False-Belief Understanding - Assignment Example

Examine the Association between False Belief Understanding and/or Executive Functions and Social Competence Name Institution Examine the Association between False Belief Understanding and/or Executive Functions and Social Competence Various studies illustrate or demonstrate associations among false-belief understanding (FBU), executive function (EF), and the essence of social competence. In this review, the focus will be on evaluation of ten peered-review journals in relation to the associations among false-belief understanding, executive function, and social competence. In the course of achieving this goal, the review will concentrate on the assessment of the aims of the studies, research participants, and techniques or methods by the researchers in the development of the studies. In addition, the review focuses on evaluation of the findings by the researchers in the studies prior to illustration of the implications for the early childhood professional practice. Razza & Blair (2009) focused on extending the assessments by previous studies through illustration of the longitudinal associations among the false-belief understanding and its correlates within a low-income sample of the preschoolers attending Head Start. In the course of achieving this purpose, the study did consider assessing sixty-eight children with a mean age of sixty-two months in relation to their preschool and kindergarten years. According to the findings of the study, the researchers did determine the essence of bidirectional relations between false-belief understanding and social competence. From this perspective, it is essential to understand the influence of the positive associations between the false-belief understanding and social competence in kindergarten. On the other hand, the findings of the study did demonstrate a positive association between social competence and false-belief understanding in kindergarten (Razza & Blair, 2009). Similarly, there were positive associations between preschool executive functions and the social competence in the kindergarten and preschool contexts, as well as with the false-belief understanding in the preschool context. According to the mediation analysis, there bidirectional longitudinal association between the false-belief understanding and social competence tends to be independent of the executive functions. In addition, Benson & Sabbagh (2013) focused on the evaluation of the relationship between executive functioning and social cognition. According to this research article, it is essential to consider the usage of the ‘theory of mind’ in order to make sense of, as well as predict the behaviour of the individuals around. The ‘theory of mind’ refers to the essence of understanding peoples’ actions emanating from the idiosyncratic mental states in relation to intentions, beliefs, and desires. In the current context, various works demonstrate the existence of a connection between the preschoolers’ abilities and potentialities to illustrate theory-of-mind understanding and the development of the executive-functioning skills in relation to the frontal cortex. In this context, executive functioning relates to the relevant skills, as well as processes and abilities, which facilitate acting in thoughtful and planned aspects towards the achievement of the relevant goals. The purpose of the article was to summarize research with reference to the nature of the associations between executive functioning and false-belief understanding prior to evaluation of the implications for the social competence. Joseph & Tager-Flusberg (2004) focused on the investigation of the extent to which individual difference in the false-belief understanding and executive functions could offer substantive explanation in relation to the various in the social competence under the influence of severe autism symptoms. In the course of executing this study, the researchers focused on the inclusion of 31 verbal- school-aged children with autism, thus administration of a battery of tests to facilitate understanding of their mental states. From this perspective, the study focused on evaluation of the associations between the false-belief understanding and the executive control skills. According to the findings of the study, there were significant variations beyond explanation by the language level in the communication systems. Nevertheless, the false-belief understanding and executive functioning could not offer substantive explanation to the significant variations in the reciprocal social interaction, as well as repetitive behaviors features. Moreover, Rezayi (2013) did focus on comparing the social competence in two groups of students with the autism disorder and learning disorders. The researchers focused on integration of a descriptive approach with two comparative groups, thus the usage of 90 research participants under the influence of random sampling technique. The researchers incorporated the Felner 4 dimensions SCT (social competence test) in the assessment of the social competence prior to analysis of data under the influence of the T-test. According to the findings of the study, social competence mean scores of learning disorder students proves to be higher in comparison with the autism disorder. From this perspective, the autistic children fail to accomplish social competence because the false-belief understanding and impairments of the executive function. This demonstrates the positive influence of the executive function and false-belief understanding in enhancing social competence in children. Riggs et al (2006) focused on reviewing diverse literature linking the executive function to the social-emotional development in children while proposing integration of three testable or falsifiable models under which executive function can influence interventions. This is through operating as a mediator, moderator, and implication of the intervention effects. According to this study, executive function plays a critical in the enhancement of the social competence and emotional development among children. From this perspective, executive function comes out as the collective aspect relating to interrelated sub-skills for the purposeful, as well as goal-oriented activities in children. Mizokawa & Koyasu (2008) focused on the evaluation or examination of the correlations between understandings of the hidden emotions and the theory of mind, thus the concept of the false-belief. In the course of executing this research, the focus was on 105 children charged with diverse hidden emotion tasks, as well as vocabulary test and first-and-second-order false belief tasks. The teachers did participate in the rating of the social interactions or competence of the children in relation to the peer relationships. According to the findings of the study, the individual differences in the children’s understanding of the false-belief and hidden negative emotions did relate to the differences in the language ability. From these results, it is vital to note that children with more advanced understanding of the false-belief have the potentiality to overcome various issues concerning social competence. The study focused on the evaluation of the