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. 2021 Sep;42(13):4224-4241.
doi: 10.1002/hbm.25542. Epub 2021 Jul 1.

Exploring the relationship between anthropomorphism and theory-of-mind in brain and behaviour

Ruud Hortensius  1   2 , Michaela Kent  2   3 , Kohinoor M Darda  2   4 , Laura Jastrzab  2   5 , Kami Koldewyn  5 , Richard Ramsey  6 , Emily S Cross  2   4
Affiliations

Exploring the relationship between anthropomorphism and theory-of-mind in brain and behaviour

Ruud Hortensius et al. Hum Brain Mapp. 2021 Sep.

Abstract

The process of understanding the minds of other people, such as their emotions and intentions, is mimicked when individuals try to understand an artificial mind. The assumption is that anthropomorphism, attributing human-like characteristics to non-human agents and objects, is an analogue to theory-of-mind, the ability to infer mental states of other people. Here, we test to what extent these two constructs formally overlap. Specifically, using a multi-method approach, we test if and how anthropomorphism is related to theory-of-mind using brain (Experiment 1) and behavioural (Experiment 2) measures. In a first exploratory experiment, we examine the relationship between dispositional anthropomorphism and activity within the theory-of-mind brain network (n = 108). Results from a Bayesian regression analysis showed no consistent relationship between dispositional anthropomorphism and activity in regions of the theory-of-mind network. In a follow-up, pre-registered experiment, we explored the relationship between theory-of-mind and situational and dispositional anthropomorphism in more depth. Participants (n = 311) watched a short movie while simultaneously completing situational anthropomorphism and theory-of-mind ratings, as well as measures of dispositional anthropomorphism and general theory-of-mind. Only situational anthropomorphism predicted the ability to understand and predict the behaviour of the film's characters. No relationship between situational or dispositional anthropomorphism and general theory-of-mind was observed. Together, these results suggest that while the constructs of anthropomorphism and theory-of-mind might overlap in certain situations, they remain separate and possibly unrelated at the personality level. These findings point to a possible dissociation between brain and behavioural measures when considering the relationship between theory-of-mind and anthropomorphism.

Keywords: anthropomorphism; mind perception; social cognition; theory-of-mind.

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Figures

FIGURE 1
FIGURE 1
Dispositional anthropomorphism and theory‐of‐mind network activation. (a) Dispositional anthropomorphism across the sample as measured with the Individual Differences in Anthropomorphism Questionnaire, (b) activation in the six regions of the theory‐of‐mind network during the observation of scenes that trigger mentalising compared to scenes that trigger pain perception during an animated film, no clear relationship between dispositional anthropomorphism and activity (c) across the theory‐of‐mind network and (d) within the individual regions (quadratic predictor in red, linear predictor in blue). Indices are centred and scaled in (c) and (d). dmpfc, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex; mmpfc, middle medial prefrontal cortex; prec, precuneus; rtpj and ltpj, right and left temporoparietal junction; vmpfc, ventromedial prefrontal cortex
FIGURE 2
FIGURE 2
Posterior distribution for the linear and quadratic dispositional anthropomorphism predictor for each region of the theory‐of‐mind network in Experiment 1. The highest density interval of the posterior distribution and a region of practical equivalence around the null decision rule suggest that for all regions of the theory‐of‐mind network the null could be not be accepted or rejected for the linear and quadratic dispositional anthropomorphism predictor. dmpfc, dorsomedial prefrontal cortex; mmpfc, middle medial prefrontal cortex; prec, precuneus; rtpj and ltpj, right and left temporoparietal junction; vmpfc, ventromedial prefrontal cortex
FIGURE 3
FIGURE 3
Dispositional anthropomorphism does not modulate theory‐of‐mind network activation across diverse measures. (a) No clear relationship between dispositional anthropomorphism and activity across the theory‐of‐mind network when participants read stories containing false beliefs compared to false depictions of photographs. (b) Posterior distributions for the linear and quadratic dispositional anthropomorphism predictor for each task measure of theory‐of‐mind network activity. Dispositional anthropomorphism did not modulate activity in the theory‐of‐mind network during passive viewing of an animated movie or during the false belief task. Contrast used per task: false belief versus false photograph stories (false belief task;1 Dodell‐Feder, Koster‐Hale, Bedny, & Saxe, 2011), scenes that trigger mentalising versus control events unrelated to the main characters (Partly Cloudy: hand‐coded events; Jacoby et al., 2016), and scenes that trigger mentalising versus scenes that trigger empathy for pain (Partly Cloudy: reverse correlation; Richardson et al., 2018)
FIGURE 4
FIGURE 4
Situational and dispositional anthropomorphism and theory‐of‐mind. (a) Situational anthropomorphism and effectance ratings, a proxy of theory‐of‐mind, fluctuated throughout the film (average ratings are shown in red and individual participants are represented by black lines), (b) dispositional anthropomorphism across the sample, (c) performance for the false belief trials, a proxy of general theory‐of‐mind, of the false belief task (dashed line indicates preregistered exclusion criteria of <.5), (d) situational, but not dispositional anthropomorphism linearly predicted effectance ratings, (e) neither situational nor dispositional anthropomorphism predicted false belief accuracy (quadratic predictor in red, linear predictor in blue). Indices are centred and scaled in panels (d) and (e)
FIGURE 5
FIGURE 5
Posterior distribution for each predictor for both theory‐of‐mind indices in Experiment 2. The HDI of the posterior distribution and a region of practical equivalence around the null decision rule suggest that for effectance ratings, the null could be rejected for the linear situational anthropomorphism predictor and accepted for the quadratic situational anthropomorphism predictor, while for false belief accuracy only the null could be rejected for the quadratic situational anthropomorphism predictor
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