Imaginary companions and peer aceptance.pdf

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International Journal of Behavioral Development # 2004 The International Society for the

2004, 28 (3), 204209 Study of Behavioural Development

http://www.tandf.co.uk/journals/pp/01650254.html DOI: 10.1080/01650250344000415

Imaginary companions and peer acceptance

Tracy R. Gleason

Wellesley College, MA, USA

Early research on imaginary companions suggests that children who create them do so to compensate

for poor social relationships. Consequently, the peer acceptance of children with imaginary

companions was compared to that of their peers. Sociometrics were conducted on 88 preschool-aged

children; 11 had invisible companions, 16 had personified objects (e.g., stuffed animals animated by

the child) and 65 had no imaginary companion. The three groups were compared on positive and

negative nominations, social preference, social impact, and total number of reciprocal friends. Given

the positive correlation between pretend play and social competence, fantasy predisposition was used

as a covariate. The groups did not differ on number of positive nominations by peers, total number of

reciprocal friends, or social preference scores. However, compared to their peers, children with

personified objects had higher social impact scores, largely as a result of negative nominations.

Attention is thus called to the differences between personified object and invisible imaginary

companions, and to the underlying social cognition that may be involved in their creation.

The creation of an imaginary companion is simultaneously atypical and an atypical pathway through development in early

childhood. The phenomenon is typical in that an imaginary

companion who is controlled by the child and usually friendly

is not considered a form of psychopathology (Silberg, 1998;

Trujillo, Lewis, Yeager, & Gidlow, 1996). Moreover, some

estimates suggest that imaginary companions are relatively

common; incidence can be as high as 65% (D. Singer & Singer,

1990) when they are defined as including invisible compa-

nions, personified objects (i.e., objects such as stuffed animals

or dolls that are animated by the child), and extensive

impersonation of a character. However, the phenomenon is

atypical in that the emergence of an imaginary companion is

not universal to preschool-aged children. Indeed, if only

invisible friends are included in the definition, estimates of

incidence can be as low as 6% (e.g., Harvey, 1918). Perhaps

because many but not nearly all children engage in this kind of

intense fantasy, researchers have searched for correlates of

imaginary companion formation within several domains,

including perception (Harvey, 1918), social cognition (Glea-

son, 2002; Taylor & Carlson, 1997), and creativity (Schaefer,

1969). Although each of these areas has enjoyed some success

in distinguishing between children with and without imaginary

companions, the correlates of the phenomenon within social

development have not been fully explored.

Examination of the relation between the formation of

imaginary companions and social development seems promis-

ing given that many hypotheses regarding the origins ofpretend friends relate to social conditions. In particular,

imaginary companions have been related to childrens relation-

ships with and acceptance by peers. For example, the creation

of an imaginary companion has been explained as an effort to

relieve loneliness or compensate for poor social relationships(Bender & Vogel, 1941; Harvey, 1918; Manosevitz, Prentice,

& Wilson, 1973). In fact, the suggestion implied by some

studies is that children with imaginary companions may be

creating them precisely because they lack the social skills or

opportunities to create real friends (Ames & Learned, 1946;

Nagera, 1969; Svendsen, 1934). Some support for this theory

comes from research by Harter and Chao (1992). Using the

written version of the Pictorial Scale for Perceived Competence

and Social Acceptance (Harter & Pike, 1984), these authors

asked teachers to rate the competence of children in their

classrooms who did and did not have imaginary companions.

Children with imaginary companions were rated as less

competent than their peers on the overall measure, which

included a component of social acceptance by peers.

The nature of relationships with imaginary companions

seems to support the notion that pretend friends are created by

socially incompetent children who may have been rejected by

their peers. For example, parents often explain childrens

creation of an imaginary companion in terms of the childs

need for a relationship, and some pretend friends are imaginary

versions of real people (Gleason, Sebanc, & Hartup, 2000).

