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diverge. Many younger children, typically 3-year- is that older children understand that people live
olds, fail such tasks. Instead of answering randomly, their lives in a mental world as much as in a world of
younger children often make a specific false-belief real situationsand occurrences.
error-they assert that Maxi will look for the choco- False-beliefperformancehas come to serve as a
late in the drawerto which it was moved. marker for mentalistic understanding of persons
These findings are empirically intriguing; it is more generally.Thus,in researchon individual differ-
strikingthat young childrenwould make such a pro- ences in young children'ssocial cognition,false-belief
vocative error.They are also theoreticallyimportant performancesare used as a majoroutcome measure
in that they support a developmentalhypothesis that to assess the influence of early family conversations
children'stheory of mind undergoes a majorconcep- (Dunn, Brown, Slomkowski, Tesla, & Youngblade,
tual change in early life. To be clear,the claim is not 1991), engagement in pretend play (Youngblade&
that young children know nothing of mental states, Dunn, 1995), or family structure(Hughes & Dunn,
but that they fail to understandrepresentationalmen- 1998;Perner,Ruffman,& Leekam,1994)on develop-
tal states. One way of depicting this claim is pre- ment of mentalisticunderstandings.False-beliefun-
sented in Figure 1. A simple understandingof a state derstandinghas also become a majortool for research
such as desire could involve construingthe desireras with developmentallydelayedindividuals.Thetheory-
having an internal, subjectiveurging for an external of-mind hypothesis for autism, in particular,claims
state of affairs.But an everyday understandingof be- that the severe social disconnectedness evident in
lief requiresthe notion thatthe person has a represen- even high-functioning individuals with autism is
tation of the world, the contents of which could be, due to an impairmentin their ability to construeper-
and in the case of false beliefs are,quite differentfrom sons in terms of their inner mental lives (see, e.g.,
the contents of the world itself. Thus, the change in- Baron-Cohen,1995). False-belief performancespro-
volved has been characterizedas a shift (1) from a vided an initial empirical test of this claim in that
situation-basedto a representation-based understand- high-functioningchildren with autism who are able
ing of behavior (Perner,1991), (2) from a connections to reason competently about physical phenomena
to a representationalunderstandingof mind (Flavell, often fail false-belieftasks, whereas Down syndrome
1988), or (3) from a simple desire to a belief-desire and other delayed populations of equivalent mental
naive psychology(Wellman,1990).In short,as revealed age often do not (e.g., Baron-Cohen,Leslie, & Frith,
in part by successful false-beliefreasoning,the claim 1985;for more comprehensivefindings and compa-
risons, see Happe, 1995; Yirimiya,Erel, Shaked, &
Solomonica-Levi,1998).
Forvariousreasons,therefore,a considerablebody
of researchhas accumulated,which employ an in-
creasingvariety of false-belieftasks that focus on at-
tempting to demonstrate and explain false-belief
errors, as well as relate performanceon false-belief
tasks to other conceptions,tasks, and competencies.
Theory-of-mindresearchgoes well beyond this task
Desire(wants an apple) and these data; nonetheless false-belief tasks have a
centralplace in currentsocial-cognitiveresearch(see
Flavell & Miller, 1998), much as conservation tasks
once were focal for understandingcognitive develop-
ment and for testing Piaget'sfindings and theorizing.
For the case of false belief, just as in the conservation
literature, the initial accounts, the initial tasks, and es-
pecially the claims of conceptual change have all been
vigorously challenged.
In particular, research on false belief instantiates a
basic conundrum in the study of cognitive develop-
Belief(thinksthat that is an apple) ment. Performance on any cognitive task reflects at
least two factors: conceptual understanding required
Figure 1 Graphic depiction of how the person on the right to solve the problem ("competence") and other non-
construes the desire (top) or belief (bottom) of the person on focal cognitive skills (e.g., ability to remember the key
the left. information, focus attention, comprehend, and an-
swer various questions) required to access and ex- olds fail false-belief tasks but claim many 4- and 5-
press understanding ("performance").The last 25 year-olds do as well. "Themost strikingthing about
years of cognitive development research have pro- the age trends was the lack of them ... Quite simply,
duced a plethora of early competence studies and it has become fashionable to claim that there is a
accounts essentially showing that on various tasks sharp age trend, but in fact there is not" (Mitchell,
young childrenfail not because they lack the concep- 1996,pp. 137-138).
tual competence,but ratherbecause the testing situa- These issues, controversies, and theories, along
tion was too demanding or confusing. This research with the increasing amount of empirical findings,
has had several desirable results:undeniable under- mandate a carefulreview.Indeed, several qualitative
estimations of young children's knowledge have reviews have been presented,both several years ago
been exposed; information-processinganalyses of when the number of focal studies were modest (Fla-
how children arrive at their answers and responses, vell, 1988;Perner,1991;Wellman,1990)and more re-
and not just what answers or responses they make, cently as the studies and discrepancieshave grown
have flourished; and domain-general accounts of (Leslie, 2000;Mitchell, 1996;Taylor,1996).But these
cognitive competence have yielded to more precise reviews have come to differentconclusions,and have
domain-specific understandings of children's con- failed to provide a compelling synthesis of all the
ceptions and skills. At the same time, however, ac- data. We provide a quantitativereview and integra-
cepted demonstrations of conceptual change have tion of the findings, a meta-analysis of the data. A
largely disappeared.This is curious inasmuch as the meta-analysisseems feasible and useful. The number
interplay between cognitive change and stability is of studies is now large;certainlysufficientfor infor-
the cornerstoneof all majortheories of cognitive de- mative meta-analysisand, indeed, so large that con-
velopment.Yeteach proposed developmentalchange sidering all the studies one by one is difficult or im-
(e.g., Piaget's conservationcompetence,Carey'spro- possible. In addition, although different qualitative
posed shift from naive psychology to naive biology, reviews depict this database in contradictoryfash-
false-belief understandings) has seemingly evapo- ions, many of the contradictionscould be addressed
ratedin the mist of task variationsshowing enhanced by meta-analysis.Consider the essential dependent
performancein still younger children. variable,false-beliefperformanceas reported across
Conceivably, conceptual change may indeed be studies. When studies show a mixtureof above-, at-,
rare.The contemporaryre-emergenceof strongly na- and below-chance responding, as is the case for re-
tivist perspectives on cognitive development both search on false belief, then a comprehensivepooling
contributesto and derives from this possibility (e.g., of the data across studies is needed to clarifythe na-
Spelke, 1994).On the other hand, genuine conceptual ture of children'sperformance.
