Children With ASD Do Not Understand Hidden Emotions Before False Belief Attribution.

Previous studies concluded that theory of mind (ToM) development is deviant in autism spectrum disorders (ASD). Typically developing children's ability to understand that one may hide their emotion would be acquired before false belief understanding in children with ASD (e.g., Peterson and Wellman 2019), but with contradictory results (e.g., Zhang et al. 2016). In the current work, we aim to determine whether the order of acquisition of ToM-related concepts in ASD differs, using methodological improvements compared to previous studies. Our results support the conclusion of a non-deviant developmental trajectory for ToM in individuals with ASD, with a general ability to understand hidden emotions that is not mastered before false belief attribution.