Plousia Misailidi

This study examined associations between adaptive and maladaptive narcissistic traits, theory of mind (ToM), and empathy in a sample of 10- to 12-year-old adolescents. Participants ( N = 130, M _age = 10.84 years, 69 girls) completed self-report measures assessing dimensions of narcissism (adaptive and maladaptive) and empathy (cognitive empathy, affective empathy, and intention to comfort) as well as two advanced ToM tasks, the Strange Stories test and the Reading the Mind in the Eyes test. Performance on the Strange Stories test was positively associated with adaptive narcissistic traits (authority and self-sufficiency), whereas a stronger self-reported intention to comfort others was associated with lower levels of these traits. In addition, both higher affective empathy and a greater intention to comfort were associated with lower levels of maladaptive narcissistic traits (entitlement, exploitativeness, and exhibitionism). Age and gender did not have a moderating impact on these relationships.

Three hundred and eighteen in‐service teachers from Greece, Cyprus, Romania and Hungary participated in a professional training program aimed at promoting their metacognitive and epistemic thinking and practices, with argumentation as a prominent teaching practice. Pre‐program survey results revealed that teachers' personal and teaching epistemic practices were underdeveloped, with particularly low engagement in the latter. Personal epistemic practices predicted teaching ones. Cultural differences emerged, with Greek and Cypriot teachers reporting higher engagement in both epistemic practices than Romanian and Hungarian teachers. In‐depth interviews with six Greek and Cypriot teachers who implemented argumentation post‐program indicated that argument‐based practices improved students' epistemic understanding, particularly in appreciating multiple perspectives, evaluating sources and using evidence. Teachers acknowledged receiving limited preparation for promoting students' epistemic understanding and argumentation skills. These findings highlight the need for higher education programs to develop pre‐ and in‐service teachers' epistemic practices. Implications for higher education and policymakers are discussed.

Educational programs aimed at developing metacognitive skills usually focus on students, neglecting the development of teachers by teaching metacognitively aware instructional methods. The effectiveness of such development programs is well-established, but there is a gap between research findings and their application in schools. A framework for a training program was developed in the context of an international partnership project aimed at enhancing the metacognitive abilities of both children and teachers. The final form of classroom activities was developed at the country level using action research methods with the involvement of teachers. After implementing a 3-week educational program involving 35 experimental and 19 control groups from Romanian public schools, a comparison of pre- and post-test scores indicated a significant increase in the number of children in the experimental group with improved efficiency in metacognitive monitoring in reading. Teachers’ metacognitive awareness significantly improved after the Teacher Training Program, as indicated by a comparison of the pre- and post-training results of the Metacognitive Awareness Inventory for Teachers (MAIT). No correlation was found between teachers’ development scores (as expressed by differences between pre- and post-intervention MAIT results) and the number of students from their classes whose progress in metacognitive monitoring significantly increased. The cyclical process of the action research methodology proved to be useful for increasing the efficiency of the intervention program. However, due to methodological limitations, the results are primarily interpretable within a local context. The results confirm expert recommendations aimed at integrating the targeted development of metacognitive teaching skills into both pre-service and in-service teacher training programs.

Fear and fearlessness are two distinct emotional responses that can occur when a person faces a potentially dangerous situation. These responses seem to be linked to gender stereotypes (fearful female and fearless male). This study examines whether preschool children attribute fear and fearlessness stereotypically in relation to gender and whether their attributions vary as a function of age and gender. One hundred and twenty children (60 boys and 60 girls) aged 3, 4 and 5 years participated in this study. We examined children's gender‐stereotypical performance through emotional scenarios and drawing tasks involving fear and fearlessness conditions. The results showed that children's performance was equally stereotypical in the two conditions. An age effect was found: children's gender stereotypical attributions increased with age. The results showed no differences in children's stereotypical performance in regards to their gender and task type (emotional scenarios and drawing tasks). The significance and implications of these findings are discussed in the context of gender‐emotion stereotypes.

Shame, theory of mind (ToM) and self-consciousness were examined in a group of early adolescents aged 10-12 years. The aim was to assess whether the relationship between early adolescents' dispositional shame and ToM is mediated by their private and public self-consciousness. One hundred adolescents (M = 11;1 years; months, 51 girls) were administered measures assessing dispositional shame and self-consciousness and a ToM test. Results support an essential distinction between the private and public aspects of self-consciousness and show that ToM's relationship to dispositional shame is mediated by public but not private self-consciousness. The significance of these findings and their potential implications for theoretical models of shame development is discussed.

Children's theory of mind (ToM) and emotion regulation (ER) have been associated with various parental factors. This study examined associations between ToM, ER, and dimensions of parental reflective functioning (RF) in children aged 7 to 12 years. A total of 95 children (M = 8.85 years, 51 girls, and 44 boys) and their mothers took part in the study. Children completed two higher‐order ToM tasks and mothers rated their own RF and children's ToM and ER. Analyses revealed unique effects of parental prementalizing modes (PM) on both task‐measured and parent‐reported ToM as well as on children's socially‐appropriate ER skills and their lability/negativity. Moreover, parents’ interest and curiosity about their children's mental states (IC) was uniquely associated with parent‐reported ToM and ER. The study also revealed bidirectional mediation effects, with ToM mediating the relationship between ER and both PM and IC, and ER mediating the relationship between ToM and both PM and IC.

The relation between children’s guilt proneness and theory of mind (ΤοΜ) was examined in children (Ν = 96) aged 7- to 11-years. Guilt proneness was assessed with a self-report scenario-based measure and ToM was examined with a battery of first-order and second-order mental-state tasks. Hierarchical regression analysis revealed that second-order, but not first-order, mental state understanding, predicted children’s guilt proneness. Age and gender did not have a moderating influence on this relation. These results add to research investigating the significance of ToM for children’s moral emotions.