THEORY OF MIND DEFICITS IN ADULT STROKE PATIENTS

我们提出了一个研究计划，以测试对话语的解释 中风患者表现出的障碍，特别是那些右 大脑半球损伤 这个项目的主题是什么， 被称为一个人的“心理理论”，即，他或她的推理能力， 理解别人的信仰、情感和动机是什么 主意了 准确地将精神状态归因于他人的能力 在沟通中起着关键作用。 例如，听众需要 推断说话者的信念和意图，以确定 非真实的话语（字面上不真实的话语）是一种诚实的错误， 故意的谎言，或试图开玩笑、戏弄或讽刺。 即一个 说下雨时天气很好的人可能不会 知道下雨了（一个错误），可能知道下雨了买想欺骗 ”““撒谎，“或者“ 同样，说话者需要推断出他们的听众知道什么和不知道什么 为了使他们的话语信息丰富和相关：当被问到 当一个人在阅读什么时，回答“一本书”是没有信息的，因为 发言人已经知道了这一点。 推理能力和 心理状态和话语能力已经在两者中建立 正常儿童和自闭症儿童。 该研究主要有两个方面 目标. 首先，我们评估前后两个人的能力， 一组单侧左右半球受损的中风患者， 理解信念（不可观察的、心理的、表象的 状态）扩展到其它不可观察的状态（例如，饥饿）和 非心理表征（例如，照片），或反映了一个选择性的 局限于理解心理和表象状态的缺陷。 第二、 我们测试了心理理论缺陷是否能预测患者在一个 一系列的话语任务。 其中一些任务需要解释 非真实的话语，如谎言，错误，或讽刺，其中它是 这对于推断说话者的信念和意图尤其重要。 其他 任务测试受试者的能力，以调整文字的话语形式， 反映听众知道什么和不知道什么。 拟议研究 将作为一组任务呈现，这样（除了两个例外 在课文中解释了所有的主题将参与所有的任务。 的 该项目的结果应提供理论说明， 沟通障碍通常是右半球受损的特征 这可能会严重限制他们在社会和 家庭背景 这项工作也可能揭示更多的令人惊讶的 保留左半球的话语理解受损，失语 患者

We propose a program of research to test an explanation for the discourse impairments exhibited by stroke patients, especially those with right hemisphere brain damage. The main theme of this project is what has been termed a person's "theory of mind," i.e., his or her ability to infer and understand what beliefs, emotions, and motivations are in someone else's mind. The ability to attribute accurately mental states to other people plays a critical role in communication. For example, listeners need to infer speakers' beliefs and intentions in order to determine whether a nonveridical utterance (one that is not literally true) is an honest error, a deliberate lie, or an attempt at joking, teasing, or irony. That is, a speaker who states that the weather is great when it is raining may not know it is raining (an error), may know it's raining buy wants to deceive the listener (a lie), or may be joking about the weather (irony). Similarly, speakers need to infer what their listeners do and do not know in order to make their utterances informative and relevant: When asked what one is reading, it is not informative to reply "a book," since the speaker already knows this much. A relation between the ability to infer mental states and discourse ability has already been established in both normal and in autistic children. The proposed research has two major goals. First, we assess the abilities of both anterior and posterior groups of unilaterally right and left hemisphere damaged stroke patients to understand beliefs (which are nonobservable, mental, representational states) extends to other nonobservable states (e.g., hunger) and to nonmental representations (e.g., photographs), or reflects a selective deficit limited to understanding mental, representational states. Second, we test whether theory of mind deficits predict patients' performance in a range of discourse tasks. Some of these tasks require interpretation of nonveridical utterances as lies, mistakes, or irony, in which it is particularly critical to infer speakers' beliefs and intentions. Other tasks test subjects' abilities to adjust the form of literal utterances to reflect what a listener knows and does not know. The proposed research will be presented as a battery of tasks such that (with two exceptions explained in the text all subjects will participate in all tasks. the results of this project should provide a theoretical account of communication deficits that often characterize right hemisphere damaged patients and that can severely limit their long-term success in social and familial settings. This work may also shed more light on the surprisingly preserved discourse comprehension of left hemisphere damaged, aphasic patients.