To provide: a surface treatment agent which enables formation of a
surface layer excellent in
lubricity; a
coating liquid; an article; and an article manufacturing method.SOLUTION: A surface treatment agent comprises a
fluorine-containing
ether compound having a fluoropolyether chain(s) and a reactive group(s), and satisfies the following requirement 1. Requirement 1: in a
mass spectrum showing a relationship between
mass / charge ratios of product ions and area intensities, the
mass spectrum being acquired from product ions using a second mass
spectrometer, IB / IA, which is a ratio of IB, a total of area intensities of peaks corresponding, respectively, to product ions having mass / charge ratios 66 u, 166 u, 182 u and 282 u, to IA, a total of area intensities of peaks corresponding, respectively, to product ions having mass charge ratios of 116 u and 232 u, is 0.025 or more, where the product ions are generated by generating negative secondary ions by irradiating a
surface layer, formed on a base material using the surface treatment agent, with pulsed primary ions, separating the generated negative secondary ions on the basis of a mass / charge ratio using a first time-of-flight mass
spectrometer, selecting the negative secondary ions having a mass charge ratio of 348 u as precursor ions from the separated negative secondary ions using an
ion selection device, and introducing the selected precursor ions into a collision
cell and cleaving the precursor ions by
high energy collision-induced dissociation.SELECTED DRAWING: None