Associate Professor Ted Ruffman
 Contact
Details
Tel 64 3 479 7670
Email tedr@psy.otago.ac.nz
Link to published PDF
papers
Social/Emotion Understanding in Older Adults (60+ Years):
We have found that some older adults are worse
at recognising some emotions relative to younger adults. In
particular, they have difficulty identifying anger and sadness
in facial, bodily and auditory expressions. They also seem
worse when identifying which persons look dangerous but not
when identifying dangerous situations. When attempting to
identify emotional expressions, younger adults tend to focus
on the most informative regions of faces, whereas older adults
do not. We think all of these differences can be traced to
decline of the “social brain” with age, in particular,
the amygdala and orbitofrontal cortex.
Theory of Mind in Children:
We are interested in theory of mind development (understanding
of beliefs, desires, intentions) from birth to about 4 or
5 years. We are investigating how mothers’ language
might facilitate children’s theory of mind (and their
general language development), how it relates to their ability
to discern statistical patterns in stimuli (statistical learning),
and how a theory of mind might impact on the child’s
real life. A central theme is the relation between explicit
(verbal) and implicit (eg, eye gaze, galvanic skin response)
measures of social understanding.
Object Permanence in Infancy:
A third area of interest is object permanence understanding
in infancy. This involves infants’ understanding that
an object continues to exist even though the baby cannot see
it (eg, it has been covered up). We find that babies might
possess implicit knowledge of object permanence even when
they search incorrectly for hidden objects, and that search
errors indicate genuine confusion at least some of the time.
Henry, J. D., Ruffman, T., McDonald, S., Peek O'Leary, M.-A.,
Phillips, L. H., Brodaty, H., & Rendell, P. G. (2008).
Recognition of
disgust is selectively preserved in Alzheimer's disease. Neuropsychologia,
46, 1363-1370
Roberts, S. G. B., McComb, K., & Ruffman, T. (2008).
An experimental investigation of referential looking in free-ranging
Barbary Macaques (Macaca sylvanus). Journal of Comparative
Psychology, 122, 94-99.
Ruffman, T., Henry, J. D., Livingstone, V., & Phillips,
L. H. (2008). A meta-analytic review of emotion recognition
and aging: Implications for neuropsychological models of aging.
Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews, 32,
863-881.
Taumoepeau, M., & Ruffman, T. (2008). Stepping stones
to others’ minds: Maternal talk relates to child mental
state language and emotion understanding at 15, 24 and 33
months. Child Development, 79, 284-302.
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