Seven-month-old babies can 'read minds'

Recognition of the viewpoints of others seen much earlier than previously thought.
December 23, 2010 | 13
Babies as young as seven months old may be able to take into account the thoughts and beliefs of other people,
according to a paper published December 23 in Science. Called "theory of mind," this ability is central to human
cooperation.

1. The finding provides evidence for the earliest awareness in infants so far of others
perspectives. The research team made the discovery by measuring a simple behavior--how long
infants stare at a scene--in experiments that did not require infants to explicitly assess others
thoughts or predict their actions. Although many past studies have suggested that the ability to
infer another persons viewpoint does not arise until the age of four, scientists demonstrated in
2005 and 2007, respectively, that 15- and 13-month-old infants can, in some situations,
comprehend the beliefs of others. Showing that younger babies possess this aptitude is
significant. Its not known how babies acquire the capacity to understand others mental states,
but some scientists have argued that conversation has a key role.
Seven-month-old babies can 'read minds'
Recognition of the viewpoints of others seen much earlier than previously thought.
December 23, 2010 | 13
Babies as young as seven months old may be able to take into account the thoughts and beliefs of other people,
according to a paper published December 23 in Science. Called "theory of mind," this ability is central to human
cooperation.

2. The researchers showed 56 seven-month-old infants an animated cartoon in which a dwarflike character watches a ball roll behind a rectangle placed on a table. The ball either stopped
behind the rectangle and was hidden from view, or kept rolling along the table until it
disappeared from the scene. In some of the scenes, the dwarf watched the whole process. In
others, he left too soon to see the balls final position. For example, a ball that previously rolled
behind the rectangle while the character was present would start rolling again and disappear from
view after his departure. In the last scene, the rectangle dropped off, revealing no ball behind it.
The team found that the infants stared longer at the final scenes depicting a surprising outcome
for the cartoon character when he retreated early (ball absent) than the anticipated one (ball
present). In other words, the babies seemed to process the characters viewpoint, not just their
own.

7 Billion
By 2045 global population is projected to reach nine billion. Can the planet take the strain?

3. Historians now estimate that in the 17th century there were only half a billion or so humans on
Earth. After rising very slowly for millennia, the number was just starting to take off. A century
and a half later, when another scientist reported the discovery of human egg cells, the worlds
population had doubled to more than a billion. A century after that, around 1930, it had doubled
again to two billion. The acceleration since then has been astounding. Before the 20th century,
no human had lived through a doubling of the human population, but there are people alive today
who have seen it triple. Sometime in late 2011, according to the UN, there will be 7 billion of us.
And the explosion, though it is slowing, is far from over. Not only are people living longer, but
so many women across the world are now in their childbearing years1.8 billionthat the
global population will keep growing for another few decades at least, even though each woman
is having fewer children than she would have had a generation ago.
7 Billion
By 2045 global population is projected to reach nine billion. Can the planet take the strain?

4. Sometime in late 2011, according to the UN, there will be 7 billion of us. And the explosion,
though it is slowing, is far from over. Not only are people living longer, but so many women
across the world are now in their childbearing years1.8 billionthat the global population will
keep growing for another few decades at least. With the population still growing by about 80
million each year, its hard not to be alarmed. Right now on Earth, soil is eroding, glaciers are
melting, and fish stocks are vanishing. Close to a billion people go hungry each day. Decades
from now, there will likely be two billion more mouths to feed, mostly in poor countries. There
will be billions more people wanting and deserving to boost themselves out of poverty. If they
follow the same path as wealthy countriesclearing forests, burning coal and oil, freely
scattering fertilizers and pesticidesthey too will be stepping hard on the planets natural
resources. How exactly is this going to work?

7 Billion
By 2045 global population is projected to reach nine billion. Can the planet take the strain?

5. In the two centuries after Malthus declared that population couldnt continue to soar, thats
exactly what it did. The process started in what we now call the developed countries, which were
then still developing. The spread of New World crops like corn and the potato, along with the
discovery of chemical fertilizers, helped banish starvation in Europe. Growing cities remained
full of disease at first, but from the mid-19th century on, sewers began to channel human waste
away from drinking water, which was then filtered and chlorinated; that dramatically reduced the
spread of cholera and typhus. After World War II the developing countries got a sudden
transfusion of preventive care, with the help of institutions like the World Health Organization
and UNICEF. Penicillin, the smallpox vaccine, DDTall arrived at once. Thats why the
population explosion spread around the planet: because a great many people were saved from
dying.
7 Billion
By 2045 global population is projected to reach nine billion. Can the planet take the strain?

6. The fertility decline that is now sweeping the planet started at different times in different
countries. France was one of the first. By the early 18th century, noblewomen at the French court
were knowing carnal pleasures without bearing more than two children. Village parish records
show the trend had spread to the peasantry by the late 18th century; by the end of the 19th,
fertility in France had fallen to three children per womanwithout the help of modern
contraceptives. Other countries in the West eventually followed Frances lead. By the onset of
World War II, fertility had fallen also in parts of Europe and the U.S. As that same transition
takes place in the rest of the world, what has astonished demographers is how much faster it is
happening there. Chinese women, who were bearing an average of six children each as recently
as 1965, are now having around 1.5. In Iran, with the support of the Islamic regime, fertility has
fallen

more

than

70

percent

since

the

early

80s.

