The mind behind the picture: The links between Folk Psychology and Early Understanding of Pictures as Symbols

Abstract

To understand what a picture represents, is pivotal to know or infer the intentionality of the picture´s producer. Toddlers seem to be especially prepared to establish inferences about the mental states of people, that is, they construct a commonsense or folk Psychology. The aim of this article is to explicit the link between the development of folk psychology and early understanding of pictures as symbols. To do this, the major milestones of the development of folk psychology and symbolic understanding of pictures preschoolers will be examined and major research which provides evidence of meeting points between both domain-specific knowledge will be reviewed.