Uta Frith offered very in depth research on the subject of Theory of Mind.  Theory of Mind, as we have all learned, is the ability to attribute mental states to others.  These attitudes must mark who has the mental states and what sort of attitude they have.  This is something we often look at when assessing children with Autism as they typically cannot attribute mental states to others; they all have impairments in social communication which encompasses the idea of Theory of Mind.

Uta Frith provided many points that I had not previously thought of.  Not only do individuals with Autism have difficulty recognizing mental states of others, but they have difficulty identifying them within themselves.  Many children with Autism are egocentric meaning they have a great deal of difficulty putting themselves in others' shoes and taking into account what others think or feel.  They also do not reflect on their own intentions as much as typically developing children.  Obviously, if they are stuck on making sense of their own thoughts, intentions, and feelings, they will find it challenging to do so in others and this understandably may not take priority.  I also particularly enjoyed the video Uta Frith showed with the triangles.  This helped me to realize how automatic it is for typically developing individuals to attribute mental states to others and allowed me to attempt to take the perspective of a child with Autism.  Theory of mind is something that can be learned, however.  It was shared that children with Autism don't necessarily fail to mentalize, they simply do not do so at the appropriate age.  In this particular study, there was about a five year delay in developing the skills necessary to have Theory of Mind.

While Theory of Mind cannot specifically be measured, I still believe it should be taken into consideration while performing assessments and looking at assessment results of those with Autism.  During assessments, recognizing that these children have not yet developed Theory of Mind may provide an explanation as to why they are having trouble in certain areas.  Also, now that we know Theory of Mind is something that can be acquired over the years, it is crucial to look at the prerequisite skills to developing Theory of Mind, if they are there, and what we can do to foster the development of such skills.