Linking functional brain organization and social-cognitive abilities from infancy to childhood.

心理理论是思考心理状态的能力，如思想，信念和意图， 自己和他人。它对于与他人互动和向他人学习至关重要; 与自闭症等心智理论受损相关的发展状况表现出非典型的发展性 结果。尽管心理理论在人类的社会和认知功能中起着基础性的作用， 如何发展尚不清楚。一方面，直到3-5岁，儿童才能够 成功地回答关于他人精神状态的明确问题。另一方面， 在6-7个月大的婴儿中，这表明我们在能够 回答关于他们的明确问题。在过去十年中一直争论的主要问题是， 科学文献是如何自发的社会认知敏感性， 婴儿的透过看行为与后来发展的外显心理理论推理有关。的 一个根本的障碍是协调不同的婴儿测量和方法的结果， 儿童（和成人）。在这里，我们建议进一步追求一种新的，有前途的神经科学方法， 测量整个生命周期的心理理论发展，并开始根据已知的、相关的 行为和大脑指标。我们将结合联合收割机视频刺激后，行为注视时间的研究， 这只需要被动观察与光学脑测量称为近红外光谱（NIRS）， 可用于婴幼儿、儿童或成人。首先，我们将尝试开发强大的指标， 使用6-10个月大的现有NIRS数据对心理理论的功能性脑敏感性和选择性 婴儿和4-5岁儿童的新数据。接下来，我们将开始通过分析 在一个4-5岁儿童的横断面组中，他们与心理理论中的行为能力的关系。 最后，对心理理论发展在大脑和行为两个层面上的纵向研究进行可行性探索 通过将先前收集的婴儿NIRS数据与在4-5岁时收集的相同个体的新数据直接联系起来， 年我们提出的前进方向，如果成功，将克服目前的测量限制， 字段并提供请求支持的经验理由（例如，R 01）进行心理理论的全面研究 使用我们的新方法进行开发。这有可能解决长期存在的问题， 心理理论发展的直接测试自发心理理论之间的关系 婴儿期的心理加工和儿童期的外显心理理论推理。在未来，它也可能更好地帮助我们 理解以自闭症等社会认知受损为特征的发育性残疾， 检测和高质量的测量是非常具有挑战性的。大脑前所未有的特性， 我们打算收集的行为数据也有可能成为更广泛的理论和应用的桥梁。 了解大脑和认知在早期发展中的关系。

Theory of mind is the ability to think about the mental states, such as thoughts, beliefs, and intentions, of oneself and others. It is critical for interacting with and learning from other people; individuals with developmental conditions associated with impaired theory of mind like autism show atypical developmental outcomes. Despite the fundamental role of theory of mind in human social and cognitive function, when and how it develops remains unclear. On the one hand, it is not until 3-5 years of age that children are able to successfully answer explicit questions about the mental states of others. On the other hand, looking behavior in infants as young as 6-7 months suggests that we track the mental states of others well before we are able to answer explicit questions about them. The main question that has been debated over the last decade in the scientific literature is how spontaneous social-cognitive sensitivities to the mental states of others apparent through looking behavior of infants relate to later developing explicit theory of mind reasoning. The fundamental barrier has been reconciling results from different measures and methodologies in infants and children (and adults). Here we propose to further pursue a new, promising neuroscience methodology to measure theory of mind development throughout the lifespan and begin to validate it against known, relevant behavioral and brain metrics. We will combine video stimuli modeled after behavioral looking time studies and that only require passive viewing with an optical brain measure called near-infrared spectroscopy (NIRS) that can be used with young infants, children, or adults. First, we will attempt to develop robust metrics of functional brain sensitivity and selectivity for theory of mind using existing NIRS data from 6-10-month-old infants and new data from 4-5-year-old children. Next, we will begin to validate those metrics by analyzing their relationship to behavioral abilities in theory of mind in a cross-sectional group of 4-5-year-old children. Finally, we will pilot the feasibility of studying theory of mind development in brain and behavior longitudinally by directly linking previously collected infant NIRS data to new data collected on the same individuals at 4-5 years. The way forward we are presenting, if successful, will overcome current measurement limitations in the field and provide empirical justification to request support (e.g., R01) for a full-scale study of theory of mind development using our novel approach. This has the potential to resolve longstanding questions regarding theory of mind development by directly testing the relationship between spontaneous theory of mind processing in infancy and explicit theory of mind reasoning in childhood. In the future, it may also help us better understand developmental disabilities characterized by impaired social cognition like autism, where early detection and high-quality measurement are very challenging. The unprecedented nature of the brain and behavioral data we propose to collect also has the potential bridge broader theories on and applications of understanding the relationship between brain and cognition over early development as well.