changes may be obscured by current emphasis on Of equal theoreticalimportanceare possible inde-
early competence and task simplifications,making it pendent variables, such as the ages of the children
difficultto comprehendthe bigger pictureamidst the tested. In particular,investigationsof false belief rea-
haze of accumulating results from numerous task soning have increasinglydifferedaccordingto a vari-
variations.A comprehensiveanalysis of the volumi- ety of task variables. The focal false-belief question
nous and varied false-beliefresearchprovides an im- has been asked in terms of action (where will Maxi
portant contemporaryopportunity to examine this lookfor his chocolate),in terms of thoughts (where
basic issue. does Maxi thinkhis chocolate is), and in terms of
Empirically,an increasing number of researchers speech (where will Maxi say his chocolate is). Some-
now claim that the original false-belieftasks are un- times the targetobjecthas been moved fromits origi-
necessarilydifficultand that 3-year-oldscanevidence nal locationinadvertently,whereas at othertimes, the
improved, even above-chance, false-belief reasoning movement has been presented, emphatically, as a de-
if the tasks are suitably revised (e.g., Siegal & Beattie, liberate deception designed to fool or trick the protag-
1991; Sullivan & Winner, 1993). Not only the correct onist. At various times the protagonist, Maxi, has
estimation of 3-year-olds is at issue, but more impor- been a puppet, a doll, a real person, or a video por-
tantly, basic developmental trends. Some authors trayal. Moreover, the change-of-locations task dis-
now claim that 3-year-olds, and much younger chil- cussed earlier represents only one "standard" false-
dren as well, understand belief and false belief (e.g., belief task among several. Another often-used task
Chandler, Fritz, & Hala, 1989; Fodor, 1992). False- involves unexpected contents: Children see a crayon
belief competence, assessed correctly,is thus predicted box, state it will have crayons inside, then open the
to be high even in young children. Other authors (e.g., box to find it is filled with candies. Then they are
Robinson & Mitchell, 1995) claim that many 3-year- asked about someone else, Mary, who has never
looked inside the box, "What will Mary think is in ety. Understanding people in terms of mental states in
here, crayons or candies?" A variation on unexpected- general, and in terms of beliefs, more specifically, can
contents tasks are unexpected-identity tasks, in which be argued to be a universal folk psychological stance
a false belief is engendered by an object with a decep- (e.g., Wellman & Gelman, 1998) or a specific manifes-
tive identity (e.g., a sponge that looks just like a rock). tation of a particular Anglo-European individualistic
The variety of independent variables contributes interpersonal stance (e.g., Lillard, 1998).
to an increasingly confused picture. Again meta-
analysis could be especially informative; sufficient METHOD
variation exists on a number of independent variables
across studies to allow for the examination of factors In a meta-analysis, conditions within studies, rather
that have not been varied, or not comprehensively than individual participants or entire studies, com-
varied, within studies. prise the unit of analysis (Glass, McGraw, & Smith,
Among the extended set of variables we will con- 1981). In our analyses, the proportion of children in a
sider in this study, five deserve brief introduction be- condition who demonstrated the target behaviors-
cause of their prominence in research and theory. The correct false-belief judgments versus errors-was
first variable is age. According to initial findings, used as the essential dependent variable. (More pre-
false-belief performance changes dramatically from 3 cisely, we use the proportion of false-belief questions
to 5 years of age; this change may or may not remain answered correctly, because many studies asked each
when important task variations are accounted for. child two or more false-belief questions.) A meta-
The second variable concerns deception-whether analysis of such data is especially straightforward;
the child views the false-belief situation as happen- many of the statistical problems that arise for other
stance or a deliberate ploy to trick the protagonist. types of meta-analyses, which require the transfor-
Several authors claim that framing the task in terms mation and collapsing of various derived inferential
of explicit trickery reduces or eliminates young chil- statistics (e.g., F tests, t tests) (see Glass et al., 1981),
dren's errors (e.g., Chandler et al., 1989), although can be avoided given this type of comparable descrip-
others claim it does not (e.g., Sodian, Taylor, Harris, & tive data across studies.
Perner, 1991). The third variable concerns salience. In addition, we have been able to rule out aberra-
For example, framing the task in terms of trickery tions due to sampling by supplementing our ordinary
may be unimportant except that it serves to make least squares estimates with bootstrap estimates of pa-
mental state (being fooled or duped) more salient to rameters and their standard errors. The details of
the child in comparison with the alternative real state these analytic methods are presented below in the Re-
of affairs (where the chocolate really is). Salience is- sults section. Here, we present information on the
sues have two separate aspects. Certain task manipu- studies and conditions included in the analyses.
lations arguably serve to enhance the salience of the
protagonist's mental state; other manipulations serve Studies
to reduce the salience of the contrasting real state of
affairs. The total potentially relevant literature is large.
The fourth variable of special import concerns Therefore, the first task was to search pertinent jour-
whether the children are asked about someone else's nals, review articles, databases, and chapters for
false belief or their own. In a false-belief task for self studies on several related topics, including false be-
(sometimes called a representational change task), a lief, mental representations, theory of mind, under-
child may be shown the crayon box, and that it con- standing mental states, belief-desire reasoning, and
tains candies, and then asked, "Before you looked in- folk or naive psychology. The references of each cita-
side, did you think the box contained crayons or can- tion were searched for additional articles. The studies
dies?" Different theoretical accounts make different generated in this fashion were supplemented by a
predictions about the difficulty of false-belief judg- search through several conference abstracts and by
ments for self versus others (as detailed later in soliciting information from a variety of known re-
the Discussion section). Moreover, an empirically in- searchers in this field (e.g., P. L. Harris, A. Gopnik, S.
triguing question is, do children understand beliefs Baron-Cohen, J. W. Astington, J. H. Flavell, M. Siegal,
first for their own case, for others, or both similarly? M. Chandler, K. Bartsch, J. D. Woolley, and C. Lewis).
Finally, the national or community identity of the Our efforts to find relevant studies were concluded in
children tested needs to be considered, for example, January 1998; no studies published or sent after that
whether children are from the United States, Austria, time were included in the analyses. In retrospect, we
Japan, or a hunter-gatherer traditional African soci- have discovered that several studies published before
1998 were omitted; given the size of the literature and ditions involved atypically difficult tasks or ex-
its publicationin a great many differentjournalsthis tremely confused children.
was inevitable. In total,a largemajorityof false-beliefresearchwas
Many studies that were encounteredinitially were examined, representativeof both published and un-
not considered further because they reported no published false-beliefstudies in the field as of January
false-belieftasks or conditions. Some studies or con- 1998. The analyses of the data provided by these
ditions were not included because they focused only studies proceededin several stages. In each, different
on autisticor delayed samples;the focus in our study subsets of the total data were used, as clarifiedin the
was on normallydeveloping children.In total 38 arti- Results section.
cles were examinedand excludedfor these reasons.
Not all studies or conditionspurportingto include
false-belief tasks with normally developing children Coding
could be included in the analyses.As alreadynoted,
differentstudies encompassed a wide variety of dif- Eachconditionincluded in the analyseswas coded
ferent task situations and questions. Most of these for the dependent variable (proportionof correctre-
were reasonably straightforward, at least when sponses to the false-beliefquestion) and for a variety
sorted in relevant, measurableways (e.g., deception of features constituting the following independent
versus none, puppets versus live protagonists).Some, variables:
however, were so different as to be irrelevant (e.g., 1. Yearof publication.
conditions in which the real state of affairswas com- 2. Mean age and number of participants in a
pletely unknown, and hence, whether the protago- condition.
nist's belief was false or true was indeterminable). 3. Percentageof participantspassing controlques-
Moreover,for our procedureswe needed compa- tions,andpercentagedroppedfromthe research.
rably reported data on the dependent measure (pro- 4. Country of participants: for example, the
portion of correct false-belief judgments) and we United States,United Kingdom,Austria,Japan,
needed the data to be reportedseparatelyfor children and so forth.
of various ages (e.g., 3- versus 4-year-olds) and for 5. Type of task: Three levels of task type, which
separate tasks (e.g., locations versus contents tasks). distinguishedlocationsversus contentsversus
Several studies collapsed their reportedfindings to- identity tasks (as describedearlier).
gether across age or task features. For a number of 6. Nature of the protagonist:Five levels that de-
these, more detailed data was sought and received scribed the protagonistas a puppet or doll; a
from the authors,but this was not always possible or pictured character;a videotaped person; or a
clarificationswere not always forthcoming. real person presentin, or absent from,the cur-
In total, our analyses encompassed 77 reports or rent situation. Protagonists who were real,
articlesincluding 178 separatestudies and 591 condi- presentpersons were then also coded as either
tions. A list of the number of studies and conditions the self or anotherperson.
appears in Table1. These same 77 reportsyielded 58 7. Nature of the targetobject:Fourlevels that de-
conditions that were excluded for the reasons de- scribed the target object as a real object (e.g.,
scribed earlier (less than 10%of the conditions that chocolate),a toy, a pictured object,or a video-
were included). taped object.