Unlike real friends, who will not always conform to a childs

desires, an imaginary companion is subject to the childs whim

(Taylor, 1999) and thus does not require sophisticated social

skills for successful interaction. Moreover, children claim that

their relationships with imaginary companions are equally as

important as their relationships with real people (Mauro,1991), suggesting that pretend friends occupy a status in the

childs world that would typically be occupied by a real friend.

Taken together, these elements of pretend friends existence

seem to suggest that they are created to compensate for poor

Correspondence should be addressed to Tracy R. Gleason, Depart-

ment of Psychology, Wellesley College, Wellesley, Massachusetts

02481-8203, USA; e-mail: [email protected].

This research was supported in part by a Wellesley College Faculty

Award. Thanks are due to the children and teachers who participated

in the study, as well as to Jean Gleason, Bill Hartup, and David Kaiser

for their comments on earlier versions of this manuscript. The author is

also grateful to Anneliese Bass, Kate Fiske, Amy Gower, and Lisa

Hohmann for help with data collection and coding and especially to

Bill Bukowski for his assistance with data analyses.

at Universidad Nacional Aut Mexic on September 21, 2015jbd.sagepub.comDownloaded from
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peer relationships, but this question has never been tested

empirically. The goal of this study was thus to test the

connection between the creation of imaginary companions and

childrens peer acceptance.

Not all of the literature supports the notion that children

who create imaginary companions have poor peer relation-

ships. In fact, some evidence indicates that children who create

imaginary companions are more sociable than other children.

For example, compared to their peers, children with imaginary

companions are more cooperative with adults and other

children and demonstrate more positive affect in their play

(Partington & Grant, 1984; D. Singer & Singer, 1990). In

addition, parental reports of childrens shyness have suggested

that children with imaginary companions are less shy than their

peers, at least during the preschool period (Mauro, 1991).

Children with pretend friends also have real friends and

playmates at rates similar to children without imaginary friends

(Gleason et al., 2000; Manosevitz et al., 1973; Masih, 1978).

These findings run directly counter to the idea that children

with imaginary friends are rejected by their peers.

If children who create imaginary companions are not doing

so to compensate for their relationships with real peers, then

they may develop pretend friends simply because they enjoythe companionship available from such a friend (Taylor,

1999)after all, most imaginary companions are abandoned

when real playmates are around (Manosevitz et al., 1973). As

with real friends, children play with their imaginary compa-

nions, pretend with them, involve them in their daily routines,

and occasionally argue with them (Gleason et al., 2000;

Taylor, 1999). In fact, rather than being the result of rejection

by peers, imaginary companions may enhance childrens peer

relationships by providing a forum for children to practice

interacting with a peer. After all, children with imaginary

companions appear to conceptualise their pretend friends as

relationship partners, and appear to attribute similar qualities

to these quasi-relationships as they do to relationships with

best friends (Gleason, 2002). This extra social rehearsal mayeven mean that children with imaginary companions are

particularly adept at forming and maintaining peer relation-

ships in comparison to other children. If so, imaginary

companion creators might be attractive playmates, as socially

competent children often enjoy high acceptance by peers

(Connolly & Doyle, 1981; Howes, 1988).

The idea that children with imaginary companions may

have heightened social skills is supported by the positive

relation between social competence and fantasy play more

generally (Connolly & Doyle, 1984; Doyle & Connolly, 1989;

Garvey, 1977; Rubin & Maioni, 1975). Formulating an

imaginary companion constitutes the creation of a fantasy

(Taylor, 1999), and just as pretend play is described as anelaboration of elements of real experiences (Harris, 2000), the

creation of an imaginary friend might be an elaboration of

elements of real relationships. After all, fantasy play and the

creation of an imaginary companion appear to be related. In a

longitudinal study, Acredolo and colleagues (Acredolo, Good-

wyn, & Fulmer, 1995) demonstrated that 4-year-olds with

imaginary companions had shown a pattern of significantly

more interest in fantasy play than their peers since infancy.

