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British Journal of Developmental Psychology (2015), 33, 2123

2014 The British Psychological Society
www.wileyonlinelibrary.com

Commentary

Digging deeper into the link between

socio-cognitive ability and social relationships
Ai Mizokawa1* and Masuo Koyasu2
1
2

Meiji Gakuin University, Tokyo, Japan

Kyoto University, Kyoto, Japan
In this commentary on Friendlessness and theory of mind: A prospective longitudinal
study by Fink, Begeer, Peterson, Slaughter, and de Rosnay (Brit. J. Dev. Psychol, 2015; 33, 1
17), we reconsider the link between early mastery of theory of mind (ToM) and social
relationships by focusing on connections with other related areas of socio-cognitive
ability such as emotional competence, ToM development across age, and the effect of
interventions.

In the target paper Friendlessness and theory of mind: A prospective longitudinal study,
Fink, Begeer, Peterson, Slaughter, and de Rosnay report new findings about theory of
mind (ToM) and its social consequences. They revealed a connection between
impairment of ToM in children 5 years of age and chronical friendlessness 2 years later
when those same children became 7 years old. Given the effect of childhood
friendlessness on mental health problems in later life, the work, which identified early
roots of friendlessness, makes an important contribution to the existing literature on
socio-cognitive ability and provides suggestions for clinical intervention as well.
There is a large body of research suggesting positive links between the development of
ToM and social relationships. For example, childrens ToM abilities relate to positive peer
relations and popularity amongst peers, and greater engagement in pro-social and
empathic behaviours (e.g., Mizokawa & Koyasu, 2011; Slaughter, Dennis, & Pritchard,
2002; Watson, Nixon, Wilson, & Capage, 1999). On the other hand, impairment of ToM
enhances the risk of problematic behaviours (Fahie & Symons, 2003; Hughes, Dunn, &
White, 1998). It is apparent that ToM is a fundamental cognitive process required for every
persons social life.
Although Fink et al. recognize the limitation of their measures of emotion
understanding and delay of gratification, it is unclear whether an overreliance on the
positive effect of early development of ToM is sufficient without adequate consideration of other areas of socio-cognitive ability such as emotional competence. Emotional
competence may also be a fundamental component of social competence. It has been
shown, for example, that Japanese children with low ToM ability, but high ability in
understanding hidden emotions, rarely showed sympathic behaviour and had difficulty
in forming high-quality peer relationships, including mutual friendship (Mizokawa &
Koyasu, 2011). In addition to using a wider range of ToM and EU (emotion
*Correspondence should be addressed to Ai Mizokawa, Faculty of Psychology, Meiji Gakuin University, 1-2-37 Shirokanedai,
Minato-ku, Tokyo 108-8636, Japan (email: aimizokawa@gmail.com).
DOI:10.1111/bjdp.12072

22

Ai Mizokawa and Masuo Koyasu

understanding) tasks (Fink, Begeer, Peterson, Slaughter, & Rosnay, 2015, p. 14), it is
important to consider how ToM ability and emotional competence are integrated in
becoming a factor that contributes to the development of social interactions.
Furthermore, with regard to the tasks to measure emotional competence, caution
should be taken in the use of total scores of various tasks, which address different
dimensions of emotion understanding. There is a clear difference in understanding of
emotion depending on the valence (positive or negative). For example, children
identify positive emotions such as happiness earlier than negative emotions such as
sadness, anger, and fear (Denham & Couchoud, 1990). Also, regarding appearance-reality emotion understanding, 6-year-olds have difficulty in understanding false sadness
expressions compared to false happiness expressions (Mizokawa, 2007). More detailed
exploration is needed to reveal whether and how emotional competence come to be
reflected in childrens social relationships.
Moreover, it should be noted that the impact of ToM ability on peer relationships
changes according to childrens age. For example, Slaughter et al. (2002) found that ToM
ability was the best predictor of peer acceptance in 5-year-old children, but not in younger
children. How about in older children? The target paper of Fink et al. has made a
fascinating attempt at examining the role of early ToM as a predictor of chronic
friendlessness. They report childrens friendship in two time points (Time 1: 5-year-old,
Time 2: 7-year-old), but there is a lack of socio-cognitive data in Time 2 (7 years old). Thus,
it is less clear whether ToM at the time of entering a specific social group is the most
important, or whether steady ToM development for their age contributes to building and
keeping mutual friendship. Regarding moral judgment, as an example, compared to
younger children, 7-year-old children place a great deal of value on commission or
omission of the act when making moral judgments, but the judgment is not based on an
understanding of second-order mental states until the age of 9 years (Hayashi, 2007,
2010). Most 7-year-olds pass first-order false belief tasks, but there are apparent individual
differences in the advanced ToM ability (i.e., higher-order ToM) and related socio-cognitive abilities (e.g., moral judgment, understanding of irony, faux pass, and display rules),
which are also crucial competences in communication with others.
In the target paper, Fink et al. suggest that ToM training might be one possible
intervention to help reduce the lifelong mental health cost of chronic friendlessness.
Indeed, there is evidence to show that some training can improve ToM (e.g., role-play:
Furumi & Koyasu, 2014; mental state talk: Lecce, Bianco, Devine, Hughes, & Banerjee,
2014; but see also: Ornaghi, Grazzani, Cherubin, Conte, & Piralli, 2015). While this may be
true, little is known about how long the effects of training continue. Moreover, a growing
body of research has revealed indispensable socio-environmental influences on the
development of ToM, such as motherchild relationships, suggesting a need to consider
the role of social environments on the development of ToM. How much do children in
environments deficient in fostering ToM ability manage to repair that ability and catch up
with others through intervention? Could the ability to understand anothers mind as a
result of such ToM training be directly applicable in childrens real social life? Thoughtful
empirical exploration of these questions is likely to significantly advance this area of
research.
The target paper of Fink et al. will almost certainly stimulate important debates about
the link between socio-cognitive ability and its social consequences. It should be
emphasized, however, that much discussion is needed to dig deeper into the link between
these dyads, especially by focusing on the meaning of early mastery of ToM
understanding.

Socio-cognitive ability and social relationships

23

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Received 28 October 2014