Title: Causes and correlations in the link between language and mindreading

Abstract: This paper proposes a developmental link between language and mindreading. It puts forward two contrasting ways of interpreting this link. One reads the link as causal. On this reading, language development contributes to the development of mindreading, so that mindreading could not develop normally had it not been for language. The other reads the link as correlational. This is the pragmatic view. On this reading language development merely contributes to task performance, and not mindreading development itself, because language helps the child to correctly interpret the experimenter’s question in the context of a mindreading task. I find that the causal reading is better supported than the correlational reading on two grounds: First, sometimes subjects’ development in verbal and non-verbal tasks is mirrored, indicating only a small role for pragmatic factors. Second, some experiments avoid pragmatic factors entirely but still show major developmental effects from language. I conclude thus that there is a developmental link between language and mindreading, and that it is a causal one.