A-level psychology: Baron-Cohen

understanding disorders- individual differences- autism eyes task

what is theory of mind?

being able to see the world through someone else's eyes

what was the old test for theory of mind?

the Sally Anne test

why was wrong with the Sally Anne test?

it only worked with children and it wouldn't work with children with a high IQ which made it an invalid test

what was the aim in Baron Cohen's study?

to create a new 'advanced theory of mind test'

what was the method used in the study?

quasi experiment- naturally occurring IV in an artificial setting

what year was this study done?

1997

how many groups were there and what were they categorised as?

3 groups- autistic group, normal group, tourettes groups

what was the sample in group 1?

16 individuals with high autism and aspergers

4 autistic individuals and 12 individuals with aspergers

gender ratio 13:3 (m:f)

what was the sample in group 2?

50 'normal adults' 25 male and 25 female

what was the sample in group 3?

10 adults with tourettes

gender ratio 8:2 (m:f)

where was the sample in group 1 recruited from?

group 1 was recruited from an advert in the national autistic magazine

where was the sample in group 2 recruited from?

group 2 was drawn from the general population of Cambridge

where was the sample in group 3 recruited from?

group 3 was recruited from a teritary referral centre in London

how many pairs of eyes were there in the 'eyes task'?

test contained 25 pairs of eyes

what are target and foil words?

the target word would have been the correct word for the photo shown and the foil word was another word but incorrect

how many judges were asked to decide on the target and foil words?

4 judges- 2 male and 2 female

how many judges were tested before the actual study?

8 judges were tested and they did not know the purpose of the study

why didn't Baron Cohen make the foil and target words?

so that it reduced bias therefore making it valid

what were the 4 tasks that Baron Cohen presented?

eyes test- advanced theory of mind

happés strange stories- advanced theory of mind

basic emotion recognition task- full face

gender recognition task- eyes only

what was the eyes task?

participants were shown 25 different pairs of eyes for 3 seconds each and these photos were standardised to the same size and were in black and white

Underneath the photos were 2 opposite words (target and foil words) to choose from

what was happé's strange stories task?

participants were presented with a short story and then asked questions about it- this was used to check the validity of the eyes task

what was the basic emotion recognition task?

participants were shown 6 full faces where they were asked to identify the correct emotion- this was used to make sure that the findings from the eye task was not due to the lack of ability to recognise basic emotions

what was the gender recognition task?

participants were asked to look at photos of standardised eyes just like in the eyes task but this time they were to use social judgements to identify whether they were a man or woman- this was done to check whether poor performance in the eyes task was linked to the lack of facial perception

what were the findings for the eyes task for group 1?

autistic/aspergers group (out of 25)

mean score: 16.3

range: 13-23

what were the findings for the eyes task for group 2?

'normal group' (out of 25)

mean score: 20.3

range: 16-25

what were the findings for the eyes task for group 3?

tourettes groups (out of 25)

mean score: 20.4

range: 16-25

what was the findings for the eyes task for the 'normal male and females group'?

males: means score: 18.8 range: 16-22

females: mean score:21.8 range: 20-25

what was the IV in this study?

whether you had autism/aspergers, tourettes or not

what was the DV in this study?

the scores on the tasks

what are the two target and foil words you should remember?

attraction- repulsion

certain- uncertain

what was the conclusions from Baron Cohen?

more errors were made by the autistic group on the eyes task and happés strange stories

girls did better on the eyes task in the 'normal group' therefore have better theory of mind

there were no significant differences between the groups on the gender and emotion control tasks

what type of design was used in the study?

matched pairs design