If you were directed here from the first page, it’s because you said you were under 18. There are some questions on this survey that some would consider inappropriate for those under 18, and furthermore we are unable to use data from participants under age 18. If you would like to know more about this research, please read the information below, and feel free to contact us with any questions at: heberlein@wjh.harvard.edu.

Thank you for your participation!

The study in which you just participated is following up on previous studies examining how we perceive other minds. When we think about other minds, there are a lot of different features we might be thinking about—as you rated in the first part of these questionnaires. It turns out that these features fall into two clusters: the other mind’s agency, or ability to have goals and plan actions, and its experience, or capacity to feel things. Recent work in our lab has shown that these two features are not only separable, but that emphasizing one or the other of them can have interesting effects on how we think about other people (you can read more about this research at: http://mind.wjh.harvard.edu/MCLab.htm).

In the current version of the study—the one you completed—we are interested in exploring how different personality traits or other characteristics of the person doing the rating can affect how agency and experience are perceived. You may have noticed that some of the questions you answered seemed to focus on topics related to depression or other mental disorders. While we were not attempting to test individuals with such disorders with the current survey, many researchers believe that milder forms of many clinical conditions exist within the normal population—for example, many of us know someone who, while not exactly depressed, is generally a little down; or someone who, while not autistic, is less socially attuned than most. The next step in this work will be identifying some traits that are related to disorders that affect mind perception—disorders such as autism or schizophrenia—and then applying the insights gained from this and similar tests to studies of these populations. The eventual aim of this work is to better characterize the kinds of social deficits that are frequently a devastating part of these disorders, in the hope that a deeper understanding will lead to improved treatment.

A good reference for the background to this study is:
Gray, H., Gray, K., & Wegner, D. M. (2007). Dimensions of mind perception. Science, 315, 619.

Please feel free to contact us with any questions. The best way to reach us is by email: heberlein@wjh.harvard.edu.

Thank you again for your time!!