One other exclusion was made. False-belieftasks 8. Real presence of the target object:Two levels
typically ask not only the false-belief question (e.g., denoting whether, at the time the false-belief
Wheredoes Maxi think his chocolateis?)but also one question was asked, the target objectwas real
or more control questions (e.g., Where is the chocolate and present (e.g., chocolate was in the drawer,
really? Where did Maxi put his chocolate?). Perfor- the crayon box contained candies) or not (e.g.,
mance on these control questions varies, but typically Maxi's chocolate was used up and thus now
even the youngest children do reasonably well, and absent, the crayon box was empty and thus
often only children who answer the controls correctly contained no real object).
are then included in the final data. Conditions in 9. Motive for the transformation: Two levels cap-
which fewer than 60% of the children answered the turing whether the key transformation (e.g.,
control questions correctly or in which 40% or more of the change of location or the substitution of un-
the initial subjects were dropped were excluded from expected contents) was done to explicitly trick
our analyses. A total of nine conditions were ex- the protagonist (deception), or for some other
cluded for these reasons; we assumed that these con- reason including for no explicit reason at all.
(Continued)
10. Participation in the transformation: Three dren themselves(e.g., the child initiallydiscov-
levels describing whether the child initially ered that the crayonbox containedcandies),or
helped to set up the task props, engaged in ac- whether the character'smental state was ex-
tively making the key transformation,or only plicitly stated (e.g., the child was told "Maxi
passively observed the events. thinks it is in the cupboard")or pictured in
11. Salienceof the protagonist'smental state:Four some fashion (e.g., via a thought bubble).
levels describingwhether the mental statehad 12. Typeof question:Fourlevels denotingwhether
to be inferredfrom the character'ssimple ab- the false-beliefquestion was phrased in terms
sence during the key transformation,whether of where the protagonistwould look (or some
the character'sabsence was emphasized and other belief-dependent action the character
explicitly noted, whether the false-beliefexpe- might take), what he'd think or believe, what
rience was demonstratedinitially on the chil- he'd say, or what he'd know.
Table1 Continued
13. Temporal marker:Two levels capturing whether mation) agreement was perfect. The two lowest re-
the false-belief question explicitly mentioned liabilities were 92% (for percent passing control
the time frame involved ("When Maxi comes items and for salience of the protagonist's mental
back, which place will he look in first?") or not. state). All disagreements were resolved through
discussion.
Because the way in which an individual condi-
tion was to be coded on the above measures was
not always clear-cut, two independent raters coded RESULTS
94 conditions representing 20 studies. Agreement
Primary Conditions
(agreements divided by agreements plus disagree-
ments) ranged from 92 to 100%. Over all codings, As noted, the entire database for the meta-analysis
reliability averaged 97%. On some variables (year contained information on 591 false-belief conditions.
of publication, country, and motive for the transfor- In the first wave of analyses, however, we included
000
dramatically improves with age. Figure 2A shows
each primary condition and the curve that best fits the 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110
data. The curve plotted represents the probability of
Age (Months)
being correct at any age. At 30 months, the youngest
age at which data were obtained, children are more
than 80% incorrect. At 44 months, children are 50% Figure 2 Scatterplot of conditions with increasing age show-
ing best-fit line. (A) raw scatterplot with log fit; (B) proportion
correct, and after that, children become increasingly correct versus age with linear fit. In (A), each condition is rep-
correct. Figure 2B shows the same data, but in this resented by its mean proportion correct. In (B), those scores are
case the dependent variable, proportion correct, is transformed as indicated in the text.
transformed via a logit transformation. The formula
for the logit is:
straightened, yielding a linear relation that allows
logit = In , systematic examination of the data via linear regres-
sion; second, the restricted range inherent to propor-
where "ln" is the natural logarithm, and "p" is the tion data is eliminated, for logits can range from
proportion correct. With this transformation, 0 rep- negative infinity to positive infinity; and third, the
resents random responding, or even odds of predict- transformation yields a dependent variable and a
ing the correct answer versus the incorrect answer. measure of effect size that is easily interpretable in
(When the odds are even, or 1, the log of 1 is 0, so the terms of odds and odds ratios (see, e.g., Hosmer &
logit is 0.) Use of this transformation has three major Lemeshow, 1989).
benefits. First, as is evident in Figure 2B, the curvilin- The top line of Table 2 summarizes the initial anal-
ear relation between age and proportion correct is ysis of age alone in relation to correct performance
Nonsignificant
Year of publication F(1, 325) = 2.65, p > .10 F(1, 324) = .96, p > .32
Type of task F(1, 359) = .63, p > .42 F(1, 358) = .64, p > .42
Type of question F(3, 357) = 1.96, p > .11 F(3, 354) = .81, p > .48
Nature of the protagonist F(4, 356) = 1.66, p > .44 F(4, 352) = 1.15, p > .33
Nature of the target object F(3, 357) = 2.49, p > .06 F(3, 354) = 2.35, p > .07
Self versus other F(1, 230) = 1.77, p > .18 F(1, 229) = 3.10, p > .07
Main effects
Motive F(1, 359) = 14.27, p < .001 F(1, 358) = .30, p > .58 1.90
Participation F(2, 358) = 5.91, p < .003 F(2, 356) = 1.25, p > .28 1.96
Real presence F(1, 359) = 16.05, p < .001 F(1, 358) = .63, p > .42 2.17
Salience F(3, 357) = 4.28, < .006 F(3, 354) = .98, p > .40 1.92
p
Country F(6, 345) = 10.42, p < .001 F(6, 359) = 1.04, p > .40 Australia versus United States = 2.27
United States versus Japan = 1.48
Interaction
Temporal marker F(1, 358) = 5.45, p < .02 F(1, 358) = 7.57, p < .006
aEffect sizes are presented only for significant variables. Effect sizes were computed in odds ratios and represent the increased odds of
being correct given a facilitating value of a variable, as explained in the text.