findings in terms of the social and cognitive competence of the children. Razza & Blair (2007) focused on the evaluation or examination of the role of self-regulation in relation to emerging academic ability in one hundred and forty-one 3-to-5-year-old children from the low-income homes. In addition, these researchers did concentrate on relating the measures of effortful control, false-belief understanding, and aspects of executive function in preschool to the measures of the literacy and math ability among the children in kindergarten. According to the findings of the study, diverse child self-regulations tend to account for unique variance in relation to the academic outcomes, which are independent of the general intelligence. Moreover, the executive function correlates to both early literacy and math abilities, thus enhancement of the social competence. Newton (2011) did focus on the evaluation and investigation of the potential associations between the development of the theory mind and social competence. In addition, the research sought to evaluate the relationship between social peer play and the social competence among young children. In the course of achieving these objectives or purposes, the researcher did focus on investigating theory of mind task performance, frequencies of the observed social play, and parent-rated social competence in 85 three-to-five-year-old Australian preschool children. According to the findings of the study, social interaction during play proves to be essential for the development of the young children’s social competence. Furthermore, there is an inverse association between the high frequency solitary play and the social competence, which eventual demonstrates positive associations with the overall problem behavior among the young children. Razza & Blair (2003) did focus on the evaluation or investigation of the false-belief understanding in relation to a low-income population. This is through examination of the false-belief understanding among children attending Head Start through assessment of the coherence among diverse tasks prior. The method did offer a platform for the assessment of the relations between false-belief understanding and verbal ability, as well as social competence. The study did incorporate fifty-three research participants. According to the findings of the study, there is moderate consistency in relation to the children’s performance concerning diverse tasks, which were essential in the evaluation of the associations between false-belief understanding and social competence. Finally, the study did focus on the exploration of the gender effect on the false-belief understanding. Walker (2005) focused on the evaluation or examination of the potential and existing relationships, as well as associations between the theory-of-mind understanding and preschool-aged children’s peer-related social competence. In the course of achieving this objective, the study did focus on the utilization of 111 three-to-five-year-old children towards participating in the two theory-of-mind tasks aiming at evaluation of their understanding of the false-belief. In addition, teachers did play critical roles in the course of rating peer-related social behavior in accordance with the aggressive or disruptive behavior, pro-social behavior, and shy or withdrawn behavior. According to the findings of the study, theory-of-mind understanding did have critical implications towards prediction of the aggressive or disruptive behavior among boys while demonstrating pro-social behavior for the girls. Moreover, theory-of-mind did demonstrate aspects of lower scores in relation to withdrawn behavior for the boys. The researcher focused on the presentation of the findings in accordance with the gender differences in the factors generating early peer competence. Based on the reviewed research journals, there are two critical implications in relation to the early childhood professional practice. In the first instance, there is need to adopt and incorporate effective and efficient interventions towards improvement of the social competence of children. In order to make this effective, there is need to consider integration of the false-belief understanding or theory-of-mind training with the positive pro-social or executive function, thus the perfect platform for the improvement of the social competence among the young children. This will enable early childhood practitioners to take into considerations the social goals of the young children in the course of addressing their educational and theory-of-mind understanding or development. The findings of these research journals are appropriate in enhancing the social and cognitive development through effective and efficient planning. Secondly, it is essential to note that false-belief understanding and executive function performance have the tendency of differing across income levels because of various factors such as familiarity with the tasks’ format and level of comfort concerning the interview process. Nevertheless, early childhood practitioners should express caution in making diverse conclusions relating to the influence of these performance variations in reflecting fundamental diversities towards the acquisition of the false-belief understanding and executive function. From this perspective, there is need to execute future research practices with the intention of determining or exploring the associations in more ethnically diverse samples by the early childhood practitioners. References Benson, J., & Sabbagh, M. A. (2013). The Relation between Executive Functioning and Social Cognition. Executive functions, 21. Blair, C., & Razza, R. P. (2007). Relating effortful control, executive function, and false belief understanding to emerging math and literacy ability in kindergarten. Child development, 78(2), 647-663. Joseph, R. M., & Tager–Flusberg, H. (2004). The relationship of theory of mind and executive functions to symptom type and severity in children with autism. Development and psychopathology, 16(01), 137-155. Mizokawa, A., & Koyasu, M. (2008). Children’s understanding of hidden emotion, theory of mind, and peer relationship. Newton, E., & Jenvey, V. (2011). Play and theory of mind: associations with social competence in young children. Early Child Development and Care, 181(6), 761-773. Peters Razza, R., & Blair, C. (2003). False-belief understanding in a low-income population. Early Education and Development, 14(4), 425-440. Razza, R. A., & Blair, C. (2009). Associations among false-belief understanding, executive function, and social competence: A longitudinal analysis. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 30(3), 332-343. Rezayi, S., (2014), “Social Competence in Children with Learning and Autism Spectrum Disorders.” Iranian Journal of Clinical Psychology, 2 (1); 31-35. Riggs, Nathaniel R., et al, (2006). Executive function and the promotion of social–emotional competence. Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology, 27(4), 300-309. Walker, S. (2005). Gender differences in the relationship between young children's peer- related social competence and individual differences in theory of mind. The Journal of genetic psychology, 166(3), 297-312. Read More