7 Billion
By 2045 global population is projected to reach nine billion. Can the planet take the strain?

7. Chandan Bortamuly is on the front lines of a battle that has been going on in India for nearly
60 years. In 1952, just five years after it gained independence from Britain, India became the
first country to establish a policy for population control. Since then the government has
repeatedly set ambitious goalsand repeatedly missed them by a mile. A national policy
adopted in 2000 called for the country to reach the fertility of 2.1 by 2010. That wont happen for
at least another decade. In the UNs projection, Indias population will rise to just over 1.6
billion people by 2050. Whats inevitable is that India is going to exceed the population of China
by 2030. Nothing less than a huge catastrophe, nuclear or otherwise, can change that.
Sterilization is the dominant form of birth control in India today, and the vast majority of the
procedures are performed on women. The government is trying to change that.
Technology, Anthropology, Conservation and Development: A Personal Journey
By Ken Banks

8. As a child I had a fascination with the natural world. It helped being brought up in Jersey, one
of the Channel Islands between the English and French coasts where Gerald Durrell set up a zoo
in the late 1950s that would become famous for its pioneering work, captive-breeding
endangered species. It also helped having grandparents who were ardent amateur naturalists, and
a mother who followed closely in their footsteps. I remember flicking through old National
Geographic magazines in awe, scissors in hand, wondering what it would be like to visit
"deepest darkest" Africa and see the wildlife first-hand. Looking back, I really wasn't that
different to many children my age. Only, my dreams came true. I was already beginning to turn
my back on a career in information technology when I was selected to be a team member for a
school building project in northern Zambia.

Technology, Anthropology, Conservation and Development: A Personal Journey

By Ken Banks

9. Back in 2003 mobile phones were just beginning to get smart. For the first time they were
integrating cameras and color screens, and were able to access the Internet and play music and
video. Witnessing this, a small team from Cambridge (UK) asked two important questions: How
could these new devices be used to promote conservation in the "developed" world, and how
could they be used to assist conservationists and development practitioners on the ground in the
"developing" world? It was my job to help find the answers. Today, with over 500 million
subscribers across Africa alone and more people around the world owning a phone, mobile
phones seem to be everywhere. Farmers are now able to access market information through their
phones, increasing income in some cases by up to 40 percent. Unemployed youth can receive
alerts about job vacancies. And, for the first time, the unbanked can transfer money to relatives,
or make payments for goods and services, through their phones.
In Teen Music Choices, Anxiety Rules
Teens' brains reveal discomfort when taste fails to conform
By Abigail Baird | March 16, 2010

10. In 2009, Miley Cyrus reportedly made an astonishing 25 million dollars. Most of that money
came from album sales, which were reported to be slightly over 4 million during that year. 4
million4 million?! Have you heard Miley Cyrus sing? Are there really 4 million kids out there
willing to spend their hard-earned babysitting money on a Miley Cyrus album because they
deeply love listening to her sing? Well, according to the findings of a study, selling four million
albums does not translate to having four million people like your music. The study reports that
there is good reason to believe that a lot of those purchases were made out of fear -- a fear well
known to adolescents all over America: terror of social rejection. The fear of social rejection is
so strong in adolescents because their relationships are essential for passing on the lessons that
will enable them to join adult society.

In Teen Music Choices, Anxiety Rules

Teens' brains reveal discomfort when taste fails to conform
By Abigail Baird | March 16, 2010

11. A study reports that there is good reason to believe that a lot of those purchases by teenagers
are made out of fear -- a fear well known to adolescents all over America: terror of social
rejection. The fear of social rejection is so strong in adolescents because their relationships are
essential for passing on the lessons that will enable them to join adult society. In order to do this
properly and efficiently, teenagers come equipped with the ability to learn fast and furiously
from their peers, especially those who wield more social power -- who are older or more popular.
Although this system developed because it helps the teen transition to adulthood, it has proven an
excellent principle upon which to base economic decisions. The popular kids dictate teen culture,
and if they endorse it, it will sell. So what does this study mean practically? In terms of
marketing, if you want to sell a lot of albums, get the popular kids hooked, and their endorsement
will cause enough fear among their overly attentive peers to make the music sell.
Do You Know When You're Wrong? Gray Matter Shows Introspective Ability Is Not Black and White
Differences in people's ability to gauge their own accuracy may be linked to having more volume--and more
connections--in the prefrontal cortex
By Katherine Harmon | Thursday, September 16, 2010

12. When answering a question, your accuracy in assessing whether you have gotten the answer
rightor wrongmight depend on the volume of gray matter in a certain part of your brain,
according to a new study. Introspection is a high-level mental process. "Accurate introspection
requires discriminating correct decisions from incorrect ones, a capacity that varies substantially
across individuals," researchers behind the new findings explained in their study. For the study,
researchers used simple visual stimuli to test 32 healthy subjects' perceptionand how confident
they felt about their assessment of a geometric image. The tests were customized to each
individual's level of perceptual skill, in order to keep each subject's accuracy score at 71 percent,
so that the test was consistently difficult for all subjects.