(transformedvia the logit transformation).The far change-for example, all ages evidence essentially
right column presents the measure of effect size: the random performance,or all evidence similar above-
odds of being correct increase 2.94 times for every chance performance.
year that age increases. At about 44 months of age, A central question for evaluating these baseline
children are about 50%correct,or at 0 on the trans- models is whether and where children'sperformance
formed measure;hence, at that age the odds of being significantly differs from chance. Ninety-eight per-
corrector incorrectare even or 1.0 (Figure2B).The ef- cent of all false-beliefconditions in the studies sam-
fect size measure in Table2 indicates the increase in pled used two locations(Maxi'schocolatemight be in
the odds of being correct for a more advantageous the draweror the cupboard),or two limited identities
value of a variable.A 2.94 increasefor age means that (the crayon box usually contains crayons but now
for childrenwho are 1 year older (i.e., 56 ratherthan containscandies),thus chancerespondingrepresents
44 months of age) percentcorrectwould be 74.6%.In 50%correct(or a score of 0 in the transformeddata).
terms of months, the effect size for age is 1.09 per We calculated a 95% confidence band around the
month, or an increase from 50%to 52%correctfrom best-fitline shown in Figure2B and then determined
44 to 45 months of age. where performanceswithin this band fell below or
A meta-analysismust be guided by an organized above 0. These confidencebands are also depicted in
set of questions and hypotheses. Our analyses were Figure 2B.1At younger ages--essentially 41 months
originally directed toward evaluating several base- (3 years, 5 months) and younger--children per-
line models of children'sperformancein false-belief formed below chance, making the classic false-belief
tasks. The simplest model is a null model predicting error.At older ages--essentially 48 months (4 years)
random performanceon false-belief tasks. Random and older-they performed above chance, signifi-
performanceat some age might suggest that children cantlycorrect.As shown in Figure2, then,averageper-
are confused, have few relevant systematic concep-
tions, or that the tasks tap little of children'sunder- 1The confidence bands, here and throughout the analyses,
standings.Predictionsof randomperformancecontrast are natural extensions of confidence intervals for the population
clearlywith predictionsof significantlybelow-chance mean, with the exception that confidence limits are formed for
the conditional mean of the dependent variable at different com-
performance(systematic false-belief errors)and sig- binations of the independent variables. These are simultaneous
nificantlyabove-chanceperformance(systematiccor- confidence bands that contain the error rate at .05, no matter
rect understanding of false beliefs). Developmen- how many combinations of independent variables are investi-
tally, a baseline model predicts no developmental gated (Draper & Smith, 1981).
formance changes rapidly during the period 3 to 41/2 No effect Maineffect Interaction
years from significantly wrong to significantly correct.
This age trend constitutes the foundation for anal- *0 U
yses of the influence of various factors on perfor-
mance in which we examined the effects of the 12
.A B C
remaining independent variables (e.g., year of publi-
cation, type of task, nature of the target object, and so young old young old young old
forth, as overviewed in the Method section). Again,
consider in advance various patterns of results that Figure 3 Three hypothetical patterns of results: (A) No effect,
(B) main effect, and (C) interaction.
might emerge. As depicted in Figure 3A, one pattern
of results is that some additional variable (e.g., type of
task-a comparison between locations versus con-
tents tasks) would have no effect on the foundational is of no theoretical interest, it provides a meta-analytic
age trajectory. Alternatively, as shown in Figure 3B, check for the possibility that an initial intriguing find-
that variable may be significant, but only as a main ef- ing can shrink or disappear as later experiments are
fect that does not interact with age. That is, differ- devised with better controls and procedures (Green &
ences on that variable affect performance similarly at Hall, 1984). Some authors contend that early reports
all ages. Finally, as depicted in Figure 3C, a focal vari- of young children's false-belief errors are plagued
able could interact significantly with age. A variety of with just such problems. However, the meta-analysis
patterns might yield significant interactions with age, shows that false-belief results from earlier studies are
but the one shown in Figure 3C is especially relevant virtually identical to those from later studies.
for discriminating early competence accounts from More important, however, is that type of task, type
claims of conceptual change. To confirm early compe- of question, nature of the protagonist, and nature of
tence claims, task modifications should influence the target object were all nonsignificant. To confirm
younger children's performance (and thus account graphically the absence of some of these variables as
for their poor performance relative to older children), significant factors, Figure 4 shows the data for type of
and, in particular, some task version(s) should in- question and type of task. Type of question concerns
crease young children's responding to above-chance whether the false-belief question is phrased in terms
levels. of what the character will think, know, or say, or
We tested for such patterns as follows. First, linear where he will look. As can be seen in Figure 4A, these
regression was used to screen for main effects and all variations make little difference.
two-way interactions with age. If interactions with As noted, false-belief tasks come in three essential
age were absent, the interaction term was dropped forms: change-of-location tasks, unexpected-contents
from the regression and main effects were then tested. tasks, and unexpected-identity tasks. In fact,unexpected-
For those variables shown to have a significant effect, identity tasks are rare (used in only 44 of 362 condi-
confidence bands were constructed around the ob- tions), and preliminary analysis showed that they did
tained regression lines to determine where these lines not differ from unexpected-contents tasks, which
differed from chance. Finally, these primary analyses they closely resemble. Therefore, unexpected-identity
were corroborated both by using more assumption- tasks were collapsed with unexpected-contents tasks
free bootstrapping methods and by examining the en- and Figure 4B thus plots the data for these two
tire omnibus dataset of 591 conditions. Due to the main task types, locations versus contents (including
large database, a conservative .01 level for signifi- identity). As shown, these task types are remarkably
cance was generally adopted. Because interaction ef- equivalent.
fects are of particular theoretical importance, how- In addition, the "medium" in which the false-belief
ever, any interactions at the .05 level were considered task is presented has no significant effect. That is, it
significant as well. makes no difference if the protagonist is presented as
As shown in Table 2, six variables did not signifi- a real person, a puppet, a doll, a pictured storybook
cantly affect performance, neither by themselves nor character, or a videotaped person. Similarly, as long
in interaction with age; five were significant but failed as a concrete target object is present at the time the
to interact with age; and one significantly interacted false-belief question is asked, it makes no difference
with age. whether the object is a real item (a piece of edible
Nonsignificant variables. Given 362 conditions, a chocolate), a toy (a small toy car), a picture of an ob-
failure to find significance with such a powerful test is ject (a drawing of a piece of chocolate), and so forth.
noteworthy. For example, although year of publication Most studies maintained concordances across protag-
3-
Figure 4 (A) Proportion correct versus Age x Type of Ques- .I- o
tion, and (B) proportion correct versus Age x Type of Task. ) 2- o
O 0
x
o o o
So
-4 ,-x
o x Other
self
- o x xx
0-
x x X9x . x o x
onist and object. If a real person was used as the pro- r-4 "wx x x
doing so they leave the underlying developmental Table 2 presents F values for all the variables as
trajectory (from incorrect to correct performance) un- well as effect sizes for significant variables. To reiter-
changed. Figure 6 graphically depicts the effects for ate, just as for age, this odds ratio measure indicates
motive for the transformation ("motive"), participa- the increase in the odds of being correct for a more
tion in the transformation ("participation"), salience advantageous value of the variable: for example, for
of the protagonist's mental state ("salience"), and real motive, the increase in odds of being correct for tasks
presence of the target object ("real presence"). with deceptive motives over those without deceptive
Motive concerned the motive presented to the motives. As shown in Table 2, this value for motive is
child for the change of location or the unexpected 1.90, that is, a deceptive motive increases the odds of
contents. Sometimes a deceptive motive was explic- being correct by 1.90. In percentage terms, if children
itly stated (the chocolate was moved to trick the pro- are 50% correct at 44 months without deception, then
tagonist), sometimes it was not (either because no they are 66% correct with deception.
motive was stated-the crayon box just contained Participation by the child in transforming the tar-
candies, or, rarely, a nondeceptive motive was get object is also important. Often children are essen-
mentioned-to put them away). As is clear in Figure tially passive onlookers; for example, they watch as
6A, a deceptive motive enhances children's perfor- someone transfers Maxi's chocolate from one place to
mance, and does so for children of all ages. another. However, in some tasks children help set up
A B
5 I x xo0x x9 x xxe xx
4- 4
xr..4 x
4U x -o
x-.o-x
3Ox-3,
6b 3
-0x 0x
o 3.
