Egocentrism

In psychology, egocentrism is the characteristic of regarding oneself and one's own opinions or interests as most important. The term derives from the Greek egô, meaning "I." An egocentric person has no theory of mind, cannot "put himself in other people's shoes," and believes everyone sees what he sees (or that what he sees in some way exceeds what others see.)

Jean Piaget (1896-1980) claimed that young children are egocentric. This does not mean that they are selfish, but that they do not have the mental ability to understand that other people may have different opinions and beliefs from themselves. Piaget did a test to investigate egocentrism called the mountains study. He put children in front of a simple plaster mountain range and then asked them to pick from four pictures the view that he, Piaget, would see. Younger children picked the picture of the view they themselves saw.

However the Mountains Study has been critised for judging children's visual spatial awareness, rather than egocentrism. A follow up study involving police dolls showed that even young children were able to correctly say what the interviewer would see. It is thought that Piaget over-estimated the levels of egocentrism in children.

Autistic people are particularly likely to be egocentric.