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Sally–Anne test

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Social Processes: Methodology · Types of test


The Sally–Anne test is a developmental measure, used in developmental psychology to measure a person's social cognitive ability to attribute false beliefs to others (Wimmer & Perner, 1983).[1] The flagship implementation of the Sally–Anne test was by Baron-Cohen, Leslie, and Frith (1985);[2] in 1988, Leslie and Frith repeated the experiment with human actors (rather than dolls) and found similar results.[3]

Test description Edit



Outcomes Edit



Criticism Edit

While Baron-Cohen et al.'s data have been purported to indicate a lack of theory of mind in autistic children, there are other possible factors affecting them. For instance, individuals with autism may pass the cognitively simpler recall task, but have difficulty with semantically conceptualizing the Belief Question. Tager-Flusberg (2007) posited that the pass-fail designation derived from the Sally–Anne test "indexed" what is an overall "complex social-cognitive developmental progression", unfairly categorizing participants.[5]

Ruffman, Garnham, and Rideout (2001) further investigated links between the Sally–Anne test and autism in terms of eye gaze as a social communicative function. Ruffman et al. added a third possible location for the marble: the pocket of the investigator. When autistic children and children with moderate learning disabilities were tested in this format, Ruffman et al. found that both groups answered the Belief Question equally well; however, participants with moderate learning disabilities reliably looked at the correct location of the marble, while autistic participants did not, even if the autistic participant answered the question correctly.[6] These results may be an expression of the social deficits relevant to autism.

Implications Edit

The Sally–Anne test remains highly associated with theory of mind, chiefly because of its role in the work of Baron-Cohen et al.[2] The test is by no means fully conclusive; however, its application is telling about social development trends in autism.

See alsoEdit


  1. Wimmer H, Perner J (1983). Beliefs about beliefs: Representation and constraining function of wrong beliefs in young children's understanding of deception. Cognition 13 (1): 103–128.
  2. 2.0 2.1 2.2 2.3 2.4 Baron-Cohen S, Leslie AM, Frith U (1985). Does the autistic child have a 'theory of mind'?. Cognition 21 (1): 37–46.
  3. Leslie A M, Frith U (1988). Autistic children's understanding of seeing, knowing and believing. British Journal of Developmental Psychology 6 (4): 315–324.
  4. Premack DG, Woodruff G (1978). Does the chimpanzee have a theory of mind?. Behavioral and Brain Sciences 1 (4): 515–526.
  5. Tager-Flusberg H (2007). Evaluating the theory-of-mind hypothesis of autism. Current Directions in Psychological Science 16 (6): 311–315.
  6. Ruffman T, Garnham W, Rideout P (2001). Social understanding in autism: Eye gaze as a measure of core insights. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry 42 (8): 1083–1094.

Further readingEdit

  • Suddendorf T, Whiten A (2001). Mental evolution and development: evidence for secondary representation in children, great apes and other animals. Psychological Bulletin 127 (5): 629–650.

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