-1 21< Age (Months)Initial
x xxx Motive
o x6 x
Passive
O -3
30 40 50 60 70 80 90100110
Fx +
xNo Deception
-5 1 I I
C D
5 I XX
x x ,l
5 .
4 x.e •
4- "
3- 3
3x
2- x. ,
x
0 x
u.0 - Salience
01-
Sx xx
x xx
xReal
U Derno x;
-1- -1':• , " . Presence
, Inferred x S-2 - No
0 -2
- Absence Y
Pres
S-3
-4 -
-4-
Stated/ Pictured -5 xxx?
Figure 6 (A) Proportion correct versus Age x Motive; (B) proportion correct versus Age x Participation; (C) proportion correct
versus Age x Salience; (D) proportion correct versus Age x Real Presence.
5 I I I I 5 I 1 1 1 / 1
3/I ',
4 7 4-
Australia - / 0
,>
S / <--Austria Sx Oox x Pox 0 0
2 Canada 8o 2
o ,'1,,
IiI
So o o0
Z/ J-Japan x o oY
0 U
U.S. <- 3 o O
o
o es
Korea
-1 -
- • 00 mor
-2- U.K. o M
-3
1 1 1
-4 - 5 1?!1 !
-35
-5I I I I 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110
30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 110
Age (Months)
Age (Months)
Figure 8 Proportion correct versus Age x Temporal Marker.
Figure 7 Proportion correct versus Age x Country for the pri-
mary conditions.
producedresultsalmost identicalto the originalanal- have failed to find differences for these variables.
ysis. Reservationsabout meta-analyticfindings also However, detecting a lack of differenceswhen com-
arise because of concerns with the appropriateness, paring small samples of 12 to 20 childrenis problem-
assumptions, and robustness of various techniques atic. In contrast, because our meta-analysis encom-
for pooling indirect measures of effect significance passed 350 to 500 different conditions representing
(e.g., p values). The analyses in this study were more more than 4,000 children, it is certainly powerful
straightforward;we analyzed proportionsof correct enough to detect differences on these variables, if
answers, ratherthan derived measures from statisti- they existed.
cal treatments that vary across studies. Finally,our The null findings of this study have important
analyses encompassed a great number of task varia- methodologicalimplications.Knowingthatvalid and
tions. Yetwhen these variationswere organizedinto a comparableassessments of false-belief performance
systematic set of factors,the results clusteredconsis- are uninfluencedby a variety of task specifics,exper-
tently with the exceptionof only a few outliers.Thisis imenters can confidentlyvary their tasks over an ex-
testimony to the robustnessof the basic phenomena, tended set of possibilitiesfor ease of presentationand
the tasks used to assess it, and our meta-analytic to achieve other experimental contrasts. More cru-
procedures. cially, this lack of effects is of theoreticalimportance
Using these meta-analyticprocedures,a variety of as well. Thatchildren'sfalse-beliefjudgmentsaresys-
substantive results emerged. The combined-effects tematically unrelated to such task variations in-
models made it possible to predict approximately creases the likelihood that theirjudgments reflectro-
50%of the variancein false-beliefjudgments.Thisis a bust, deep-seatedconceptionsof human action,rather
strong accounting of the variance,because in meta- than task-specificresponses provoked by the special
analysestherearea host of factorsthattypicallyatten- features of one set of materialsor questions. Specifi-
uate findings; in this case, there were differences cally, the irrelevance of these task and procedural
acrossstudies in experimentercharacteristicsand ex- variationsincreasesthe likelihood that children'sper-
pertise, differences in exact stimuli and procedures formance is systematically dependent on the one
used, linguistic differencesacross a variety of coun- thing that does not vary, namely their conception of
tries, and differences in child-rearingcultures sam- belief states.
pled. In what follows, the substantive results are Foradults,the task variationsmentionedabove are
considered in a series of ordered sets, and the impli- conceptuallyequivalent or irrelevant;it is a substan-
cations of the resultswith regardto currentproposals tive finding thatyoung childrentreatthem as equiva-
about theory-of-minddevelopment are addressed. lent as well. Consider the notion of belief that is
targeted by standard false-belief tasks. The beliefs
involved are determined by informationalaccess-
Development whetheror not Maxisaw the chocolatebeing moved-
The basic finding in this study is the presence of a but should be uninfluencedby irrelevantindividual
substantial effect for age in every analysis. Correct differences in the target protagonists, such as their
performance significantly increases with increasing age, gender,and theirreallife presenceversusvideo or
age; in some cases, correct performance increases storybooknature (Miller,in press). The meta-analytic
from chance to above chance,but in most cases it in- findings show that even young children appropri-
creases from below chance to above chance. Such ately understand the irrelevance of several protag-
findings clearly support the initial claims of substan- onist differences for an understanding of belief.
tial development during these preschool years, and
contradict recent suspicions that developmental
change is nonexistent (Mitchell,1996) or is confined EarlyCompetenceversus ConceptualChange
to only a few standard tasks that are unusually de- As noted in the Introduction, our findings speak to
manding (Chandler et al., 1989). an important divide between two general accounts
of young children's poor false-belief performance.
"Noneffects" One account argues for conceptual change, that is,
developmental changes in performance on false-
Many potentially relevant variables (e.g., nature of belief tasks reflect genuine changes in children's
the protagonist, nature of the target object, type of conceptions of persons. A contrasting account ar-
question, and type of task) systematically failed to af- gues for early competence, that is, even young chil-
fect children's age-related performances. These re- dren have the necessary conception; their poor task
sults confirm those of several individual studies that performances reflect instead information-processing
limits, unnecessarily demanding tasks, or confusing age are aided, but younger children still genuinely fail
questions. Fodor (1992, p. 284), for example, argued the task, then the timing of a developmental change,
that something like belief-desire psychology is in- but not its absence versus presence, may be at issue.
nate: "The experimental data offer no reason to be- Thus, for early competence accounts, task variations
lieve that the 3-year-old's theory of mind differs in should interact with performance in a specific devel-
any fundamental way from adult folk psychology. opmental pattern.
