Phoebe E. Bailey

A meta-analytic review of age differences in theory of mind.

Age-related difficulties in understanding basic emotional signals are now well established, but less clear is how aging affects theory of mind (ToM), which refers to the understanding of more complex emotions and mental states. A meta-analysis of 23 datasets involving 1462 (790 younger and 672 older) participants was conducted in which six basic types of ToM task were identified (Stories, Eyes, Videos, False belief-video, False belief-other, and Faux pas). Each ToM task was also categorized according to domain (affective, cognitive, or mixed) and modality (verbal, visual-static, visual-dynamic, verbal and visual-static, or verbal and visual-dynamic). Overall, collapsed across all types of task, older adults were found to perform more poorly than younger adults, with the degree of ToM difficulty they experienced moderate in magnitude (r = -.41). The results also provide evidence for increased ToM difficulties in late adulthood regardless of specific task parameters, with deficits evident across all task types, domains, and modalities. With few exceptions, age deficits for ToM tasks were larger in magnitude compared with matched control tasks. These data have implications for our understanding of mental state attribution processes in late adulthood, suggesting that ToM difficulties are not simply secondary to non-ToM related task demands.

Empathy, social functioning and schizotypy.

Whilst affective empathy is concerned with ones emotional response to the affective state of another, cognitive empathy refers to ones understanding of anothers mental state, and deficits in both are believed to contribute to the social behavioral abnormalities associated with schizophrenia. The present study aimed to test whether individual differences in normally distributed schizotypal personality traits are related to cognitive and affective empathy, and whether any observed association between schizotypy and empathy mediates the relationship between schizotypy and (reduced) social functioning. Non-clinical volunteers (N=223) completed measures of schizotypal personality, cognitive and affective empathy, social functioning and negative affect. The results indicated that higher schizotypy was associated with reduced empathy, poorer social functioning and increased negative affect. Of the specific schizotypal dimensions (positive, negative and disorganized), only negative schizotypy was significantly associated with social functioning, and this relationship persisted even after controlling for negative affect. Further, affective empathy functioned as a partial mediator in this relationship. These data show that the relationship between negative schizotypy and social functioning is at least partially attributable to deficits in affective empathy.

Alexithymia, somatization and negative affect in a community sample.

Whilst alexithymia has been consistently linked to somatization, two prominent theoretical models lead to opposite predictions as to which of two proposed typologies of alexithymia will be particularly associated with somatic symptom reporting. In the present study, participants were recruited from a cross-section of the general adult population (n=301), and asked to complete a battery of self-report questionnaires which assessed alexithymia, somatization and negative affect. Collapsed across the whole sample, specific facets of alexithymia (enhanced fantasy life and difficulty identifying emotions) were significantly associated with somatization, and these pathways were perfectly mediated by negative affectivity. Further, type II alexithymia (impairment in the cognitive but not the affective dimension of alexithymia) was more predictive of somatization relative to type I alexithymia (impairment in both the cognitive and affective dimensions of alexithymia) and non-alexithymia (unimpaired in the cognitive and affective dimensions of alexithymia). The theoretical and clinical implications of these results are discussed.

Empathy and social functioning in late adulthood

Objectives: Both cognitive and affective empathy are regarded as essential prerequisites for successful social functioning, and recent studies have suggested that cognitive, but not affective, empathy may be adversely affected as a consequence of normal adult aging. This decline in cognitive empathy is of concern, as older adults are particularly susceptible to the negative physical and mental health consequences of loneliness and social isolation. Method: The present study compared younger (N = 80) and older (N = 49) adults on measures of cognitive empathy, affective empathy, and social functioning. Results: Whilst older adults’ self-reported and performance-based cognitive empathy was significantly reduced relative to younger adults, there were no age-related differences in affective empathy. Older adults also reported involvement in significantly fewer social activities than younger adults, and cognitive empathy functioned as a partial mediator of this relationship. Conclusion: These findings are consistent with theoretical models that regard cognitive empathy as an essential prerequisite for good interpersonal functioning. However, the cross-sectional nature of the study leaves open the question of causality for future studies.

Empathic deficits in schizophrenia: The potential role of rapid facial mimicry

Emotional facial expressions evoke rapid, involuntary, and covert facial reactions in the perceiver that are consistent with the emotional valence of the observed expression. These responses are believed to be an important low-level mechanism contributing to the experience of empathy, which some have argued rely on a simulation mechanism subserved by the human mirror neuron system (MNS). Because schizophrenia is associated with pervasive social cognitive difficulties which have been linked to structural abnormalities in the MNS network, the aim of the present study was to provide the first assessment of how rapid facial mimicry reactions (within 1000 ms poststimulus onset) are affected in schizophrenia. Activity in the corrugator supercilii and zygomaticus major muscle regions was quantified using electromyography while individuals with schizophrenia (n = 25) and controls (n = 25) viewed images of happy and angry facial expressions. In contrast to controls, individuals with schizophrenia demonstrated atypical facial mimicry reactions which were not associated with any clinical features of the disorder. These data provide evidence for a low-level disruption that may be contributing to empathizing deficits in schizophrenia and are discussed in relation to neuropsychological models of empathy and schizophrenia.

