Children's interpretations of social experiences were compared to adults' interpretations of the same experiences in a study involving 151 children between 6 and 12 years of age and the mothers of a subsample of 43 of the children. Seventy-six participating children were asked to describe some of their social experiences and generate attributions for these events; an additional 75 children then coded the attributions on the dimensions of internality, stability, and control. The interviews were conducted at the Arts and Computer Camp, University of Waterloo (Ontario), and taped on a hidden tape recorder. Subsequently the children's parents listened to the stories and the attributions in their homes, and then coded the attributions on the same three dimensions. The parents completed the task for two children (their own and a stranger) and did the coding twice: once from an adult's perspective and once from a child's. Differences were found between the parents' adult- and child-perspective codings, indicating that adults have theories about children's social perceptions. However, for the most part, adults were unable to predict the children's actual responses. Moreover, though parents felt they were more accurate when coding their own child's attributions than those of the other child, no effects were found for parent's acquaintance with the target child. Implications of these findings for research on peer relationships are discussed. (RH)