Developing Minds Lab
Oklahoma State University ｜Department of Psychology
Overview
Our research examines the acquisition, learning, and development of social-cognitive understanding across lifespan. We are interested in inclusively studying diverse populations in various social-cultural contexts and combining meta-analytical, behavioral, neuroimaging, and computational approaches.
Theory of Mind
Theory of mind is the ability to understand and explain others and ourselves as thinking, forgetful, wanting, and remembering beings. We examine various aspects of theory of mind, including its origins, underlying processes, developmental timetables, conceptual sequences, developing brain mechanisms, and consequences. We study typically developing children, neurodiverse children (e.g., children with autism), sensory-diverse children (e.g., deaf children), socioculturally diverse children (e.g, bilingual children), and computational child agents (e.g., large language models).
Mind Perception
Before building theories of another person's mind, how do people consider a particular entity to have a mind? We investiage whether and how people perceive an entity to have a mind and the underlying, developing factors associated with it. We also explore how modern computational advances, including generative artificial intelligence and large language models, can be perceived as more mindful for humans.
Natural Language Comprehension
How do humans understand what other people are talking about? How do humans understand what a story they listen to is about or what a novel they read is about? How do humans combine their theory-of-mind skills and language competencies to comprehend natural language? We answer these questions of natural language comprehension using neuroimaging techniques (e.g., fMRI & fNIRS) and eye-tracking tools.
Language and Cognition
A popular research topic in psychology in general and developmental psychology in particular is: How do language and cognition shape each other? To explore this question, we specifically look at how different uses of language and how different types, kinds, and amounts of language experiences can influence a child’s theories of other people’s minds, theories about social relationships, and theories about the social world.
Meta-Science
In addition to the theoretical research topics above, we address methodological research topics. Our lab uses various methodologies, including meta-analysis, behavioral experiments, neuroimaging, and computational modeling, so we frequently develop new analytical algorithms/models and create novel methods to advance our theoretical explorations in a more nuanced and more open-science way. We also examine existing methods' psychological and methodological processes, further helping refine and reconstruct them.