ABSTRACT
Theory of mind has certainly captured the interest and imagination of researchers in the field of cognitive development, to an extent rivalled by few topics in the history of the field. There is a sense that this topic finally focuses our attention on fundamental matters. How do children construct an understanding of their world, with other human beings the most salient component of this world? Yet theory of mind has been approached by most of its recent investigators both as a specialist’s topic and as an entirely new domain of inquiry. At the same time, at least implicit in much of the discussion surrounding the topic has been a sense that characteristics of broad significance to the developing intellect are at stake. Indeed we would expect this to be the case. If an understanding of false belief is the major conceptual achievement that many have claimed it to be, this achievement should be evident in contexts and respects other than the already paradigmatic false belief task.
