Theory Of Mind
Bender
Citizen
I've been thinking a lot about this lately, and honestly started to ask myself if it really exists at all.
I've only heard the term while learning about autism, from what I understand, it's supposed to be something that NTs are able to do instinctively.
But this hasn't been my experience with people at all, and I'm talking about the way "normal" people react towards each other, not those on the spectrum.
First, most seem incapable to relate to experiences they never had themselves: this often leads to terrible advice or being very judgemental. While many seem to understand for instance that people can want different things in life or have different values, preferences and desires, a lot don't seem to process this at an emotional level and would often see others' choices as invalidating their own or even as offensive, abnormal or unhealthy 
I see this all the time, regarding personal or career choices, whether people have children or not, where and how they live, what they wear or eat and an array of other trivial things. I won't even mention religion, politics/ideology or sexual orientation, that's a whole other level of madness.
Even when they had the experience, the whole thing seems very limited and specific: I've often seen people who suffered discrimination and prejudice doing the same thing to a different group, seemingly oblivious of what they're doing (Incel culture would be an extreme example of people being in the same boat, but being extremely unsupportive and prone to sabotage even towards their brethren.). And even within such groups, there's always the pissing contest about "who has it worse" as if they get some kind of relief out of thinking their struggles are the worst in the world. Doesn't this reflect a clear disconnect and lack of ability to instinctively relate to others?
Obviously, some people don't do these things, but in my experience, they are pretty rare.
I'm not asking about the reasons why people act or react this way, I can understand that for the most part. I'm asking where is this mythical theory of mind and how does it manifest itself in those who are supposed to have it?
Am I missing something? Is it only supposed to apply to very basic things like being cold or hungry? Is it maybe just a very week trait easily overcame by ego?
Comments
The key word in theory of mind is "theory" no it is not science of mind.NT's do it better but not perfectly,autistics struggle with it but do have limited TOM.It's theory not science and some people have better TOM than others but no person has absolute knowledge of other peoples thoughts.
Good theory of mind is being good a guessing what people might be thinking or feeling and guessing right more often but not always.Women are probably better than men(feminine intuition)
But that can be and is usually done at an intellectual level, even if some people aren't aware of the process. I thought this was supposed to be instinctive, or am I being too literal?
I'm not sure,it could be a combination of both,I don't have answer for that.Intuitions are thought but thoughts based on ones own emotional reactions to things or people as opposed to thoughts that come from books,academic lectures or otherwise intellectual study.When a woman has an intuition,there thinking but the thought comes from there emotions.What Psychological doctors have written on the subject does not specify other than TOM is thoughts about thoughts specifically other peoples thoughts.Or empathetic thinking not just knowing what people feel but understanding it's validity and relevance.
Realizing that NTs have just as limited theory of mind as autistic people are supposed to have is baffling. Lack of TOM is always a "symptom of autism", but I've noticed most apparently NT people I talk to have horrendous TOM and sometimes get defensive, if not downright aggressive, if you put the thought that other people feel/think different ways about certain things into their head.
Whatever TOM is, it's not "instinctual" and there's no way everyone has good TOM. If NT people struggle that much with it I'd genuinely like to know what the baseline for autistic people is supposed to be?
This reflects my experience to a T.
This is precisely what I'm trying to understand too
Thinking about it more, maybe they specifically mean things like not getting that other people don't have the same knowledge/experience with something? Or not being able to understand that something annoys someone even though it doesn't annoy you?
In school my friends were usually autistic/had autistic traits, and we used to get in arguments from time to time because someone wouldn't understand that another one of us didn't know how to do something, or why that thing annoyed someone else. It ended up in arguments because we all were in different areas of TOM development, even though we were in the same grade, and we'd all have different reasonings and understandings of things and would get frustrated.
I still think NT people have an issue with this, but observing other kids they were able to reason with each other a lot better and didn't have as many arguments over those things.
I've seen a lot of NTs doing this too. The whole "it's no big deal, get over it".
I forgot about the Sally-Anne test. Assuming people have the same information I do is definitely something I still do sometimes and so does my autistic son.
Excellent point, maybe I conflated the whole thing too much with "empathy".
Thank you for reminding me of this aspect
The main TOM deficit is the belief people make decisions based on how the world is, as opposed to people making decisions on how they think the world is.So TOM is the belief people make decisions on perceptions,so TOM is the calculation of other peoples perceptions.
Yes NT's make this mistake all the time,you see it in politics and religion.NT's think the world is how they perceive it and think other people perceive the world the way they do.You see this in every political discussion and religion.
^ Indeed, in addition I’ve observed a variable tendency to assume that everyone is as capable as they are unless a visible disability is clear... and assume moral failings in the other when proven wrong in this assumption.
And another, also variable, tendency to assume anything they haven’t experienced is “theory” and therefore “speculation” and therefore false.
Quite true
How true this is! If only more people would understand the difference...
This thread turned out to be more helpful than I expected
My whole thought process of questioning this TOM thingy started exactly with things like these and how common they are. Perception and projection run rampant too.