Accordingly, the positive relationship between fantasy play and

social competence may extend to children who create

imaginary companions as well, even if just as a function of

involvement in pretence and not as a function of the existence

of pretend friends.

The positive relation between fantasy play and social

competence raises another issue. Children with imaginary

companions are considered high-fantasy (e.g., Taylor &

Carlson, 1997), meaning that their predilections for pretence,

and not their imaginary companions per se, might be

responsible for some of the findings relating the creation of

imaginary companions to sociability. In other words, being a

high-fantasy child may be connected to social competence and

therefore to acceptance by peers (Connolly & Doyle, 1984),

and having an imaginary companion may not contribute to that

social success over and above ones involvement in fantasy.

Therefore, the creation of an imaginary companion and

predilection for fantasy ought to be examined as separate

contributors to childrens acceptance by their peers.

Another factor that might influence the relation between

imaginary companions, fantasy, and peer acceptance is the

definition of imaginary companion used to identify children

with and without pretend friends. This distinction is impor-

tant, as systematic differences have been found between

different types of imaginary companions. In particular, parents

frequently describe invisible imaginary companions as provid-

ing egalitarian relationships, akin to friendships, whereas

children appear to nurture their personified objects much asa parent nurtures a child (Gleason et al., 2000). If interactions

in these quasi-relationships influence interactions with real

peers, then children with invisible companions may be at an

advantage, in that invisible friends may offer social rehearsal

that is more directly applicable to peer relationships than that

of children with personified objects.

This investigation was designed to test directly the notion

that having an imaginary companion is related to acceptance

by peers. One possible hypothesis was that children may create

imaginary companions in order to compensate for inadequate

social relationships, or as an alternative to interactions with real

peers. Presumably, then, children with either invisible imagin-

ary companions or personified objects would be less accepted

by their peers than children without imaginary companions.However, the bulk of the literature suggests that acceptance by

peers should not be lower for children with imaginary

companions because of their sociability (Taylor, 1999) and

their extensive involvement in fantasy (Connolly & Doyle,

1984). Conceptualising the imaginary companion as a venue

for social rehearsal also suggests that the peer acceptance of

children with imaginary companions should not be lower than

that of their peers, and may even be higher. Moreover,

acceptance by peers might be higher for children with invisible

companions over those with personified objects given the

differential nature of the relationships that children often form

with these different types of companions. Sociometric inter-

views thus were conducted with a large group of preschool-aged children to examine their social status in the classroom as

a function of whether they had imaginary companions.

Childrens scores on a measure of fantasy predisposition were

factored out of these analyses to more clearly indicate the

relative contributions of imaginary companions to a childs

acceptance by peers independently of his or her fantasy level.

Method

Participants

A total of 105 preschool children were invited to participate in

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF BEHAVIORAL DEVELOPMENT, 2004, 28 (3), 204209 205



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206 GLEASON / IMAGINARY COMPANIONS AND PEER ACCEPTANCE

the study and 92 accepted. Four children had to be dropped

from the study because they were missing fantasy interviews

owing to absences or the end of the school year. The remaining

88 children (43 boys, 45 girls) ranged in age from 43 to 69

months (M = 54.8 months, SD = 7.43 months) and were

enrolled in six different classrooms in two private preschools

located in an upper-middle class suburban area. Approxi-

mately 84% of the children were white.

Materials

This investigation was part of a larger study of childrens

fantasy play and imaginary companions. Materials relevant to

this portion of the study are described below.

Sociometric interview. Childrens preferences for particular

classmates were assessed using a sociometric interview.

Participants were shown individual photographs of the children

in their classrooms whose parents had given permission for

participation in the study. Participants were asked to name the

child pictured, after which the photo was placed face up on the

table. Once all the pictures were out, children were asked to

point to pictures of three children with whom they most likedto play. The researcher then removed all of the photos except

those the child had chosen, and asked the child to choose the

one friend of the three with whom he or she liked to play with

the very most.

