Abstract
Forty-six children from 3 to 6 years of age participated in two false belief tasks, role play, and pretend play in Experiment 1. The results revealed a significant correlation between false belief and role play behavior, but not between false belief and pretend play. In Experiment 2, 38 children from 3 to 5 years of age were assigned to a role play training group, pretend play training group, or a control group. After five training sessions, the role play training group, but not the pretend play training group or the control group, increased their scores on the false belief task. Based on the results of Experiments 1 and 2, it is concluded that role play, but not pretend play, is a precursor of the acquisition of theory of mind.