I'll refrain from ranting about how much I hate assumptions or you'll never hear the end of it
Yes: it can be one of the most frustrating aspects of trying to converse with humans in general.
For the moment I’m operating under the hypothesis that TOM is an automatic (borderline/wholly un) conscious proto-cognitive function that is highly adaptable to both cultural context in childhood (in both a broad sense, and the particular of this family in this neighbourhood attending this school etc etc) and the direct subjective experience of the mind within which it is operating:
that is to say I think NTs have TOM, but it’s a highly personal, subjective process that operates through a fog of biases, prejudices, traumas, trained blinkers & triggers ... and so forth.
A survival mechanism that has to function like this for assimilation into groups maybe?
(I think I put that much better in WP at some point...
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I conflate it with empathy a lot, too, but to be fair it seems that when people talk about TOM (at least when NTs talk about it with each other) the conversation seems to be based on empathy, probably because they have an easier time with the other two things and take them for granted a bit.
I think regarding the "It's no big deal," thing my friends and I didn't necessarily just think things weren't a big deal, we flat out couldn't understand why someone was having a problem with what we were doing. With the autistic people I've talked to it seems to be more that we literally could not understand why someone is upset by something, and with NT people they seem to sometimes just be dismissive because they do have the skills to understand it, they just don't want to/don't see the need to because their view works for them and that person is really just concerned with things affecting them.
I still struggle a lot with not understanding why people are upset by things, so whenever I have a conversation about something like that I try really hard to consciously put myself in the place of someone else and try to imagine the reasons why they'd not like me doing something.
But, that's why I don't get how TOM could be "instinctual", nothing about it is "instinctual" for me and I have to consciously think through everything relating to it. I still want to know if NT people just automatically get TOM or if they have to do the same thing I do.
Are you just trying to make me feel glad we're not supposed to have it?
You're probably hitting the nail on the head here, it always boils down to group dynamics - I'd like to say with NTs but I'll go with humans, since various forms of tribalism seem very strong in people on the spectrum too.
^ Could be spun like that
Can have positive conditioning as well, and alongside, the negative: those aspects just didn’t seem relevant.
Could also function as a driving force behind a lot of charitable work & giving for instance, or careers in healthcare.
The “whatever ideological row is current” variants of tribalism certainly.
I am a bit seizure fragged at the moment so my ability to recall things is a bit like trying to do an unsolved cross-word puzzle currently ~ but a simple analogy for Theory Of Mind (TOM) is dancing with people and playing games where people have to take turns in playing roles, with Neurologically Typical types (NTs) being more generically and habitually predisposed to "filling in" with them dynamically (i.e., going with the flow), and us Neurologically Divergent types (ND's) being more predisposed to having to learn them mechanically (i.e., the moves and the motions),
There is a book called the GAMES PEOPLE PLAY : THE PSYCHOLOGY OF HUMAN RELATIONS, by Eric Berne MD, and it explains all the rules and roles for each of the games, which most people have not got the foggiest or even the faintest idea about how explain ~ I mean from the age of three I asked about the sociological patterns of behaviour I observed people habitually following and got no relevant answers until I started doing a psychology and sociology course at college when I was 19; when I became friends with a fellow student who loaned me a copy of GAMES PEOPLE PLAY ~ and all the patterns of behaviour and the whys and what fors I had been asking about were addressed in considerable detail, and also relatively simply too.
Here's three ten minute videos going through the basics involved with TOM from the TA perspective:
Transactional Analysis 1: Ego States & Basic Transactions:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKNyFSLJy6o
Transactional Analysis 2: Games:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YOqJ4sc9TAc
Transactional Analysis 3: Gimmicks:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58F2qYyAzME
And if you fancy going through a self help book that is also a qualification manual ~ there is quite a good one called, TA Today : A New Introduction to Transactional Analysis, by Ian Stewart and Vann Joines,
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I am following this with great relish and curiosity.
It is really interesting to see different perspectives on this subject.
It is usually the caregivers reaction to a baby's emotion which helps the baby come away from completely being inward focused to learning to understand how touch, noises and language match their experiences. A mother or father figure does a great deal to teach by modelling the ability or TOM.
So here is where it starts.
I'll have to reflect more, especially on the second paragraph - I'm not entirely sure how it works for me. I generally just accept when someone says they're upset whether I understand it or not.
Putting yourself in someone else's shoes would also require knowing them very well, as being in a situation that would upset them, might not upset you, personally, at all. Personality, individual experiences and preferences etc can make a big difference. I'm often not bothered by things that seem to annoy most people or get aggravated by things others tolerate or even like.
I think that's the point: it's supposed to be "instinctive" for NTs, but not for us.
Anecdotal: I used to know a guy who regularly said stuff like "How can you eat that, it's disgusting?" when someone was eating something he didn't like and othter similar things because he seemed literally incapable to understand that his taste and preferences are not universal: basically, he thought said food is objectively disgusting. He also didn't understand why people got pissed off by this. But the real problem was that he refused to stop volunteering such opinions when nobody asked him and thought people were in the wrong to react negatively to him.
