Development and clinical application of the social cognition scale

2016 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 26670437
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Neurology
• Research Institution: Tokyo Dementia Care Research and Training Center (2016); Gunma University (2014-2015)
• Principal Investigator: Yamaguchi Haruyasu 社会福祉法人浴風会認知症介護研究・研修東京センター, その他部局等, センター長 (00158114)
• Project Period (FY): 2014-04-01 – 2017-03-31
• Keywords: 認知症 / 社会脳

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Theory of Mind (ToM) reasoning plays a pivotal role in social interaction. The ability can be used for an evil purpose, and ToM reasoning is required both to deceive others, and to detect deception.
Those with MCI have difficulties to detect other’s deceiving intentions when the intention was shown implicitly using social signs of gaze and pointing, while they could notice the intention when depicted in the cartoon explicitly. For those with mild Alzheimer disease dementia, the detection is hard even when the intention was depicted explicitly. The "Manju" task may be a useful scale for social cognition in demented subjects.Knowledge of social cognition is insufficient in medical staffs. Function of social emotion negatively correlated with degree of behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD), suggesting that social emotion prevent development of BPSD.

Free Research Field

認知症医療