Neural and behavioural correlates of Theory of Mind reasoning in five-year-old children born preterm
Selina Abel, Melissa Thye, Katie Mckinnon, Rebekah Smikle, Jean Skelton, Lorena Jiménez-Sánchez, Ray Amir, Gayle Barclay, Charlotte Jardine, Donna Mcintyre, Iona Hamilton, Yu Wei Chua, Aditi Hosangadi, Alan Quigley, G. David Batty, Michael J. Thrippleton, Heather C. Whalley, James P. Boardman, Hilary RichardsonAbstract
Behavioural studies suggest atypical or delayed development of “theory of mind” (ToM; our ability to reason about others’ mental states) following preterm birth. Using pre-registered analyses of behavioural and movie-viewing functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) metrics of ToM, we tested for a domain-specific impact of preterm birth (24-32 weeks’ gestational age) on theory of mind development at age five years. Preterm-born children (n=52) scored lower than term-born comparators (n=58) on a linguistic behavioural ToM task, but this difference was primarily driven by differences in receptive language. Neurally, preterm-born children (n=30) had qualitatively similar responses in brain regions that support ToM reasoning to a short movie to term-born comparators (n=46), as characterised by four neural metrics; responses to one scene differed as a function of gestational age. Using intersubject correlation analyses, we found that preterm-born children’s ToM network responses were more heterogenous than term-born children’s responses; however individual preterm-born children’s responses most resembled those observed in same-age term-born children, relative to younger children or other preterm-born children. Taken together, preterm birth does not appear to preclude broadly similar functional development in ToM brain regions by age five years.