This touches on the crux of the issue and connects with Tem's post: most NT children pick such things from the adults around them without ever being explained things in detail or in a formal fashion, while we would need such explanations.
You see the same thing with body language and other forms of non-verbal communication: most people who are good at it are incapable of explaining the cognitive process behind it, especially since so much of it is contextual. I needed to formally learn such things, then practice them, sometimes assisted by an NT.
I remember running into TA before - I don't process videos well, so I'll pick up Berne's book, thank you.
Also, I hope you feel better soon.
Yes, and as I was saying above, NT children mostly "pick up" these things from their parents in an informal way (my experience has been that small children learn much more by mimicking and through play then through formal or verbal instructions), while autistic ones are not supposed to - yet, they still seem to pick many of their parents' maladaptive behaviours or prejudices
Which also goes back to Karamazov's comments about tribe and culture 
This is very complicated, it's hard for me to tell where it starts and where it ends and pinpoint precisely the nature of impairment in people on the spectrum, there's a lot of overlap between "instinctive" and learned behaviours.
I find that theory of mind problems that emerge are more a linguistic thing for me. I've always spoken in an old-fashioned, overly formal, (confessedly) pedantic kind of way, and so when dealing with members of the public, especially younger ones, who can seldom construct a full sentence, I often feel I'm speaking a foreign language.
I don't really find it that hard to put myself in someone else's shoes even if I don't know them, I just try to think about the possible reasons why someone would be upset by something or feel a certain way about something. Whether I get the actual reason they're upset or not, it makes more sense to me and I can accommodate people better/have better conversations with them about a topic.
When I do that I don't just think about how I would feel, I think about reasons why someone who has a specific opinion/feeling would have that view and how that could cause them to react a certain way.
Example: Someone says they don't like dogs and thus don't want to be around dogs at all. Being around dogs stresses them out. I don't feel that way towards dogs, but I can imagine maybe that they don't like how loud dogs are, or had a bad experience with a dog as a child, so then it makes more sense to me that they don't like them or want to be around them.
That sounds very sensible. Pragmatic too, given the result.
It would actually be great if more people would think this way, instead of dismissing what they don't understand, as it happens so often.
Snap!
I’m not 100% successful, and haven’t always done it: started doing it after I tore up my adult life and started again age 29, I’ve gradually become calmer and found that I can hypothesise possible legitimating or extenuating explanations.
(Terrified of dogs by the way: loudness, speed, teeth: muscly ones are extra scary, I freeze immobile if one comes too close to me. Never had a bad experience: it’s an animal level all consuming dread)
I don't really remember how and when I figured out how to do this, and sometimes peoples feelings about things still don't make sense to me. When that happens I just don't really talk about the topic at all as I obviously don't get their view enough to talk about it.
Also, I like dogs a lot, but some of them still scare me. I definitely get how someone can not enjoy being around them as they aren't always predictable, and certain breeds of dogs I don't like being around my pets or the people in my family as they can lock their jaws if they bite something.
It’s obvious, but true: theory of mind is the ability to know that not everyone has the exact same thought pattern as one’s self.
To be autistic does not mean a lack of “theory of mind.” Or of empathy.
There was an article published by Nicholas Chown in 2014, titled 'MORE ON THE ONTOLOGICAL STATUS OF AUTISM AND DOUBLE EMPATHY' which covers what @kraftiekortie has stated above as follows:
"The double empathy/cross-neurological hypotheses of Milton and Beardon can be summarised as follows:
(1) non-autistic people appear to have as much difficulty in understanding autistic minds as vice versa;
(2) autistic people often develop a greater understanding of society than non-autistic people develop of autism; and
(3) autistic people have a similar ability to empathise with other autistic people as non-autistic people have with their peers.
Milton does not suggest that non-autistic people are less capable of developing an understanding of autism than vice versa; as he points out, it is simply that autistic people have no choice but to try to develop an understanding of society if they are to ‘survive and potentially thrive’ whereas no such imperative applies in the opposite direction (Milton2012). If one accepts that autistic people appear to understand other autistic minds as well as non-autistic people understand each other, this would be a significant achievement given that, in general, persons with autism spend far less time with their peers than non-autistic people spend with theirs. I think it is unlikely that autistic people do understand other autistic minds as well as those with-out autism understand each other but I do agree with Beardon that autistic people have an affinity with other autistic people which non-autistic people do not have. I believe this implies that, given the same level of interaction with their peers as non-autistic people generally have with theirs, persons with autism could develop autistic ToM similar to non-autistic ToM. On this basis it appears that the ontological status of autism is partly dependent upon the simple fact that only about 1% of any population is autistic (Brugha et al.2009) so that, of necessity, our society, which is almost totally a social construction by members of the majority non-autistic neurotype, is a fundamentally non-autistic society."
https://tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09687599.2014.949625?needAccess=true
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