Research on "theory of mind" (TOM) suggests that a grasp of the mind develops universally and sequentially, but both these claims require testing in different cultural groups. Study 1, involving 72 preschoolers, showed the expected developmental transition on false belief tasks; 3 year olds were below statistical chance, while 4 year olds were at chance, representing a lag behind Western children. The same pattern of at chance (pretence, desire and belief) and below chance performance (false belief) was replicated in study 2 with 77 preschoolers (3-5 years) and corroborated the lag identified for some Asian countries. This deficient and varied timing of TOM performance is consistent with theories (social constructivist) supporting the role of social factors in TOM development. Moreover, significant inter-task correlations corroborate the need to broaden the research focus beyond false belief tasks.

This study examines the relationship between work-family interface and job performance. Furthermore, it focuses on the moderating role of conscientiousness, agreeableness, and the relationship between work-family interface (inter-role conflict and inter-role integration) and job performance. A purposive sample of 345 residents of Karachi consisting of 173 males and 172 females, belonging to double income families and employed in various factories, participated in the study. Data were collected using the Work-Family Interface Scale, the Job Performance Scale, and two personality dimensions of the Revised NEO Personality Inventory (Conscientiousness and Agreeableness). Multiple regression analysis results indicated that the inter-role conflict dimension of work-family interface and agreeableness dimension of personality were significantly negatively associated with job performance. Conscientiousness and agreeableness significantly moderated inter-role integration and job performance, whereas no evidence was found of them having a moderating role in inter-role conflict and job performance. This research contributes towards an understanding of the role of positive dispositional attributes moderating between both aspects of work-family interface and job performance.

Two studies are presented to examine whether and why 3–5-year-olds in Pakistan display limited social understanding. Study 1 tested 71 preschoolers on Lillard and Flavell’s (1992) test of desires, pretence and beliefs, plus two false belief tasks, and showed very limited understanding across these measures even though almost half were over 5 years old. Study 2 replicated this effect with 35 preschoolers, and also conducted home observations of mother–child interaction at two time points. It tested three competing explanations of the role of adult-conversation in the preschooler’s developing understanding of the mind: the quality of the caregiver’s references to mental states, the child’s grasp of mental state language in such conversations, and the connectedness of adult–child talk. These factors are usually highly correlated in Western cultures. In Pakistan, with a delay in the acquisition of social understanding skills, Study 2 showed that maternal and child references to mental states were rare (2% of maternal and 1% of child utterances). Analyses of the relationship between mother–child conversation and the children’s test performance suggested that the measures of social understanding were not predicted uniquely by the connectedness of talk within the dyad, or maternal use of mental state terms. However, the children’s concurrent (and to a lesser extent previous) use of mental state terms was related to their grasp of mental states. Thus, the data support previous analyses, which suggests that the child’s construction of mental state terms is more crucial in their grasp of the social world.

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