Teacher nominations. While other researchers have asked

children to specify who they do not like to play with or simply

do not like in the classroom to acquire negative nominations

(e.g., Asher & Dodge, 1986; Coie, Dodge, & Coppotelli,

1982), the schools where we collected data were reluctant to

use this method. Instead, each childs primary teacher

nominated a peer with whom the child rarely or never played

from among a list of children in the class who were

participating in the study. A single negative nomination wasobtained as data were collected toward the end of the year

when children knew each other well and were likely to have

played with most of their classmates at some point. Although

obviously childrens nominations of each other would have

been ideal, teacher nominations seemed to be a viable

alternative given the overlap of their responses with childrens

responses on such measures in past research (Wu, Hart,

Draper, & Olsen, 2001) and the relation of teacher-based

rankings of popularity to childrens social competence (Con-

nolly & Doyle, 1981). Teachers were blind to the hypotheses of

the study and to childrens imaginary companion status.

Fantasy interview. A fantasy interview developed by Singerand Singer (1990) was administered to the children. This

interview has been used to categorise children into high and

low fantasy groups (J. Singer, 1961; J. Singer & Streiner,

1966), and correlates with other measures of fantasy such as

parents reports of the childs impersonation of characters, the

ability to use an imaginary object (versus a body part) in a

pretend action, and creation of imaginary companions (Taylor

& Carlson, 1997). Children were asked to name their favourite

story, toy, TV show, and game. In addition, they were asked to

tell the researcher what they liked to do alone, what they

thought about when lying in bed at night, and what they liked

to play with others. The responses were coded as either fantasy

oriented (e.g., Cinderella, playing house), which received a

score of 1, or reality oriented (e.g., puzzle, tag), which received

a score of 0. Finally, they were asked if they ever pretended to

be an animal or another person. Affirmative responses received

a score of 1, and negative responses a zero. Childrens fantasy

scores were the sum of their responses to the 10 questions.

Parent report of imaginary companions. Parents were asked to

complete a short questionnaire regarding whether their child

had an imaginary companion. If so, the parent was asked to

specify if the companion was invisible or a personified object

and, regardless of type, to report the companions name and

give a general description.

Imaginary companion interview. Each child was asked whether

or not he had a pretend friend using the procedure described

by Taylor, Cartwright, and Carlson (1993). This procedure

has been used successfully to identify children with imaginary

companions, as children understand that these friends are not

real (Taylor, 1999). If the child responded affirmatively to the

question, then the imaginary companion interview was con-

ducted. If the child responded that he or she did not have an

imaginary companion though the parent had reported one, the

child was asked What about X? Your (Mom/Dad) tells methat you have a pretend friend named X, is X your pretend

friend? Although seven children initially reported no imagin-

ary companion (four with invisible friends, three with

personified objects), no child whose parent had named an

imaginary companion responded negatively to this question.

Children with imaginary companions were asked some general

questions about the companion to help ensure that the children

were not creating it on the spot. Interviewers also ascertained

whether the companion was invisible or a personified object.

Procedure

Because they were combined with other measures not included

here, the sociometric interview was administered in onesession, and the fantasy and imaginary companion interviews

in a separate session. Before the fantasy interview, the

imaginary companion questionnaire was distributed to parents,

and teachers were asked for the negative peer nominations.

Children were asked about imaginary companions regardless of

their parents reports, as children do not always share their

companions with their parents. Approximately 2 weeks after

the imaginary companion interview, children were questioned

a second time about imaginary companions to be sure their

companions were consistent. Parents were also asked to clarify

that any companion mentioned by a child was not a real friend,

and that any personified objects mentioned by either child or

parent were animated by the child and not just carried aroundor used for comfort. Children were classified as having an

imaginary companion if they named the same companion in

both interviews, or if the companion they named once was

corroborated by the parent.

Coding

Fantasy interview. Of the 10 items on the fantasy interview, 3

correlated either weakly or not at all with the other items.

