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# Theory of mind and wisdom: The development of different forms of perspective-taking in late adulthood

## Details

**Authors** Rakoczy et al.

**Year** 2018

**Publisher** British Journal of Psychology

**Discipline** Human Development

[Read it at the publisher](https://doi.org/10.1111/bjop.12246) 
10.1111/bjop.12246

## In authors' words

### Abstract

How does perspective‐taking develop over the lifespan? This question has been investigated in two separate research traditions, dealing with theory of mind (ToM) and wisdom, respectively. Operating in almost complete isolation from each other, and using rather different conceptual approaches, these two traditions have produced seemingly contradictory results: While perspective‐taking has been consistently found to decline in old age in ToM research, studies on wisdom have mostly found that perspective‐taking remains constant or sometimes even increases in later adulthood. This study sought to integrate these two lines of research and clarify the seemingly contradictory patterns of findings by systematically testing for both forms of perspective‐taking and their potential cognitive foundations. The results revealed (1) the dissociation in developmental patterns between ToM perspective‐taking (declining with age) and wisdom‐related perspective‐taking (no decline with age) also held – documented here for the first time – in one and the same sample of younger versus older adults; (2) this dissociation was of limited generality: It did not (or only partly) hold once the material of the two types of tasks was more closely matched; and (3) the divergent developmental patterns of ToM perspective‐taking versus wisdom‐related perspective‐taking could be accounted for to some degree by the fact that only TOM perspective‐taking was related to developmental changes in fluid intelligence.

### What they set out to do (purpose)

To explore and re-evaluate the past research that found that performance on theory of mind exercises declined with age, while tests on wisdom stayed relatively consistent with age.

### What they found (results)

Through their experiments and evaluation, they found that this discrepancy could be due to, “the pattern of diverging developmental trends in perspective-taking measured in the established ToM [Theory of Mind] versus wisdom tasks is not necessarily specific to perspective-taking as such, but might reflect the general pattern of the development of cognitive capacities over the lifespan.” In fact, the negative correlation disappeared with the theory of mind studies when they accounted for the difference in processing speed as one ages. They also found that when changing both tests to have novel ways of measuring theory of mind and wisdom performance, the performance difference due to age disappeared (practically), indicating that there could be something to the tests that made them difficult or not interesting to the older adults in the test.

## Commentary

### In short

This indicates that theory of mind (and therefore Perspective taking) is a part of cognition throughout the human’s whole life.

### In more detail

Rakoczy et. al. 2018 explored and re-evaluated the past research that found that performance on theory of mind exercises declined with age, while tests on wisdom stayed relatively consistent with age. Through their experiments and evaluation, they found that this discrepancy could be due to, “the pattern of diverging developmental trends in perspective-taking measured in the established ToM [Theory of Mind] versus wisdom tasks is not necessarily specific to perspective-taking as such, but might reflect the general pattern of the development of cognitive capacities over the lifespan.” In fact, the negative correlation disappeared with the theory of mind studies when they accounted for the difference in processing speed as one ages. They also found that when changing both tests to have novel ways of measuring theory of mind and wisdom performance, the performance difference due to age disappeared (practically), indicating that there could be something to the tests that made them difficult or not interesting to the older adults in the test. This indicates that theory of mind (and therefore Perspective taking) is a part of cognition throughout the human’s whole life.

**Patterns it shows** P

**How to cite this** Rakoczy et al. (2018). Theory of mind and wisdom: The development of different forms of perspective-taking in late adulthood. British Journal of Psychology.