Older adults have greater difficulty imagining future rather than atemporal experiences.

Episodic future thinking refers to mentally traveling forward in time to preexperience an event, and emerging research suggests that this is more difficult for older adults. The current study was designed to better understand the effect of aging on separate component processes of age differences in episodic future thinking. Young (n = 24) and older (n = 25) adults were asked to construct a) atemporal scenarios, b) future scenarios, and c) a narrative that involved navigation. Each of these conditions assesses the capacity to construct and describe a scene, but only the future scenario requires a subjective sense of self in time (autonoetic consciousness). The composite measure of performance showed that relative to young adults, older adults have substantially reduced capacity for all three types of construction, suggesting that age-related difficulty imagining future episodic events may reflect a more general cognitive decline with age. In addition, older adults were worse at imagining future experiences than atemporal experiences, indicating limited capacity for autonoetic consciousness. Further, this difference between imagining atemporal and future experiences was not as evident among younger adults. These deficits in episodic future thinking have implications for the daily lives of older adults in terms of anticipating and planning for the future.

Dismantling the “age-prospective memory paradox”: The classic laboratory paradigm simulated in a naturalistic setting

Previous research has identified “the age–prospective memory paradox”—that adult ageing results in reliably poorer performance on laboratory-based tasks of prospective memory (PM), but improved performance on such tasks carried out in real-life settings. We hypothesized that even in their everyday environment, older adults might be worse at PM tasks that are triggered during an experimenter-generated ongoing activity. The present study used a task that captured the key features of the classic laboratory paradigm, but which was completed in a setting that met key criteria to be considered naturalistic. In their everyday setting, participants’ PM was assessed, with the cue to remember occurring either (a) during their day-to-day activities, or (b) during an experimenter-generated ongoing task. The results confirmed previous naturalistic findings, in showing that older adults (n = 28) exhibited better PM than their younger counterparts (n = 65) when prompted during their everyday activities. However, older adults were also then subsequently less likely to show effective PM during experimenter-generated ongoing activity. Reproducing the paradox within a single dataset, these data indicate that older adults can effectively act on intentions during everyday activities, but have difficulty in prospective remembering during experimenter-generated ongoing tasks.

Future thinking improves prospective memory performance and plan enactment in older adults

Efficient intention formation might improve prospective memory by reducing the need for resource-demanding strategic processes during the delayed performance interval. The present study set out to test this assumption and provides the first empirical assessment of whether imagining a future action improves prospective memory performance equivalently at different stages of the adult lifespan. Thus, younger (n = 40) and older (n = 40) adults were asked to complete the Dresden Breakfast Task, which required them to prepare breakfast in accordance with a set of rules and time restrictions. All participants began by generating a plan for later enactment; however, after making this plan, half of the participants were required to imagine themselves completing the task in the future (future thinking condition), while the other half received standard instructions (control condition). As expected, overall younger adults outperformed older adults. Moreover, both older and younger adults benefited equally from future thinking instructions, as reflected in a higher proportion of prospective memory responses and more accurate plan execution. Thus, for both younger and older adults, imagining the specific visual–spatial context in which an intention will later be executed may serve as an easy-to-implement strategy that enhances prospective memory function in everyday life.

Alexithymia in schizophrenia

Changes in emotional and social behavior are considered to be amongst the most common and debilitating consequences of schizophrenia. However, little is known of the effects of schizophrenia on alexithymia, which refers to impairment in aspects of understanding emotions. In the current study, participants with schizophrenia (n = 29) and nonclinical controls (n = 30) completed self-report and performance-based measures of this construct, in addition to measures of cognitive functioning, clinical symptomatology, and negative affect. The results indicated that individuals with schizophrenia showed increased alexithymia as indexed by the performance task, with these difficulties related to cognitive functioning, and the specific clinical symptom of alogia. However, although the correlation between self-reported alexithymia and negative affect in the schizophrenia group was congruent with prior empirical research and theory, there were no group differences in perceived levels of alexithymia. It is suggested that alexithymia may not be affected per se in schizophrenia (as indicated by the lack of group differences on the self-report measure of this construct), but that schizophrenia-related difficulties do emerge in contexts where cognitive demands are incremented.

Socioemotional deficits associated with obsessive–compulsive symptomatology

Increasing emphasis has been placed on the role of socioemotional functioning in models of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD). The present study investigated whether OCD symptoms were associated with capacity for theory of mind (ToM) and basic affect recognition. Non-clinical volunteers (N=204) completed self report measures of OCD and general psychopathology, in addition to behavioral measures of ToM and affect recognition. The results indicated that higher OCD symptoms were associated with reduced ToM, as well as reduced accuracy decoding the specific emotion of disgust. Importantly, these relationships could not be attributed to other, more general features of psychopathology. The findings of the current study therefore further our understanding of how the processing and interpretation of social and emotional information is affected in the context of OCD symptomatology, and are discussed in relation to neuropsychological models of OCD.