Long before they reach school age, young children understand that people possess beliefs, wishes and intentions that operate, unseen, inside their heads. This "theory of mind" understanding plays a critical role in children's social interactions, enabling them to understand, predict and manipulate the actions of other people.A recent series of studies led by Yale University developmental psychologist Paul Bloom, PhD, indicates that children also use their theory of mind understanding to label objects that other people create, as well as their own creations. How children organize and categorize the world around them has been of long-standing interest to developmental psychologists. The new findings contradict one commonly held notion--that children depend most heavily on perceptual cues such as shape when categorizing and naming objects. When it comes to labeling objects in the world around them, "Children are not perception-bound," concludes Bloom. "This work shows that theory of mind understanding plays out in terms of how even very young children think about the physical world. Beginning in early childhood, people intuitively recognize that names are symbols for things that share deep, essential properties. And in the case of artifacts--things that people create--these essential properties seem to correspond to the intention that underlies the artifact's creation."