In particular, there is no reason to suppose that the None of these three pieces of evidence for an early
3-year-old's theory of mind suffers from an absent competence view were sustained in the meta-analysis:
or defective notion of belief." Chandler et al. (1989, older children as well as younger children were aided
pp. 1263-1264) outline two competing opinions by certain task manipulations; no set of manipu-
about the understanding of mind, and thus about lations boosted younger children's performance to
the understanding of beliefs. There are the "boost- above chance; and only one variable, presence or ab-
ers," who "advocate the . . . early onset view," and sence of temporal marking in the test question, inter-
the "scoffers," who share a "delayed-onset perspec- acted with age, but not in an early competence pat-
tive." Chandler and colleagues (p. 1266) champion tern. Even a combined-effects model, statistically
the booster point of view and claim that the "stan- assembling the most powerful package of helpful
dard assessment task ... conflates the ... capacity to task manipulations, failed to produce above-chance
entertain beliefs about beliefs with the altogether performance in the youngest children and failed to
different ability to comment on this understanding, interactively change the shape of the basic develop-
and is more tortuous and computationally complex mental pattern of performance across these years. It
than is necessary or appropriate." is important to note that the finding of an interaction
Empirical confirmation of early competence ac- between age and temporal marking demonstrates
counts requires that there be some version of the tar- that the meta-analysis was able to detect interactions
get task that indeed demonstrates enhanced perfor- in the data, if they were present.
mance by young children, when task limitations have Conceptual change accounts also require specific
been eliminated or reduced. Our findings show that empirical findings. To begin with, a task is needed
several task manipulations do increase young chil- that plausibly assesses a target conceptual under-
dren's performance: framing the task in terms of ex- standing, and performance on that task must change
plicit deception or trickery, involving the child in from incorrect to systematically above-chance judg-
actively making the key transformations, and high- ments with age. Confidence in both good and poor
lighting the salience of the protagonist's mental state performance on the task must additionally be bol-
or reducing the salience of the contrasting real-world stered by correct judgments on control tasks or on
state of affairs, all help young children to perform control questions that demonstrate memory for key
better. information and grasp of the task format. False-belief
Early competence accounts require more than just tasks, especially those included in the primary analy-
improved performance, however. First, such accounts ses, fit these criteria. As shown in Figure 2, for exam-
require that relevant task manipulations differentially ple, performance on such tasks dramatically changes
enhance young children's performance. This require- with age, and 98% of all children in primary condi-
ment derives from the essential claim that such task tions pass relevant control tasks.
factors mask early competence, thereby artifactually Conceptual change accounts require more than
producing apparent developmental differences on simply age changes on a well-controlled standard
the target tasks. Second, such accounts require dem- task, however. They are also subject to a general multi-
onstrations of above-chance performance. A task method approach to construct validity: a variety of
manipulation that raises young 3-year-olds' perfor- tasks, all conceptually similar but varying in their
mance from below-chance to chance performance task specifics, should lead to similar developmental
may be methodologically important in that the ma- changes. That is, the more the same developmental
nipulation reduces features that systematically lead change is demonstrated in a variety of conceptually
children to choose an incorrect response option. Ran- similar tasks (which vary in their specific features and
dom at-chance performance is, however, neither sys- demands), the less likely it is that the change is due to
tematically misled nor systematically informed; it specific information-processing strategies tied to spe-
provides no evidence of correct, conceptual under- cial task formats, or to limitations in understanding
standing. Third, demonstrations of above-chance per- or using particular response formats. In this regard it
formance must extend beyond children at an interme- bears repeating that in the meta-analysis a wide vari-
diate, transitional age. If children at an intermediate ety of task materials and formats yielded equivalent
developmental performances.The response require- tially without any real understandingof belief at all.
ments of the tasks included in the meta-analysisalso Arguably,therefore,Sheffield et al.'s findings repre-
varied widely: in some tasks the child could answer sent artifactsof this particulartask format.
by simply pointing, or could answer a questionabout In studies other than Sheffieldet al. (1993),correct
the character'sbehavior ("Wherewill he search?")or performancealso could be achieved, potentially,by
his mental state ("Whatwill he think?").Indeed, al- childrenmerelyrepeatingwhat was told them.In Fla-
though nonverbal tasks were not available at the vell, Flavell, Green, and Moses (1990), the child
time we conductedthe meta-analysis,similarage tra- knows that a cup hidden behind a screenis blue. An-
jectories are obtained when the task is completely other person, Ellie, who enters the room, cannot see
nonverbal(Call& Tomasello,1999). the cup, but explicitly states, "I think the cup is
Conceptual change accounts do not require that white." Then the child is asked, "Do you think the
task demands and information-processing limita- cup is white or blue?"and finally is asked, "DoesEllie
tions have no influence; on the contrary,conceptual think the cup is white or blue?" In the Flavell et al.
understandings can only be manifest in specific study,3-year-oldssystematicallyerredby saying Ellie
tasks via processes of information utilization and thinks the cup is blue. When childrenerr in this fash-
expression. Conceptual change accounts do require ion it is remarkable,because to err they avoid a very
that task demands and processing limitations not simple response strategy-just repeat Ellie's own
completely account for performance across age so words. Incorrectanswers, therefore, may informa-
that control of such factors does not eliminate a tively indicate problems with conceptualizing false
larger developmental pattern. The meta-analysis beliefs. Correctresponses with such a procedureare
showed that a number of task manipulations do much less interpretable,however,because,when cor-
influence children's false-belief performances. Al- rect, the child may indeed be simply parrotingwhat
though these factors are important in their own they just heard.
right, they nonetheless leave the basic developmen- A related issue concerns the results of the com-
tal pattern unchanged, even when considered in bined models. The best-effects model shows pre-
combination. dicted responses if childrenare presentedwith tasks
Meta-analytic results capture significant trends that combine several key enhancing features. No
across studies. Of course, not every individual study studies, however, have included a task with all four
accords with the group trends. Of particular rele- significantlyenhancingfactors:thatis, a taskin which
vance in the currentcase is whether there are any in- the salience is pictured/ stated, the motive is decep-
dividual studies that reportedclearearly competence tive, the objectis not real and present, and the child
patterns of data. Most important is whether any participatesactively in the transformation.Sheffield
studies reported above-chance performance from et al. (1993)includedonly two of these four enhancing
very young children (e.g., 2-year-olds).Such results features,and only one conditionin the meta-analysis
would appear in the top left quadrantof Figure 2A. included threeof these factorsin a taskfor young pre-
Inspection of Figure 2A shows that two data points schoolers.Woolley(1995,Experiment1) tested young
stand out from the rest as indicating highly correct 3-year-olds(M = 39 months)with a task in which the
performance(better than 85%correct)from 30- and motive was deceptive, the object was not real and
36-month-olds. These data come from a study by present, and the child actively participated in the
Sheffield, Sosa, and Hudson (1993)using a "simpli- transformation.In Woolley's study, young children
fied" task in which there was no real presenceof the performedbelow chance:14 correctresponses out of
targetobject and the character'smental state was ex- 38 false-belief questions, or 37% correct.Thus, the
plicitly stated. predictions of the combined-effectsmodel are both
Why might Sheffield and colleagues' conditions derived from and are largely consistent with ob-
emerge as outliers (e.g., was the task that they used served results from individual studies-very young
especially sensitive, or artifactually easy)? In Shef- children typically fail to perform significantly above
field et al.'s simplified task, children see a red and a chance, even when tested on tasks that combine task
green box and discover that both are empty. Then manipulations that enhance performance.