These threefavourite story, television show, and gamewere

thus dropped from the total scores. Without these items,

reliability on the scale was low but acceptable (Cronbachs

alpha = .59).



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Ratings of social status. Three different ratings of social status

were obtained. The number of positive and negative nomina-

tions each child received from the other children (positive) or

the teacher (negative) was calculated. The number of

reciprocal friends (out of the three choices) each child had

was also computed. All scores except the number of reciprocal

friends were converted to z-scores so that the ratings could be

compared across classrooms.

Results

Imaginary companions and fantasy interviews

Of the 88 children in the study, 18.2% (n= 16; 7 girls, 9 boys)

had personified object imaginary companions and 12.5% (n =

11; 9 girls, 2 boys) had invisible imaginary companions. These

proportions are somewhat lower than those found in other

studies (e.g., Gleason et al., 2000; Taylor & Carlson, 1997),

but are within the typical range (Taylor, 1999). A chi-square

examination of gender by companion type was significant, w2

(1,N= 27) = 3.91, p 5 .05, in that more girls than boys had

invisible imaginary companions.

Because gender and companion type were related, an

independent samples t-test was conducted comparing boys

and girls scores on the fantasy interview. No gender difference

emerged. A one-way ANOVA on the fantasy scores using

imaginary companion status as the independent factor was

marginally significant,F(2, 87) = 2.71, p = .07. Children with

personified objects had the highest fantasy scores, followed by

children with invisible companions and children with no

imaginary companions. (See Table 1 for means and standard

deviations.)

Measures of social status

The teacher-provided negative nominations were first tested toverify that teachers chose largely opposite-sex peers for these

measures. Although the validity of teacher-based nominations

has not been examined, verifying that teachers primarily chose

opposite-sex peers for the negative nominations provided some

support that their choices might be a reasonable proxy for the

childrens nominations, given that preschool-aged children

typically nominate opposite-sex peers when asked who they

rarely play with or do not like (Ramsey, 1995). For girls,

teachers in this sample chose boys for the negative nominations

in 90.7% of the cases, and for boys, girls were nominated in

89.2% of cases. A chi-square analysis conducted on gender of

child by gender of child nominated by the teacher was highly

significant,w2(1,N= 84) = 45.92, p 5 .001.

Children with invisible companions, personified objects,

and no imaginary companion were compared according to

their standardised scores on the positive and negative nomina-

tions (see Table 1 for means and standard deviations). Fantasy

score was used as a covariate to ensure that any effects could be

attributed to the creation of an imaginary companion per se

and not simply to high involvement in fantasy, especially since

the three groups differed marginally on the fantasy interview. A

3 (imaginary companion status) 2 (gender) MANCOVA

resulted in a significant difference only for negative nomina-

tions,F(5, 82) = 2.18,p = .05, Z2 = .14. No interaction effects

occurred, but the main effect for imaginary companion status

was marginally significant, F(2, 82) = 2.35, p = .10, Z2 = .06.

The standardised scores on the negative nominations of the

children with personified objects were high and positive, those

of the children with invisible friends high and negative, and

those of the children with no imaginary companions were close

to zero.

Reciprocity of friendships

To examine the hypothesis that the number of reciprocal

friendships a child had might differ by imaginary companion

status, once again a 3 2 ANOVA was run with gender and

imaginary companions as fixed factors and fantasy score as a

covariate. No significant differences were found. (See Table 1

for means and standard deviations.)

