Affiliations: Wellmount Health Centre, Finglas, Northern Area Health Board, Co. Dublin, Ireland
Abstract: This paper explores whether using contextual information affects the ability of the person with chronic schizophrenia to mentalise, that is, to use their Theory of Mind (ToM) skills. Put simply, peoples’ mental states (i.e. their feelings, intentions, desires) are ‘invisible’ and therefore need to be hypothesised. Such hypothesising requires a Theory of Mind (ToM) (Cahill & Frith, 1996). Lacking a Theory of Mind (ToM) may be one explanation for some pragmatic language impairments often seen in people with schizophrenia, for example, failing to take listener needs into account. The research question was investigated by assessing five participants’ ToM skills within three target areas. The target areas were understanding of irony, false beliefs and humour. Each area was assessed first within an informal conversational context, and subsequently in a formal test environment. Performances in each environment were then compared. Comprehension of false beliefs provided a clear area of strength for all participants in both conversational context and a formal test environment. Performance on false belief tasks was strongest in conversation. In contrast, comprehension of both irony and humour was found to be considerably impaired in all live individuals, across both presentations. Further, successful performance on irony and humour tasks decreased in conversation. Therefore, irony and humour were believed to require more complex mentalising skills. The importance of the role of context in facilitating understanding in communication, and in creating a more accurate representation of the language and communication skills of people with chronic schizophrenia, has been supported by the findings of this study.
Keywords: schizophrenia, theory of mind, irony, humour, false beliefs, contextual information
