Evidence map›Paper›PMID 39471222›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2024

Evaluating large language models in theory of mind tasks.

Michal Kosinski

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2024. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 42 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
42citing papers in PubMed, 1 pooled it
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

42 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.

  1. Pooled it
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  8. Persuading large language models to comply with objectionable requests.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2026
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  9. Article
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  13. On Benchmarking Human-like Intelligence in Machines.Open mind : discoveries in cognitive science · 2026
    Article
  14. Self-Reflection Protects Behavior from Volatile Beliefs Linked to Paranoia.Computational psychiatry (Cambridge, Mass.) · 2026
    Article
  15. Article
  16. Metacognition of ChatGPT in confidence judgements.Frontiers in artificial intelligence · 2026
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4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

1 author.

Michal KosinskiGraduate School of Business, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305.ORCID 0000-0003-2936-4775

Funding

No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.

6 · The paper itself

Abstract

Eleven large language models (LLMs) were assessed using 40 bespoke false-belief tasks, considered a gold standard in testing theory of mind (ToM) in humans. Each task included a false-belief scenario, three closely matched true-belief control scenarios, and the reversed versions of all four. An LLM had to solve all eight scenarios to solve a single task. Older models solved no tasks; Generative Pre-trained Transformer (GPT)-3-davinci-003 (from November 2022) and ChatGPT-3.5-turbo (from March 2023) solved 20% of the tasks; ChatGPT-4 (from June 2023) solved 75% of the tasks, matching the performance of 6-y-old children observed in past studies. We explore the potential interpretation of these results, including the intriguing possibility that ToM-like ability, previously considered unique to humans, may have emerged as an unintended by-product of LLMs' improving language skills. Regardless of how we interpret these outcomes, they signify the advent of more powerful and socially skilled AI-with profound positive and negative implications.

Indexed as

LanguageTheory of MindChildFemaleHumansMaleAIfalse-belief taskslarge language modelspsychology of AItheory of mind

Identifiers

PMID39471222
PMCPMC11551352

What OpenQuestion holds

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Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.