The strongest argument for language preceding TOM would be the approach De Villers (2001) took, that language acquisition would have a significant impact on TOM development. In order to prove this, De Villers looked at language delay, and how a delay in the acquisition of language would perhaps cause a slower rate in developing certain aspects of TOM.

To better test this theory, would be to look at the acquisition of deaf children and their TOM development. Deaf children would typically experience a delay in acquiring sign language, especially when they are born to speaking parents, that may be unable to sign with their children from day one. Studies have shown that deaf children with delayed language input would experience a delay in their reasoning of other’s mental states (de Villers, 2001). At the same time, when comparing deaf children that have delayed language input versus deaf children who acquire sign language from an earlier age (because their family members are able to provide sign input from young), it is apparent that the former are less developed in TOM compared to the latter. With regards to false beliefs, deaf children with deaf parents are not delayed in this TOM aspect, compared to deaf children with hearing parents.

While this shows how language acquisition plays an important role in the development of TOM, there is a flaw. The aspects that the researchers have been testing at this stage, are mostly on how language acquisition affects false beliefs development, which is developed when the child is 49-60 months. This does not address how language precedes TOM, since delayed language input seems to affect only later stages of TOM and not the earlier stages.

Here, it appears that a possible resolution would be that TOM influenced language in the earlier years. In the later years, language would in turn affect the development of the later stages of TOM. Malle (2004) suggests that after language has been developed to a mature level, language itself becomes autonomous from TOM, and the linguistic mastery the child possesses would be used to refine TOM skills in the later part of childhood and early adolescence.