Cookie Monster enters and explicitly says, "I think With regard to a general contrast between concep-
my cookie is in the red box." Immediately after this tual change and early competence accounts, then, the
statement the child is asked the false-belief question: meta-analysis suggests that an important conceptual
"Where does Cookie Monster think his cookie is?" To change in children's understanding of persons is tak-
be correct on this task, therefore, the child need only ing place between the ages of 2?2 and 5 years. Against
repeat back what Cookie Monster just said, poten- this general background, the detailed results of the
belief task can requirepointing to where the objectis highly with theory-of-mind tasks (approximately
not. Typically,one uses language to describe what .60) and a significant correlation remained even
is true;to be correctin false-belieftasks,one describes after age, verbal intelligence, and several other con-
something false. More generally,as noted before,it is trol measures were partialled out. At the same time,
possible to describe false-belief tasks as encompass- however, a "theory-of-mind factor" emerged in a
ing two realms of content:real-world contents (that principal component analysis alongside executive
the chocolate really is in the cupboard)and the con- functioning factors, and regression analyses in-
tents of the mind (thatMaxi thinks the chocolateis in dicated significant independent contributions of
the drawer).Correctresponsesrequiresuppressingor theory-of-mind and executive functioning to false-
inhibitingreferenceto realityand referringinstead to belief performance. Thus, Carlson and Moses (in
mental contents (and indeed to mistaken, false, or press, p. 119, 122) concluded that "executive or in-
misguided mental contents). hibitory constraints alone would appear to under-
As noted in the Results section, attempts to de- determine the nature of the changes taking place in
crease the salience or prepotence of real-world con- young children's understanding of mind," and ad-
tents have produced tasks in which the value on the vocated an account "in which executive functioning
variable real presence is not real and present. For interacts with conceptual difficulties"(see Perner&
example, Maxi's chocolate is removed from the Lang, 1999, for similar conclusions).
drawer but then eaten or destroyed (rather than The meta-analyticfindings help to illuminate the
moved to the cupboard). In this case, because there potentialinterrelationof conceptualchangeand exec-
is no real chocolate, responding correctly to the utive functioning.Using Figure2Bas a template,note
question, "Wherewill Maxi look for the chocolate?" that acrossage, false-beliefconceptualunderstanding
does not requireovercoming the prepotent response changes frombeing absentto present.At any one age,
of referring to where the chocolate really is. In the however, there is variationin performanceacrossin-
meta-analysis,tasks in which a concretereal objectis dividuals and across tasks. These variations,in part,
absent, and thus the salience of real-world contents reflectinhibitorydemands and inhibitorycontrol.At
is diminished, were shown to improve performance. the youngest ages, for example, children with better
Such task manipulations, however, do not alter inhibitorycontrol skills (or childrenon tasks that re-
the basic developmental trajectory of false-belief quire less rather than more inhibitory control) per-
responses, and do not increase young children's re- form better. Specifically, these youngest children
sponding to above-chancelevels. That such changes seem to performbetterby avoiding systematicerrors,
yielded chance rather than below-chance perfor- which makes their performance higher relative to
mance in young children, means that executive same-age peers who systematicallyerr. The absence
functioning difficulties may well be encouraging of genuine conceptualunderstandingfor such young
children to systematically err in reporting reality. children,however, means that performancedoes not
Removing such task difficulties, however, does not increaseto above-chancelevels. At intermediateages,
reveal systematiccorrectperformancefor the young- better inhibitory control could also aid transitional
est children. children: a transitional child with poor inhibitory
Attempts to increase the salience of mental con- controlmight performat chance,whereasa peer with
tents are capturedin the meta-analysiswith the vari- more skill might perform at above chance. At each
able salience. Manipulationsunder this variable, in age (or with age partialledout), therefore,executive
particular,those that involve stating or picturingthe functioning could be highly correlatedwith perfor-
protagonist's mental contents, do enhance perfor- mance.But acrossages, performancestill revealsgen-
mance. Performance is enhanced at all ages, however, uine conceptualchange.
and young children do not achieve above-chance per- Again, there may well be a deeper conceptual con-
formance. Hence, in neither of these cases do the find- nection between theory of mind and executive func-
ings conform with early competence accounts of tioning, beyond a methodological concern about
false-belief performance. false-belief tasks. Carlson and Moses (in press), for
Recently, Carlson and Moses (in press) conducted example, extended a distinction first advanced by
a thorough individual differences analysis of perfor- Russell (1996), to distinguish between executive per-
mance on theory-of-mind tasks (including, focally, formance problems and executive construction prob-
several false-belief tasks) and executive functioning lems. Performance problems are the type addressed
tasks (including, focally, inhibitory-control tasks). thus far; perhaps immature executive functioning
(See Hughes, 1998 for similar, but less comprehen- prohibits young children from performing correctly
sive, results.) Inhibitory-control tasks correlated on standard false-belief tasks. Consider instead exec-
individual children largely performingat chance, or sons generically,that is, to both self and others (Gop-
(2) from half the children understanding false belief nik, 1993;Gopnik & Wellman,1994).
and judging correctly,and the other half making sys- The meta-analyticfindings comparing judgment
tematicerrors.Todifferentiatethose possibilitiesdata about the false beliefs of self versus others is of
are needed on individual children's patterns of re- clearrelevance here: simulation accounts emphasiz-
sponse acrossmultiplefalse-belieftrials.Most studies, ing the primacy of self-experiencesuggest that self-
however, reportresponses for single trials or sum re- understandingshould develop first.As shown in Fig-
sponses across children and trials. Nonetheless, the ure 5, however, performanceon false-belieftasks for
meta-analysis provides some indirect evidence that self and for othersis virtuallyidenticalat all ages. The
group means that are close to chancelevels often rep- lack of differencesbetween false-beliefjudgmentsfor
resent confused, randomperformanceat the individ- self and others has been reportedin several individ-
ual level as well. Recall that data about consistency ual studies (e.g., Gopnik & Astington, 1988).Yetrela-
over trialswere availablefor 52 conditions.Indeed,as tively small sample sizes in these studies (e.g., 16-20
reportedearlier,consistencyin termsof proportionof participants)mean that a theoreticallyimportant,al-
agreementis correlatedlinearlywith age, r(51) = .28, beit empirically small, difference could easily have
p < .05. Thus, younger children's answers are more gone undetected.Themeta-analyticcomparison,how-
likely to be inconsistent across trials than are older ever, summarizes the performanceof several thou-
children's.At the same time, as is clear from other sand children.
analyses, younger children'sanswers are more likely On the surface,the fact that childrenever system-
to be at-chance rather than above-chancelevel. For aticallyerr in reportingtheir own false beliefs seems
these 52 conditionswe have comparedchildren'scon- problematicfor simulationaccounts.Again, however,
sistency and correctness more directly. In order to data from the meta-analysis,although important,are
score a group's mean performanceas close to or devi- not definitive.For example, Harris(1992)has argued
ant from chance (.50 correct)the absolutevalue of the that young children's difficulties with false-belief
group mean minus .50was calculated(yielding scores tasks for self are memory difficulties. False-belief
that ranged from 0 to .50, where 0 is chance perfor- tasks for self require not a report of currentmental
mance and .50 is perfectly corrector perfectly incor- states, but memory for past states. Reporting past
rect). This deviation score correlates significantly mental states may be misleadingly difficult because
with consistency,r(51) = .34,p < .02. This correlation children must overcome their own current (correct)
means that, on average,group means that are close to belief and report their own prior (incorrect) one.
chance are more likely to be inconsistentthan consis- Again, more detailed theoreticalcomparisonsrequire
tent. Thus, mean scores that are at chance often in- considerationof other tasks beyond false belief tasks.
clude a sizable proportionof random, confused per-
formance rather than even mixes of systematically
CONCLUSIONS
correctversus incorrectresponses.
