Theory of Mind: Basics of Prosocial

Mind is the most beautiful creation and has evolved with the evolving world. Earlier the frontal lobe was not the part of the brain. It was the evolution that brought frontal lobe into the brain. That is why the forehead became flatter enough in order to fit the brain within. We have talked about all this before. We have talked about perception, sensation, perceiving, human brain, attention, selection and even narcissistic personality. The theory of mind is the insight of all the above concepts.

It helps us to arrive at the conclusion of mind. We have tried to understand the mind from various concepts and this particular lesson will finally help us to summarize about the mind.

We will also understand the concept of prosocial, which is the phenomenon by which we understand other human beings. It helps us to become empathetic to our surroundings and behave in a particular way by which we become successful to achieve social conduct and also receive social sanction.

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In this part of the lesson we will see how people develop their idea of being prosocial. It generally happens in big groups or where people live in society, which actually denotes the whole world. We will learn that how one brain tries to comprehend other brain through the information of social norms and verbal communication. This is how the mind can understand the idea of the mind in accordance to other people's minds.

As by now, we already know a lot a about being prosocial and how it works.

Basically prosocial is the phenomenon of being understanding of other human being's positions or situations. The basic idea of being prosocial contains of how the person comprehends the other person's thinking. It involves only verbal conversation and ideas of how the basic social conduct actually functions. In order to be more clear we can take a very easy example : These are two men who meet each other for the first time. This is the first and the foremost stage of the prosocial concept. This is known as the first order in which both of them have a sense of self. This actually mean that they are aware of their mind and can regulate it.

This is the second-order where the man in the left side have a sense of idea of what the man in the right is thinking of by the use of basics of social conduct and also the basic of prosocial. The man uses observation in order to comprehend the person in front of him. This is the third order in which the person not only comprehends the persons thinking but also comprehends what he is thinking about other person (which is him) . The third order explain the persons thinking evolving with the set of social conduct and the basics of prosocial. He uses verbal information in order to figure out the thinking of the person.

We can take other examples as well, this kind of prediction of other people’s thoughts is actually based on ideals. We can take the example of arranging a surprise for a friend. Here, the friend would actually idealize the surprise on her birthday to be great and something unexpected. If the surprise is greater than it met her predictions. This is how idealization of thinking takes over the basics of prosocial. One of the basic parts of conceptualizing the theory of mind is by understanding how notions are a part of it. We can understand this concept easily if we take the example of child thoughts and notion. The experiment will actually prove how the psychology of a child is gullible in the basic stages of growing.

If we ask the boy on the left side to say that what is in the box of crayons? The boy would probably reply that there are crayons in the box. Later, he would be shocked to find out that the box of crayons have candles in it. When the boy will be asked that what the other boy will be thinking about what is in the box of crayons he will simply reply by saying candles. This is because the psychology of the child is steered to think that other person also knows. This is how notions make perception about the thoughts of other person.

Empathy

Empathy is another key concept to comprehend the theory of mind. It is actually the thought process of putting our own selves into other's shoes. This is the positive sanctions of the society which makes a person compassionate about the other. The person will extend help to the other even when it is not necessary on their part. Never confuse sympathy with empathy. Sympathy is offering a shoulder to cry on and feeling pity on someone’s situation but empathy is the compassion that we feel towards a human being. It is actually putting ourselves into somebody’s situation and try to comfort them about their condition.

Animals

Animals also have a theory of mind. Robert Lurz wrote a book called “Mindreading Animals” which actually talks about how animals also have thought processing power and can actually think of the other person’s thoughts or feelings. There was a experiment conducted with the chimps which actually proved animals can comprehend information. The above experiment was conducted in front of the chimps. The chimps viewed the whole experiment where Sally foods the ball into a basket and then and Anne comes into the room and puts the ball in the box. Now when Sally comes into the room to take the ball from the basket. The chimps just cannot help laughing and is amused at the funny incident. This shows that animals can also comprehend the theory of mind.