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Exploring the Ability to Deceive in Children With EXPLORING THE ABILITY TO DECEIVE IN CHILDREN WITH AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDERS by ANNIE SZE MAN LI A thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in conformity with the requirements for the degree of Master of Science Queen’s University Kingston, Ontario, Canada September, 2009 Copyright © Annie Sze Man Li, 2009 Abstract This study was conducted to explore the ability and propensity to verbally deceive others in children with and without autism spectrum disorders (ASD). We also explored the relationships among lie-telling ability, false belief understanding as measured using a standard battery of false belief tasks, and verbal mental age as measured using a standardized test of language ability. To explore antisocial lie-telling ability, we used a modified temptation resistance paradigm in which children were tempted to commit a transgression in the experimenter’s absence and given the opportunity to tell a lie about their transgression and to exercise semantic leakage control (SLC)—that is, to maintain consistency between the lie and subsequent statements that they make. To explore prosocial lie-telling ability, we used a modified undesirable gift paradigm in which children were awarded an unattractive prize for winning a game and given the opportunity to lie about liking the prize that the experimenter gave them. We found that children with ASD, like typically developing children, can and do tell antisocial lies to conceal a transgression, and prosocial lies in politeness settings. However, children with ASD were less able than typically developing children to exercise SLC. Furthermore, we found that, unlike in typically developing children, lie-telling ability in children with ASD was not related to their false belief understanding. The pattern of relations among lie-telling ability, false belief understanding, and verbal mental age are discussed with respect to possible contentions regarding the underlying processes by which children with ASD tell lies and succeed on false belief tasks. ii Co-Authorship My supervisor, Dr. Elizabeth Kelley, and Dr. Kang Lee assume primary responsibility for concocting the idea for the research reported in this thesis. I assume shared responsibility for the conceptualization and primary responsibility for the design, execution, and write-up of this thesis. Dr. Kelley assisted in all aspects of this thesis. iii Acknowledgements First and foremost, I would like to thank Dr. Elizabeth Kelley for her incredible enthusiasm, support, and guidance over the past two years. I am extremely grateful to have her as a supervisor and mentor and am thrilled to have the opportunity to continue working with her and learning from her as I move forward in my graduate career. I would also like to thank Dr. Kang Lee and Dr. Mark Sabbagh for taking the time out of their busy schedules to offer invaluable insights and helpful feedback on this project. I feel extremely lucky to have had such a talented and supportive group of researchers on my thesis committee. I also wish to thank my parents, Ellen and Joseph, my sister, Fiona, and my boyfriend, Hay, for their continuing love and encouragement. Special thanks to Sevda Bahtiyar and Laura O’Connell for their help in data collection and helpful comments, but more importantly, their support and friendship. Last but not least, I give my sincerest thanks to the families who generously volunteered their time to participate in this study and the undergraduate students who devoted many, many hours to working in ASD Studies lab. In particular, I would like to thank Carolyn Bell, Ellen Drumm, Katie Ben-Aron, Layla Hall, and Rachel Leung for their help in data collection and Monica Haberl for blind-coding the data. I would also like to thank a former doctoral student of Dr. Kang Lee, Angela Evans, for training me on the experimental paradigms and for her help in designing the coding scheme. iv Table of Contents Chapter Page 1. Introduction ....................................................................................................................1 Deception in Children with ASD .............................................................................2 Lie-Telling Ability in Typically Developing Children ............................................3 Lie-Telling Ability and False Belief Understanding in Typically Developing Children........................................................................................................6 Prosocial Lie-Telling Ability in Typically Developing Children ............................9 The Present Study ..................................................................................................10 2. Method .........................................................................................................................13 Participants .............................................................................................................13 Materials and Measures .........................................................................................15 General Cognitive Functioning ..................................................................15 General Language Ability ..........................................................................17 Autistic Symptomatology ..........................................................................20 Demographics ............................................................................................23 False Belief Understanding ........................................................................23 Antisocial Lie-Telling Ability ....................................................................26 Prosocial Lie-Telling Ability .....................................................................28 Procedure ...............................................................................................................30 3. Results ..........................................................................................................................32 Preliminary Analyses .............................................................................................32 Reliability Analysis ....................................................................................32 v Reliability of False Belief Task Battery .....................................................32 Order Effects ..............................................................................................33 Peeking Behaviour in the Temptation Resistance Paradigm .....................33 Desirability of the Bar of Soap in the Undesirable Gift Paradigm ............34 Group Differences ..................................................................................................35 False Belief Understanding ........................................................................35 Antisocial Lie-Telling Ability ....................................................................36 Prosocial Lie-Telling Ability .....................................................................38 Interrelations among Lie-Telling Ability, False Belief Understanding, and VMA ..........................................................................................................39 Relationship between Lie-Telling Ability and VMA ................................40 Relationship between False Belief Understanding and VMA ..................43 Relationship between Lie-Telling Ability and False Belief Understanding ................................................................................43 Relationship between Antisocial and Prosocial Lie-Telling Abilities .......44 4. Discussion ....................................................................................................................45 Can Children with ASD Tell Antisocial Lies? ......................................................45 Can Children with ASD Tell Prosocial Lies? ........................................................46 Is False Belief Understanding Related to Lie-Telling Abilities in Children with ASD? ..........................................................................................................47 False Belief Understanding and Antisocial Lie-Telling Ability ................48 False Belief Understanding and Prosocial Lie-Telling Ability ..................53 Do Children with ASD Have a Rudimentary ToM? ..............................................54 vi Future Directions ...................................................................................................55 Limitations .............................................................................................................56 Conclusions ............................................................................................................57 References Cited ................................................................................................................59 Appendices A. Calling Script ................................................................................................................67 B. Reinforcer Survey .........................................................................................................70 C. Letter of Information .....................................................................................................71 D. Consent Form ................................................................................................................73 E. Demographics Questionnaire ........................................................................................75 F. False Belief
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