Correlation between Learning / Intention and ToM

Table 9.4 lists correlations between ToM indicators and children’s responses to the intention and learning outcome questions. Both intention and learning outcome were significantly correlated with ToM scale score, false belief, and the sum of Contents FB

and Knowledge Access. Correlations mostly stayed significant after controlling for age. Children’s understanding of the mechanism of intention in learning was strongly correlated with their mental state understanding.

Table 9.4

Correlations between ToM indicators and Learning / Intention questions in Study 6

ToM False Belief Contents FB and Knowledge Access Zero-order correlation(df = 64) Intention _.30* (.016) .38** (.002) .40** (.001) Learning _.29* (.017) .28* (.025) .33** (.006) Controlling for age (df = 63)

Intention _.20 (.111) .32* (.010) .33** (.008) Learning _.26* (.038) .24 (.054) .31* (.011)

Note. Cells contain Pearson correlations. Numbers in parentheses are p values; *: p < .05;

**: p < .01; ***: p < .001.

9.6 Discussion

In her thesis on intentional bias, Rosset (2008) argued that human actions are assumed intentional until proven otherwise. People tend to impose an intention on accidents as a causal explanation. The focus of intention understanding is not how to infer intention, but how to inhibit it. This is what happened in the tasks of NI-L and R-L in the current study, where the learner picked up the knowledge or skill through accident or implicit learning without a learning intention. These two tasks were the most difficult ones, as shown in Figure 9.1, indicating children’s difficulty of inhibiting the assignment of a learning intention.

However, this is not the whole story. The negative intention tasks NI-NL and R- NL were quite easy for children. The challenge in Study 6 was presented by tasks with a conflict. When the learning intention was congruent with the learning outcome, children could use their understanding of knowledge state change to help them answer both the learning question and the intention question. When the learning intention was

incongruent with the outcome, the same strategy would only lead to mistaken

modification of intention judgment based on the learning outcome. Note that only those who understood the causal effect of intention would adjust their intention judgment to try to explain the unexpected learning outcome, even though it was an inaccurate and

incomplete explanation. Younger children who were yet to develop a causal

understanding of intention might even answer the intention question correctly based on behavioral cues (whether the character was paying attention to the learning event), without realizing there might be a connection of some sort between the learning intention and the learning outcome whatsoever, such as what happened in PI-NL.

Children had a hard time accepting positive intention could lead to negative outcome. ―You are lying,‖ one 5-year-old boy commented on the story of PI-NL, ―how come he did not learn if he had tried very hard to?‖ Overall, children adjusted the intention judgment to accommodate the simple cause-effect explanation of the relation between intention and outcome. In stories with negative learning outcomes like PI-NL, more children got the learning correct and the intention incorrect with the increase of age (1 in 4-year-olds, 6 in 5-year-olds, and 12 in 6-year-olds, see Table 9.4). It seemed younger children answered the intention question in PI-NL correctly simply because of the influence of Yes bias.

With the increase of age, children began to take both intention and the learning outcome into consideration simultaneously, and favored the learning outcome by adjusting the intention judgment to meet the simple causal framework. Children developed an understanding of learning outcome first; then incorporated the learning intention in the causal relationship by treating the learning intention and outcome as a bundled unit and used a simple cause-effect relation to make sense of the learning event. As far as the current sample is concerned, 6-year-olds did not yet understand the complex mechanism of intention in the process of learning. As shown in Figure 9.1, the 6-year- olds did well on intentional judgment in non-conflict stories, but responded at random in conflict stories, exact p = .541 for PI-NL, exact p = .3.07 for NI-L, and exact p = .307 for R-L.

Even though intention is not a sufficient or necessary condition for learning, it is nevertheless an important component in mindful learning. Children’s understanding of

the mechanism of intention in learning was strongly correlated with their mental state understanding.

Mills and Keil (2004) argued that overestimating one’s own knowledge and ability has adaptive advantages because it gives children a positive self-concept and protects them from getting hurt knowing they are incompetent in so many areas. Following that logic, over-attributing learning is also adaptively meaningful, in that it gives children a (false) sense of control in their own learning. As an intentional stance is the default in action explanation (Dennett, 1987; Rosset; 2008), children readily impose intention in pure discovery and implicit learning to claim credit; and discard intention in failed learning to stay clear of liability.

In summary, Study 6 replicated Study 1 in finding that children over-attributed learning in failed learning events. More importantly, this study found that children had trouble with learning scenarios that presented a conflict between the learning intention and outcome. They adjusted the intention judgment to keep in line with the learning outcome. Both children’s intention judgment and learning judgment were correlated with mental state understanding.

CHAPTER TEN Theory of Mind Scaling