The purpose of this study was to investigate the relations between mother's emotional expressiveness, reactions to child's negative emotion, and Theory of Mind in normal infants aged 3-5. For these purposes, Nursery infants and their mothers who have ...
The purpose of this study was to investigate the relations between mother's emotional expressiveness, reactions to child's negative emotion, and Theory of Mind in normal infants aged 3-5. For these purposes, Nursery infants and their mothers who have lived in Incheon or Gyeonggi showed through the following results :
First, false belief task scores for measuring of understanding about Theory of Mind, showed significant differences in age. Namely, infants aged 4-5 years understand the Theory of Mind better than aged 3 years.
Second, mother's emotional expressiveness and reactions to child's negative emotion showed no significant differences in all ages 3-5 years.
Third, the relations between mother's emotional expressiveness, reactions to child's negative emotion, and Theory of Mind, showed partially relevant. The result of correlation analysis in all ages, mother's high emotional expressiveness was associated low tasks of Theory of Mind in ages 3-5 years. It was a little more specific. (1) Mother's high emotional expressiveness and intimate emotional expressiveness was related low Theory of Mind in ages 3 years. High supportive reaction and emotion focused reaction(ERP) and problem focused reaction(PFR) about negative emotion was related low Theory of Mind in ages 3 years. (2) High distress reaction(DR) about negative emotion was related low Theory of Mind in ages 4 years. (3) High supportive reaction and expressive encouragement(EE) about negative emotion was related low Theory of Mind in ages 5 years.
Finally, limitations and implications of this study are discussed.