze alone to infer about another's desire. The authors propose that the acquisition of the ability to use attentional cues to infer another's mental state may involve both an association process and a differentiation process. We gratefully acknowledge the contribution of the children who participated in the study and the children's parents and teachers for their kind cooperation. Thanks also to Julie Board and Lianne Fisher for comments on a draft of the article and to Krista Muir for her help in data collection.
doi:10.1037//0012-1649.34.3.525 pmid:9597362 fatcat:kqy2wwhph5bghifsmg2vm2aupe