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Brief Report: An Independent Replication and Extension of Psychometric Evidence Supporting the Theory of Mind Inventory

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Abstract

This study presents an independent replication and extension of psychometric evidence supporting the Theory of Mind Inventory (ToMI). Parents of 20 children with ASD (4; 1–6; 7 years; months) and 20 with typical development (3; 1–6; 5), rated their child’s theory of mind abilities in everyday situations. Other parent report and child behavioral assessments included the Social Responsiveness Scale-2, Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scales-2, Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test-4, and Clinical Evaluation of Language Fundamentals-Preschool, 2. Results revealed high internal consistency, expected developmental changes in children with typical development, expected group differences between children with and without ASD, and strong correlations with other measures of social and communication abilities. The ToMI demonstrates strong psychometrics, suggesting considerable utility in identifying theory of mind deficits in children with ASD.

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Acknowledgments

The current study and its first author were supported by the University of Washington’s Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington Gatzert Fellowship, and the American Speech-Language-Hearing Foundation. We greatly appreciate our recruitment sources, including Dr. Annette Estes and studies at the University of Washington Autism Center as well as Anita Werner and the staff of Pediatric Speech and Language Specialists, Scottsdale, Arizona. We would also like to acknowledge the research assistants who contributed to this work. Finally, we would like to thank the families and children who participated in this study, without whom this work would not have been possible.

Author Contribution

KJG participated in conceiving of the study and its design; she also coordinated the study; collected, analyzed, and interpreted the data; and drafted/revised the manuscript. TEC participated in conceiving of the study and its design, interpreting the data, and drafting/revising the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Center for Autism and Related Disorders, Kennedy Krieger Institute, 3901 Greenspring Ave., Baltimore, MD, 21211, USA

    Kathryn J. Greenslade

  2. Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Baltimore, MD, USA

    Kathryn J. Greenslade

  3. Department of Speech and Hearing Sciences, University of Washington, 1417 NE 42nd St., Seattle, WA, 98105, USA

    Truman E. Coggins

Authors
  1. Kathryn J. Greenslade
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  2. Truman E. Coggins
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Kathryn J. Greenslade.

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Ethical Approval

All procedures performed in this study involving human participants were in accordance with the ethical standards of the institutional and/or national research committee and with the 1964 Helsinki declaration and its later amendments or comparable ethical standards.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare that they have no conflict of interest.

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Greenslade, K.J., Coggins, T.E. Brief Report: An Independent Replication and Extension of Psychometric Evidence Supporting the Theory of Mind Inventory. J Autism Dev Disord 46, 2785–2790 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-016-2784-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10803-016-2784-7

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