Theory of Mind

Also known as ToM

Overview

Theory of Mind (ToM) studies how an agent represents what others know, believe, want, or intend, and uses those representations to predict behavior or coordinate. AI approaches range from explicit belief tracking with BDI models, POMDPs, and belief graphs to prompting, reinforcement learning, and multimodal reasoning over dialogue, images, and video. Evaluations include false-belief and Strange Stories tasks as well as interactive games, negotiations, and embodied settings where agents must act on partial information. A central challenge is that success on familiar questions may rely on shortcuts: models can struggle to track changing or nested beliefs and to use mental-state inferences reliably in real interactions.

Latest papers

CardsList

92 papers13 papers in the last four weeks, up 160% on the four weeks before. 0.1% of all new papers.

  1. Who Knows What - and What Does It Support? Perspective-Bounded Evidence Calibration for Multimodal Theory of Mind

    Oct 27, 2026Ziqi Liao, Jiaqi Shen, Yiming Na +3Theory of MindMLLM Reasoning

  2. From Belief Inference to Task Action: A Multi-Level Evaluation of Theory of Mind on Verifiable Tasks

    Oct 26, 2026Zhenshuai Yin, Yongxin Guo, Mingda Zhang +4Theory of MindLanguage Model Reasoning Evaluation

  3. Diagnosing the Explicit-to-Applied Theory of Mind Gap in LLMs

    Oct 22, 2026Prajvi Saxena, Sabine Janzen, Wolfgang MaassTheory of MindLanguage Model Reasoning Evaluation

  4. ToM2Vec: Continuous Theory-of-Mind Tokens for Multi-Agent Coordination

    Oct 21, 2026Nithin Sivakumaran, Ali Payani, Hyunji Lee +2Multi-Agent CoordinationTheory of Mind

  5. Reading Too Much Into It? Interpretive Preferences and Commitment in LLM Mentalisation under Ambiguity

    Oct 20, 2026Stephanie Fong, Yiwen Jiang, Qingyang Xu +7Language Model Reasoning EvaluationTheory of Mind

  6. Beyond Large Language Models: A Mental World Model Framework for Mental Modeling, Simulation, Evolution, and Interpretability

    Oct 16, 2026Qingshi Wang, Huiqi TongTheory of MindImplicit Reasoning in Language Models

  7. ToMStories: Interpreting Theory-of-Mind in Synthetic Narratives

    Oct 15, 2026Melanie Subbiah, Chia-En Jacklyn Tsai, Kathleen McKeownTheory of MindImplicit Reasoning in Language Models

  8. PerSo: Investigating Facets of LLMs' Social Intelligence in Real-World Persuasion Scenarios

    Oct 14, 2026Ali Zamani, Soroush Esfahanian, Erfan Shahabi +3LLM EvaluationPersuasion in Language Models

  9. Learning Perception to Action Rules through Reinforcement Learning for Theory-of-Mind Reasoning

    Oct 14, 2026Soyoung Oh, Nursulu Sagimbayeva, Nicholas Jennings +3Theory of MindRL for Language Model Reasoning

  10. Jev-ToM: Evaluating Theory of Mind in Typed Decision Models

    Oct 13, 2026Kawai Chung, Chunkit Chan, Yuxuan Liu +9Theory of MindLLM Decision-Making

  11. Beyond Belief Nesting: Rethinking Higher-Order Theory of Mind in Large Language Models

    Oct 13, 2026Shanshan You, Zhengqi Wang, Hao Liu +4Theory of MindLLM Evaluation

  12. Collaborative Theory of Mind: Learning to Self-Revise by Anticipating User Responses

    Oct 9, 2026Fanzhi Zeng, Anubrata Das, Maytal Saar-Tsechansky +1Human-AI CollaborationTheory of Mind

  13. Mental-Models for Multi-Agent Systems

    Oct 8, 2026Hanan Gani, Lulu Shao, Manmohan ChandrakerMulti-Agent ReasoningTheory of Mind

  14. MindWorldBench: Evaluating Mental-State-to-Behavior Reasoning in Image-to-Video Generation

    Sep 30, 2026Ruiqi Li, Xuanyi Liu, Sijia Li +9Image-to-Video GenerationTheory of Mind

  15. Verifiable Social Reasoning for LLM Assistants

    Sep 15, 2026Amir Taubenfeld, Zorik Gekhman, Avigail Grinstein-Dabush +6Multi-Agent LLM SystemsTheory of Mind

  16. ToMAS: A Pilot Failure-Grounded Theory-of-Mind Benchmark from Multi-Agent LLM Failures

    Sep 15, 2026Muhammad Ashar Ishfaq, Glaucia MeloTheory of MindLLM Agent Evaluation

  17. Mind2Dialogue: Training Human-Aware Language Models by Simulating User Mental States

    Sep 14, 2026Zixuan Wang, Yufan Zhou, Jinzhou Tang +16LLM PersonalizationTheory of Mind

  18. Agents That Model Agents: Five Principles Toward a Theory of Mind for 6G Networks

    Sep 1, 2026Hatim Chergui, Carolina Fernández-Martínez, Mehdi Bennis +16G NetworksTheory of Mind

  19. Assessing mentalization in humans and large language models

    Aug 26, 2026Aamir Sohail, Xintong Zhong, Arkady Konovalov +2Social ReasoningTheory of Mind

  20. Unmatched Does Not Mean False: Incomplete Reference Sets Can Reverse Calibration Rankings in Open-Ended Theory-of-Mind Tracking

    Aug 26, 2026Zhexi Feng, Wuxi Chen, Bingrui ZhangProbability CalibrationLLM Reliability

  21. Inverse Theory of Mind Modeling for Content Recommendation: From Web Browsing to Dynamic Intelligent Interfaces

    Aug 11, 2026Mengyu Chen, Feiyu Lu, Chun-Fu Chen +2Theory of MindUser Modeling

  22. Avalon-ToM-Bench: Evaluating Fine-Grained Theory of Mind via Asymmetric Game Mechanics

    Aug 10, 2026Yen-Shan Chen, Yu Chian Duan, Chih-En Kuo +2LLM EvaluationTheory of Mind

  23. Evaluating Theory of Mind in Reasoning Models: Robustness over Reasoning

    Aug 5, 2026Ian B. de Haan, Peter van der Putten, Max van DuijnLLM EvaluationTheory of Mind

  24. PICTURE: Enhancing Theory-of-Mind in Large Language Models by Revealing, Not Hiding, Characters' Lack of Knowledge

    Aug 3, 2026Eojin Jeon, SangKeun LeeTheory of MindLLM Prompting

  25. Cross-Task Dissociation in Frontier Vision-Language Model Theory of Mind

    Jul 31, 2026Kejia Zhang, Youran Sun, Chugang Yi +1VLM EvaluationTheory of Mind

  26. Using Theory of Mind to Arbitrate between Social and Non-social Learning

    Jul 30, 2026Lance Ying, Ryan Truong, Joshua B. Tenenbaum +1Computational Cognitive ModelingTheory of Mind

  27. Mental World Modeling

    Jul 29, 2026Hao Fei, Yiran ZhaoWorld Model LearningTheory of Mind