Theory of Mind

Before I get into talking about stories and strategies, I want to put forth a couple of “technical” articles about autism.  Theory of Mind is probably the biggest key in my understanding of why my son, Toby, does what he does.

My Autism Specialist explained to me the concept of Theory of Mind and gave me several books and articles to read on the topic.  I have since told her on many occasions that my understanding of the Theory of Mind concept was like a light switch turning on for me.

I want to start here because I am certain that it will do for you what it has done for me.

People with autism are said to lack something called Theory of Mind.  To give this another term, it could be said that they are unable to Mind-Read.  This is basically a lack of ability to understand others’ emotions and motives.  Not being able to understand these intangibles makes it difficult for people with autism to understand situations and the motives behind other people’s actions and words.

The world we live in is a social one.  It is said that up to 90% of our communication comes from intangibles such as tonality and body language.  What if you weren’t able to understand either of these?  How much more difficult would it be to infer what is happening in a situation or what someone is really saying to you?  This is part of why it is common for kids on the autism spectrum to misunderstand events or spoken language.

Everyone has heard autism referred to as a “spectrum”, and the spectrum is vast.  Kids are affected in widely varying amounts.  To be specific, my son has a diagnosis of PDD-NOS, which is Pervasive Developmental Disorder, Not Otherwise Specified.  PDD-NOS is sort of a “catch-all” for kids who display signs of autism but who do not meet the clinical guidelines for other autism spectrum disorders, such as Autism and Asbergers, as spelled out in the DSM IV.

How this pertains to Theory of Mind is that he is not completely devoid of it.  Those who are far more impaired cannot understand the difference between people and inanimate objects such as a rock or a desk.  They don’t know that human beings are living, breathing, emotional beings.  They are typically unable to show affection and don’t understand that when they hit someone, that it hurts that person.

When Toby was younger and the doctors were trying to figure out why he had lost his language and hadn’t regained it around age 3, they had initially ruled out autism because he was very affectionate.  He continues to be affectionate to this day; however, he does still lack Theory of Mind, although not entirely.

Lack of Theory of Mind is what causes children with autism to not understand some spoken language like sarcasm and idioms.  They tend to be very literal and understand things in “black and white”, as in it either “is” or it “isn’t”.  So, if a child with autism spills a peer’s milk and the peer sarcastically says “thank you very much”, this is confusing.  The child with autism is thinking “I wouldn’t be happy if someone spilled my milk but he just thanked me for doing it.”

Other ways this can affect a child with autism is unexpected outcomes.  If a child thinks that an outcome is going to be A but it ends up being B, the child can get upset and shut down.

An example of this happened this summer.  I was taking Toby swimming at a lake where we had previously been fishing.  Despite having told Toby that we were going swimming and for him to put on his bathing suit, when we arrived at the lake, he opened the trunk of the car to grab the fishing poles.  To his dismay, we hadn’t brought the fishing poles.  This angered Toby because he had his mind set on fishing.  When this wasn’t going to happen, he shut down and refused to swim.

He did this because the outcome did not match the expectation and he shut down and refused to swim.  Before understanding Theory of Mind, I would have been angry and made him swim.  However, due to my new knowledge, I understood why he reacted this way and was able to calmly discuss what had happened.  He still didn’t want to swim, but at least he wasn’t punished for his behavior.  Instead, he sat on the beach and played in the sand.

As you can see, I will not get very technical with this.  This is not my place or area of expertise.  There are great articles and books that you can read to get a better understanding of this topic.  I am only talking here about my practical understanding of it.  I will continue to write articles, many of which will be stories of first-hand events or others that have been told to me by My Autism Specialist.  In each one, I will attempt to show how a lack of Theory of Mind played a role in the story.

Theory of Mind has helped me to understand the bigger picture of Toby’s behaviors and how to help him.  Because of this, I want to make sure that you understand, at least on a conceptual level, as to what Theory of Mind is.  We will be talking about it A LOT in the future.

If you are unfamiliar with this topic, it is absolutely crucial that you work to gain an understanding of Theory of Mind.  As I mentioned above, it has been like a light switch being turned on in my understanding of Toby’s actions and reactions.

Theory of Mind can be taught to children so please don’t be discouraged.  Please do some of your own research and reading.  Below are some books and articles that I have read on the topic to increase my understanding but they are by no means the limit of the available literature.

I welcome comments, questions and suggestions as well as your own stories. You can send the emails to myautismspecialist@gmail.com.

Thank you for reading.

Books:

Teaching Children with Autism to Mind-Read: 1999 Howlin, Baron-Cohen & Hadwin

Navigating the Social World:  2001 McAfee & Attwood

Articles:

http://www.autismspeaks.org/inthenews/ian_findings_social_skills.php

http://www.mugsy.org/asa_faq/issues/tom.shtml [Theory of Mind test]

http://www.autismnetwork.org/modules/character/tom/lecture05.html