Discussion

In general, children with and without imaginary companions

appear to be more similar than different in terms of their

acceptance by peers. This claim is supported particularly bythe effect sizes of the findings, which were small even where

statistically significant. The results suggest that having or not

having an imaginary companion per se does not correspond to

differences in childrens peer acceptance, although possibly the

type of companion a child creates may have some small bearing

on his or her popularity within the classroom. Specifically,

compared to their peers, children who create personified object

imaginary companions appeared to have slightly elevated

negative nominations (as provided by teachers). Moreover,

these results were obtained while controlling for the childrens

predisposition for fantasy as measured by the fantasy interview,


Table 1Means and standard deviations for fantasy interview scores, social status measures, and number of reciprocal friends (maximum 3) by

imaginary companion status

Imaginary companion status

Invisible friend

(n = 11)

Personified object

(n = 16)

No imaginary companion

(n = 61)

Mean SD Mean SD Mean SD

Fantasy interview 4.27 1.95 4.44 1.09 3.44 1.82

Positive nominations 0.0182 0.98 0.3142 1.08 0.1055 0.96

Negative nominations 0.5537 0.63 0.4905 1.20 0.0143 0.93

No. of reciprocal friends 1.45 1.04 1.80 0.94 1.44 0.89



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meaning that for children with personified objects, their

imaginary companions weakly relate to their social standing

above and beyond any influence derived from their status as

high fantasy children. These findings have several implications

for understanding the relation between imaginary companions

and peer acceptance.

Imaginary companions as compensation for poor

relationshipsThe hypothesis that children create imaginary companions in

order to compensate for poor relationships is unsupported by

these data. Children with imaginary companions received

statistically equivalent positive nominations from their peers to

those of children without imaginary companions, and the

groups did not differ significantly in number of reciprocal

friends. Children with imaginary companions thus are not

creating them because they have few or no real friends. They

appear to be as well-liked as children without imaginary

companions. Concerns, therefore, that children might be

creating imaginary companions because they cannot create

satisfactory relationships with real peers seem unfounded.

Initially, the fact that children with personified objectsreceived slightly more negative nominations than their peers

suggests that they might be rejected children. However, given

that they did not differ from their peers on positive nomina-

tions or number of reciprocal friends, these children appear to

have friends. Of course, many rejected children have friends

(Hartup, 1983), but despite its correlational nature, the pattern

of the data does not support the notion that children create a

personified object as a result of rejection from the peer group.

The effect was only marginally significant and quite weak,

suggesting that overall, children with personified objects are

probably not significantly more likely than their peers to receive

negative nominations.

Imaginary companions as a venue for social rehearsal

The idea that the creation of an imaginary companion might

enhance a childs social competence and thus peer acceptance

by providing a forum for practising social interactions with

peers received little support. The marginal differences between

the imaginary companion groups on the negative nominations

suggested at best that invisible companions, but not personi-

fied objects, kept children from receiving negative nomina-

tions. This finding may indicate that the creation of an invisible

imaginary companion enhances the social competence of

children to a small but largely unremarkable degree. Similarly,

the hypothesis that children with invisible imaginary compa-

nions would receive higher ratings of peer acceptance than thechildren with personified objects received some weak support

but, of course, only in terms of negative nominations.

However, these findings contribute to a growing body of

literature suggesting that invisible companions and personified

objects are subtly distinct phenomena with separate underlying

social processes. The vertical nature of childrens relationships

with personified objects (Gleason et al., 2000) implies that the

focus of this fantasy is framed by the hierarchical nature of the

relationship. Ostensibly, this emphasis on the self as the

competent partner might be reflected in childrens interactions

with their peers, meaning that their concepts of friendship may

also not be as structurally egalitarian as those of their peers.

Thus, these children may be inclined to take a leadership role

both in instances where such behaviour is warranted and where

it is not. Such behaviour would be consistent with the findings

Harter and Chao (1992) reported for girls with imaginary

companions. The girls in their study created less competent

imaginary companions and were rated as less socially

competent than their peers. Teachers also rated the boys as

less socially competent, but the companions they created were

superordinate rather than subordinate to themselves. Although

Harter and Chao did not specify if the imaginary companions

in their study were invisible or personified, one interpretation

of these findings and those of the present study is that children

with personified objects have concepts of peer relationships

that are more similar to the schemas used for parentchild

relationships than to those of egalitarian friendships (Gleason,

2002), and these schemas may occasionally hamper their

interactions with peers.

