Larkin, Fionnuala ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-3838-9165, Schacht, Robin, Oostenbroek, Janine, Hayward, Emily, Fernyhough, Charles, Munoz Centifanti, Luna and Meins, Elizabeth (2020) Mind-Mindedness versus Mentalistic Interpretations of Behavior: Is Mind-Mindedness a Relational Construct? Infant Mental Health Journal.

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Abstract

Mind-mindedness is a measure of the tendency to represent significant others in internal-state terms and is central to supportive parent–infant relationships. The two studies reported here explored whether mind-mindedness generalizes to representations of unknown individuals, using a novel task that assessed individual differences in adults’ tendency to interpret others’ behavior with reference to their internal states: the Unknown Mother–Infant Interaction Task (UMIIT). We compared UMIIT performance to measures of mind-mindedness from (a) adults’ descriptions of close friends and partners (Study 1, N=96), and (b) mothers’ appropriate versus non-attuned comments on their infants’ internal states (Study 2, N=56). In line with the proposal that mind-mindedness is a relational construct, UMIIT performance was unrelated to mind-mindedness in both studies.

Item Type:	Article
Status:	Published
DOI:	10.1002/imhj.21901
Subjects:	B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology B Philosophy. Psychology. Religion > BF Psychology > BF712-724.85 Developmental psychology
School/Department:	School of Education, Language and Psychology
URI:	https://ray.yorksj.ac.uk/id/eprint/4824

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