A second focal issue for competing conceptual The current meta-analysis organizes the available
change accountsconcernsthe role of one's own men- findings on false-beliefunderstanding-a sizable ac-
tal states in the comprehension or attribution of complishment,given thatthe voluminous accumulat-
others' mental states. The relation between under- ing findings had begun to seem contradictoryand in-
standing one's own mental states and understanding terpretively intractable.It is now clear that across
others' has been hotly debated by philosophers and studies, when organized systematically,the results
psychologists at least since Descartes. Within the area are largely robust, orderly,and consistent. Theoreti-
of theory of mind, the debate is manifest in differ- cally,once the findings are clarified,several compet-
ences between simulation-theory accounts and theory- ing accounts of false-belief performance can be evalu-
theory accounts. Simulation theorists argue that there ated. In particular, early competence accounts that
is a special primacy to knowing one's own mental claim apparent developments during the ages of 3 to
contents (e.g., Harris, 1992). First-person experience 5 years are solely the products of overly difficult tasks
not only has an immediacy and vividness that in- masking young children's essentially correct under-
forms an understanding of mind, but understanding standing of belief are not substantiated in several key
other minds requires using one's own experience to regards.
simulate that of others. In contrast, theory-theorists The meta-analysis also argues against proposals
stress the development of an interrelated body of that an understanding of belief, including false belief,
knowledge, based on core mental-state constructs is the culture-specific product of socialization
such as "beliefs" and "desires," that apply to all per- within literate, individualistic Anglo-European cul-
tures (Lillard,1998).A mentalisticunderstanding of this issue. It is important to note, however, that the
persons that includes a sense of their internal main meta-analytic findings hold regardless. That
representations-their beliefs-is widespread. Al- is, when the data from many studies are pooled,
though children may acquire such conceptions such task changes (regardlessof their ultimate inter-
sooner or later depending on the culturalcommuni- pretation) fail to influence the underlying develop-
ties and language systems in which they are reared, mental trajectory;with increasing age, children's
young children in Europe, North America, South judgments proceed from incorrect to significantly
America, East Asia, Australia, and Africa, and from correctperformance,for more difficult tasks as well
nonschooled "traditional"as well as literate "mod- as easier tasks.
ern"cultures,all acquirethese insights on roughlythe Equally important methodologically, the meta-
same developmentaltrajectory.Of course, a radically analysis underwrites the increasinglycommon prac-
differentpattern of results may yet be discovered in tice of using false-belieftasks as a markerof theory-
some presently untested socioculturalchildhood mi- of-mind understanding in other types of research,
lieu. Even if an understandingof actions in terms of such as researchon individual differencesin early so-
beliefs proves to be not strictly universal, the meta- cial cognition (e.g., Hughes &Dunn, 1998)and on im-
analysis documents that it is impressively wide- paired or delayed social cognition with autistic indi-
spread,at least in childhood.This suggests thatsuch a viduals (e.g., Baron-Cohen,1995). False-belieftasks
conceptionis a natural,easily adopted way of under- demonstrablyprovide a robustmeasureof an impor-
standing persons worldwide; it is cognitively "conta- tant early development. Nevertheless, several cau-
gious," to use Sperber's(1990)terminology. tions arenecessary.(1)False-belieftasksmeasureonly
Methodologically, these results inform us about one narrow aspect of social cognitive development;
several task variationsthat are essentiallyequivalent. therefore,use of a battery of social cognition tasks
This frees investigatorsto use a specific task instanti- would be best for many studies. (2) Individualdiffer-
ation because it is easier for them to administerthan ences can take several forms: Some individual dif-
others (e.g., using puppets versus people as the target ference dimensions (perhapsshyness) can differenti-
character)or because it best fits their theoreticalpur- ate individuals across the lifespan; other differences
poses (e.g.,for some purposesan unexpected-contents emerge only within a particularwindow of develop-
task may most closely parallel a target-contrasttask, ment and thus reflectan individual's speed of attain-
whereas for other purposes a change-of-locations ing a common developmentalmilestone. False-belief
task may do so). At the same time, the meta-analytic measuresfall into the lattercategory,and theirnature
results show that some forms of the tasks do enhance needs to be carefullyconsideredin researchon indi-
children's performance.Any investigatorwho is in- vidual differences. (3) To be useful in individual-
terested in assessing younger children'sfirst emerg- differencesresearcha measure needs to be a valid re-
ing understandingof belief would do well to consider presentative of the proposed construct, and must
tasks that are framed in terms of deception, engage have certain psychometric properties. Critically,
the child in actively transformingthe situation, and reliability and unreliability of measurement place
have no real and present objectavailable at the time limits on the assessment of interrelationamong va-
the targetquestion is asked. riables of interest. The meta-analysis suggests that,
Note, however, that when a task variation in- within its developmental window of usefulness,
creasesperformance,for example,frombelow-chance false-belief measures are reliable. To reiterate, the
to chance levels or from chance to above-chancelev- meta-analysis includes 52 reports of children's con-
els, this increased performancecan be interpretedin sistency of responding across equivalent false-belief
one of two ways: The manipulation may have re- tasks. On average, consistency, or proportion of
sulted in a better, more sensitive test of young chil- agreement, was .84; that is, 84% of the time chil-
dren's understanding, or it may have resulted in an dren's first false-belief response was matched in
artifactually easy task that is prone to false positives. their second response.
Consider, for example, the earlier discussion of Shef- Investigators have seldom explicitly considered
field et al.'s (1993) simplified task. Moreover, some of reliability of false-belief performances. One excep-
the controversies surrounding deception concern tion is a study by Mayes, Klin, Terycak, Cicchetti,
whether deception methods more sensitively test and Cohen (1996) who gave 23 children three false-
false-belief understanding (as argued, e.g., by Chand- belief tasks in one session and then the same tasks in
ler & Hala, 1994; Sullivan & Winner, 1993) or merely a second session 2 to 3 weeks later. Data within a
increase false positives (as argued, e.g., by Sodian, session were similar to the consistency data re-
1994). The meta-analysis cannot definitively address ported from the meta-analysis. For example, within
their second session, 11 children were incorrect and the mind. The results of the meta-analysis, summa-
7 correct for all three false-belief tasks (with the re- rizing 591 false-belief conditions, can facilitate such
maining 5 answering one or two tasks correctly). theoretically driven research on still broader issues
Hence, proportion of agreement was .78, even when in the field.
considered across all three tasks.
Mayes et al. (1996) assessed test-retest reliability by ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
comparing responses to identical tasks in Session 1
versus 2. Proportion of agreement for false-belief an- This research was supported by a grant from NICHD
swers ranged from .58 to 1.0 and averaged .75. How- (HD-22149) to the first author. The authors thank the
ever, Mayes et al. had more complete data and were many investigators who sent us amplified descrip-
able to calculate kappa, an index that takes into ac- tions of their data or methods, and Janet Astington
count not only proportion of agreement but also a who suggested the subtitle.
baseline of expected agreement on the basis of chance
alone. Only three of eight test-retest comparisons
ADDRESSES AND AFFILIATIONS
achieved "acceptable" kappas (.70 or greater). How
best to interpret these results is unclear. The majority Corresponding author: Henry M. Wellman, Center
of test-retest responses that failed to agree were cases for Human Growth and Development, University of
of improvement-initially incorrect children im- Michigan, 300 N. Ingalls, 10th Floor, Ann Arbor, MI
proved 3 weeks later. Improvements may represent 48109-0406; e-mail: hmw@umich.edu. David Cross is
legitimate developments rather than simple statistical at Texas Christian University, Fort Worth. Julanne
disagreement. Moreover, with only 23 subjects, Watson is also at the University of Michigan.
chance estimates for calculating kappas are noisy at
best. Finally, the authors only reported test-retest reli-
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