The role of affect and group membership in the impact of social status on theory of mind

Even adults have mature cognitive capacities to exhibit theory of mind (ToM) skills, they may interpret the mental processes underlying the behaviors of others more accurately depending on the social situation they are in. Among these social situations, social status seems to be an important variable that can affect ToM skills. This study aims to examine the mediating role of mood and group membership in the effect of social status on ToM in adults. In this context, the relationship between social status and ToM was examined together with the mentioned moderator variables. Also, depressive symptoms, lexical knowledge and momentary anxiety levels of the individuals were evaluated in the relationship between social status and ToM. The sample consisted of 112 adults (nmale = 32) between the ages of 18-30. Firstly, participants' social status and moods were manipulated, then the Strange Stories Task which measures ToM skills, State Anxiety Subtest of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory which measures momentary anxiety, the Demographic Information Form, and the ACEP Vocabulary Knowledge Scale which measures lexical knowledge, were administered respectively. The procedure was carried out face-to-face. As a result of the preliminary analyses, it was observed that ToM skill was negatively correlated with general mood and positively correlated with vocabulary knowledge. As a result of the 2x2x2 mixed design Analysis of Variance, it was found that social status and group membership did not have a significant main effect on ToM, but feedback had a significant main effect. In simple effect analyses, it was found that the mind reading scores of the participants given positive feedback in the low-status group were significantly higher than the scores of the participants given negative feedback. However, when they read low-status stories, the mind reading scores of the positive feedback group were significantly higher than the scores of the negative feedback group. Similarly, the mind reading scores of the positive feedback group were significantly higher than those of the negative feedback group when they read high-status stories. Moreover, among the low-status participants, those who received positive feedback understood the minds of outgroup members more accurately than those who received negative feedback.