Thinking while talking: adults fail nonverbal false-belief reasoning.
This experiment tested the ability of 81 adult subjects to make a decision on a simple nonverbal false-belief reasoning task while concurrently either shadowing prerecorded spoken dialogue or tapping along with a rhythmic shadowing track. Our results showed that the verbal task, but not tapping, significantly disrupted false-belief reasoning, suggesting that language plays a key role in working theory of mind in adults, even when the false-belief reasoning is nonverbal.
Newton
Ashley M
AM
Smith College, Northampton, MA 01063, USA.
de Villiers
Jill G
JG
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D003657:Decision Making / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007600:Judgment / Q000502:physiology; D007802:Language; D009043:Motor Activity / Q000502:physiology; D009633:Nonverbal Communication / Q000523:psychology*; D011936:Reality Testing; D013060:Speech / Q000502:physiology*; D013647:Task Performance and Analysis; D013850:Thinking / Q000502:physiology*; D014705:Verbal Behavior / Q000502:physiology; D014743:Videotape Recording