Imaginary companions and fantasy predisposition

The creation of an imaginary companion does not seem to

contribute to peer acceptance over and above what is

contributed by fantasy for positive nominations by peers.

These results suggest that the robust relationship between

engagement in pretend play and socially competent behaviour(Connolly & Doyle, 1984; Doyle & Connolly, 1989; Rubin &

Maioni, 1975) is not facilitated by the creation of an imaginary

companion. Nor, of course, are positive aspects of peer

acceptance hindered by the existence of a pretend friend.

Once again, the lesson here appears to be that children who

create imaginary companions are more similar to than different

from their peers in terms of positive peer acceptance.

For negative nominations, the slight between-group differ-

ences are clearly connected to having or not having a

personified object over and above any group differences in

fantasy predisposition. Although the groups differed marginally

on their fantasy scores, factoring these scores out of the

analyses ensured that the differences that emerged were notinfluenced by a general pattern of involvement in fantasy on

the part of the children with personified objects. In fact, given

their generally high predilection for fantasy, children with

personified objects would be expected to be among the more

socially competent children in the classrooms (Connolly &

Doyle, 1984).

Limitations

The use of teacher rather than peer ratings and only a single

rating for the negative nominations may have influenced the

results. Teacher ratings of childrens sociometric status are not

perfectly correlated with childrens ratings; however, nor are

they completely independent (Wu et al., 2001). Anotherpossible influence may have been the presence of the childrens

personified objects at school even if the children did not play

with them there. Many children, especially those in full-day

care, bring a precious object to school, and approximately two-

thirds of personified objects have been to school at some point

(Gleason et al., 2000). The presence of these objects may have

influenced teachers ratings of these children in systematic

ways, although presumably children with transitional objects

may have brought them to day care as well, and teachers may

not have been able to distinguish children with transitional

versus personified objects. Last, confidence in the results is

limited by the small number of children who had imaginary

companions and by the gender disparity of the invisible



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imaginary companion group. The imbalance in this group may

have prevented the detection of interactions between gender

and imaginary companion status on the standardised nomina-

tion scores and, furthermore, group differences in imaginary

companion status could have been owing to gender. Replica-

tion would certainly enhance confidence in the results.

Future directions and conclusions

The results of this investigation suggest that concerns about

childrens creation of an imaginary companion as a way to

compensate for poor or nonexistent friendships should be put

to rest. Although the slightly elevated negative nominations of

the children with personified objects invite further investigation

into the differences between these children and those with

invisible friends or no imaginary companions, the findings do

not suggest that children who create imaginary companions

have lower rates of acceptance than their peers. Instead, future

research could usefully focus on two sets of questions with

respect to the links between real and imaginary friendships.

First, concepts of real and imaginary friendships appear to be

similar (Gleason, 2002), but the concepts underlying these

relationships in early childhood have not been fully described.The relation between the qualities of real and imaginary

friendships may provide interesting insights into how children

view their friendships, what they expect from them, and how

they might like them to function. Second, although not

reflected in childrens acceptance by peers, the creation of

imaginary companions may be connected to childrens social

competence within early peer relationships. Specifically,

behaviours observable in relationships with imaginary compa-

nions may be mirrored in relationships with real friends. A

child who successfully negotiates a conflict with an imaginary

companion may be able to apply this skill with real children,

meaning that fantasy or role-play might be a way to help

children who need to work on their social skills.

Another interesting topic for future research concerns thenature of the personified object imaginary companion and its

correlates in social experience and social cognition. Many

personified objects emerge from transitional objects (D. Singer

& Singer, 1990) but this process has not been explored, nor has

any research examined why this transformation occurs to some

but not all transitional objects. In addition, if children with

personified objects are conceptualising their friendships differ-

ently from other children, the nature of these representations

deserves some attention. Last, further description of the

variation in types of imaginary companions may continue to

shed light on the functions of these fantastical friends and the

roles that they play in childrens early social development.

Manuscript received November 2002

Revised manuscript received May 2003

PrEview publication February 2004

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