Social cognition and trust: Exploring the role of theory of mind and hostile attribution bias in children’s skepticism of inaccurate informants

• Published in: Journal of experimental child psychology Vol. 215; p. 105341
• Main Authors: Palmquist, Carolyn M., Floersheimer, Andrew, Crum, Katherine, Ruggiero, Julia
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: United States Elsevier Inc 01.03.2022
• Subjects: Child; Child, Preschool; Hostile attribution bias; Hostility; Humans; Individual differences; Person perception; Selective trust; Social Cognition; Social Perception; Theory of Mind; Trust; Selective trust; Hostile attribution bias; Theory of mind; Person perception; Individual differences; Social cognition
• ISSN: 0022-0965; 1096-0457
• DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2021.105341

•This study explores the role of ToM and hostile attribution bias in trust.•Theory of mind predicts 4- and 5-year-olds’ skepticism of an inaccurate informant.•Hostile attribution bias and age predict interpretations of inaccurate behavior.•Hostile attribution bias does not predict skepticism of an inaccurate informant.•ToM and hostile attribution bias may play different roles in impression-formation. A growing body of research has examined the role of individual differences in children’s selective trust. The current study was designed to explore how individual differences in theory of mind and hostile attribution bias affect children’s trust. Four- and five-year-old children took part in a standard selective trust paradigm in which they had the choice between a previously inaccurate informant and an unfamiliar informant. They were also asked to interpret why the previously inaccurate informant had provided incorrect information in the past. Finally, children completed a hostile attribution bias task and a theory of mind task. Children with better theory of mind ability were more likely to defer to the unfamiliar informant on the selective trust task. Children with greater hostile attribution bias were more likely to interpret previous inaccuracy as a result of “being tricky” rather than having “made a mistake.” However, these interpretations did not influence children’s choices on the selective trust task. Therefore, although there is reason to believe that establishing selective trust involves both cognitive and social processes, the current study raises questions about the nature of this relationship and how children draw on different sociocognitive skills when establishing epistemic trust.