Reading the Mind Test
This "Reading the Mind" test was first published in the book, "The Essential Difference", by Simon Baron-Cohen, Professor of Developmental Psychopathology at the University of Cambridge. It lets you see how well you can judge the feelings and thoughts of people by just looking at a photograph of their eyes. Most people are actually pretty good at this, women being slightly better than men.
Its clinical use is in helping with the diagnosis of High Functioning Autism and Asperger's Syndrome (which disproportionately affects programmers) but I think it's an interesting test for just about anyone to try. Try the Reading the Mind in the Eyes Test.
Posted by Alexander at March 2, 2006 12:37 PM
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Comments
The "Reading the Mind test" is a load of rubbish and so are Simon Baron Cohens air-brain ideas, just like his cousin Sacha Baron Cohen otherwise known as Borat! Both are vastly over-rated.
Did anyone tell the people in the photographs what they were meant to be feeling so they acted? Or did the photographer actually use a stimulus to create the feeling? In the event of the former, it isn't reading the mind through the eyes if the part is being played out. In the case of the latter, a stimulus is very dubious.
Which came first: the photograph or the assigned "feelings" to the eyes?
Posted by: Miscellaneous at November 12, 2006 10:19 PM
Oddly, this website and test gives me a great deal of insight to myself. I have had peculiar occurrences in my life that have left me guessing if there is something different about myself.
There was a point in time about ten years ago where I experienced what I thought to be a very unusual occurrence. For a short period I came across this looking into the eyes and reading the mind activity. I never researched this or knew that it was something that was studied. I thought maybe I was having some sort of mental breakdown, but for a short while I was looking into peoples eyes and thinking that I could almost read their minds. I could not actually hear what they were thinking but I could somehow understand their disposition. It was as if I had never looked anyone in the eye before.
Ten years later I have been trying to understand what it was that happened. I have a brother that I believed had narcissistic personality disorder. From what I have read, a person with this disorder can not empathize. I was thinking that I, myself, may have had this same disorder and came out of the disorder by somehow suddenly being able to empathize. I connected this occurrence of looking into someone's eyes and understanding their disposition as an all the sudden being able to empathize. Supposedly, it can be somewhat common for children to have the affects of narcissistic personality disorder and then to grow out of it due to life occurrences.
After reading an article about how many times people with Asperger can be misdiagnosed with narcissistic personality disorder and then seeing this test as a test for asperger I am becoming aware that I may suffer from asperger rather then narcissistic personality disorder.
Posted by: charles at May 31, 2007 04:30 AM
