Abstract

The two classical Theory of mind tests with two non-verbal Theory of mind test are offered to bilingual minority children In Bulgaria. Together with the theory of mind tests also a language test (wh-test with the mental state verb “say”) and evidentiality test is offered. The hypothesis of the study is to check if between the four theory of mind tasks and the language task is there any correlation. In total 120 children (60 Roma and 60 Turkish children) divided in three age groups: 3;6-4;0 years old, 4;1-4;6 years old and 4;6-5;0 years old. In each age group there are 20 children form each ethnicity. The children are tested in their mother tongue (Romani and Turkish) and in Bulgarian as their L2. The hypothesis tested in carrying out the study, namely that the knowledge of grammatical categories is a factor which helps the bilingual children to understand the Theory of Mind was partially proven. In Bulgarian as their L2 the results of the children are very low, most probably because they did not acquire the knowledge on the wh-questions and evidentiality in their second school language and it seems that the TOM tasks are also still difficult for them. The results in mother tongue show that the knowledge of the children of the wh-questions helps them to understand the TOM 1 test, which is on Unexpected Content, as well as the nonverbal tests. The comprehension of evidentiality test in the mother tongue plays an important role in the performance of the TOM 1, TOM 3-nonverbal and TOM 4-nonverbal tests. Age plays a statistically significant role in the performance of the TOM 3-nonverbal and TOM 4-nonverbal tests

keywordsTheory of mind; Minority children; Bilingualism; Bulgaria