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Cited by 757Child and Animal Learning DevelopmentAutism Spectrum Disorder ResearchSocial Robot Interaction and HRI

Exploration of the autistic child’s theory of mind: Knowledge, belief, and communication

Perner, Josef, Frith, Uta, Leslie, Alan M., Leekam, Susan R.·1989·Child Development
DOI 10.2307/1130734
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Abstract

26 autistic children with mental ages of 3-13 years were tested on 3 tasks that are within the capability of 3- or 4-year-old normal children. The first task tested understanding of a mistaken belief. Children were shown a typical box of a certain brand of sweets, and they all thought that it contained that kind of sweet. To their surprise, however, the box contained something else. Yet, only 4 out of the 26 autistic children were able to anticipate that another child in the same situation would make the same mistake. In contrast, all but 1 of 12 children with specific language impairment, matched for mental age, understood that others would be as misled as they had been themselves. The autistic children were also tested for their ability to infer knowledge about the content of a container from having or not having looked inside. All 4 children who had passed the belief task and an additional 4 performed perfectly, but most failed. The third task assessed children's pragmatic ability to adjust their answers to provide new rather than repeat old information. Here, too, most autistic children seemed unable to reliably make the correct adjustment. These results confirm the hypothesis that autistic children have profound difficulty in taking account of mental states.

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37 of 37 references verified0 citation errors · 0 not checkable

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  • Research on children's theory of mind has documented the emergence of increasingly robust reasoning about others' mental states during early childhood.

    “several decades of research on children’s “theory of mind” has documented the emergence of increasingly robust reasoning about others’ mental states during the same time period (Carpendale & Lewis, 2006; Perner, et al., 1989; Wellman, Cross, & Watson, 2001)”

    From The accidental transgressor: Morally-relevant theory of mind (2011) · cites this paper as Perner, et al., 1989

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Related

Authors
Perner, J., Frith, U., Leslie, A. M., & Leekam, S. R.
Affiliations
Max Planck Society (DE)
ORCID
Venue
Child Development
Publisher
Oxford University Press (OUP)
Published
1989-06
Volume
60
Issue
3
Pages
689
ISSN
0009-3920 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.2307/1130734
OpenAlex
W2092924948
Semantic Scholar
01128a2c5afea1431d562b1235858b2c93ffffe1
Cited by
757
References
37
Citations by year
2026: 3 · 2025: 8 · 2024: 10 · 2023: 12 · 2022: 17 · 2021: 28 · 2020: 17 · 2019: 14 · 2018: 19 · 2017: 20 · 2016: 22 · 2015: 32 · 2014: 19 · 2013: 28 · 2012: 57
FWCI
18.30
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
closed
Locations
  • Child Development (publishedVersion)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (submittedVersion)
  • UCL Discovery (University College London) (submittedVersion)
  • Max Planck Digital Library (submittedVersion)
  • MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Developmental and Educational Psychology › Child and Animal Learning Development
  • Life Sciences › Neuroscience › Cognitive Neuroscience › Autism Spectrum Disorder Research
  • Social Sciences › Psychology › Social Psychology › Social Robot Interaction and HRI
Keywords
autism spectrum disorder, theory of mind, children with autism, mistaken belief, false belief understanding, pragmatic communication, pragmatic inference, specific language impairment, social cognition, mental age
MeSH terms
Adolescent, Autistic Disorder, Child, Communication, Concept Formation, Emotions, Female, Humans, Intelligence, Language Development Disorders, Male, Intellectual Disability, Set, Psychology

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