With Friends Like These...

It's normal and healthy for children to have imaginary friends, explain Marjorie Taylorand Alison B. Shawber. But what do these friends say about the children who create them?

"Sammy is a little bit mean. Sometimes he is a little bit nice, but he kinda hurts people and he kinda bited people. He bited me one time and he bited me right here, and it hurt really bad, but I didn't cry."

What should you do if a four-year-old boy tells you about a preschool bully like Sammy? Some sort of intervention might seem appropriate, perhaps a meeting with Sammy's parents.

In this case, that was impossible: Sammy was imaginary. We learned about him when the little boy and his mother participated in our research investigating children's relationships with imaginary companions.

For almost two decades, we have interviewed hundreds of children and their parents about pretend play. Initially, we were interested in how children distinguish fantasy from reality. But we soon became fascinated by the complexity and detail in children's descriptions of imaginary companions, and we launched a series of studies to learn more about them. How often do children create imaginary companions, and how does this type of play develop? What are the characteristics of children who create imaginary companions? Is there any relation between having an imaginary companion in childhood and one's imaginative behavior as an adult?

To answer these and other questions, we have observed children playing in our lab, conducted separate interviews with children and parents, compared their responses, and then resolved discrepancies with follow-up questions. Using this method, we have found that creating an imaginary companion is a relatively common activity in early childhood, and most imaginary companions are supportive, agreeable, loving, and fun additions to the family.

But a surprising number of children create imaginary companions with behaviors and idiosyncrasies that are bewildering and even threatening to their parents. Many children describe their imaginary companions as individuals who punch, bite, steal, tell lies, or engage in other forms of bad behavior.

Imaginary companions can be greedy ("she takes all my stuff"), destructive ("the first time I tried to make him turn a page, he ripped the page off"), arrogant ("he thinks he knows everything"), clingy ("she was a little annoying because she followed me around everywhere"), overbearing ("she's a really mean friend, really bossy"), and aggressive ("sometime she gets angry at me and throws things at me"). They have to be monitored ("when he is bad I just lock the door"), told how to behave ("please don't eat my daddy"), and admonished ("stop bothering me").

With imaginary friends like these, many parents and teachers may wonder why children have them at all, or if these friends signal that something is wrong with a child. But based on our years of observation, we believe imaginary companions play an important role in a child's development, and their characteristics can speak volumes about the children who create them. Rather than being trivial or troubling, these companions can help children cultivate valuable skills—social, emotional, and creative—that have the potential to serve them well in their lives as adults.

Who has an imaginary companion?

Our research shows that by the time children are seven years old, as many as two- thirds have had some experience with imaginary companions. This estimate includes children who have created a personality for a toy that serves as a special friend, as well as children who create an invisible friend. There is no "typical" imaginary companion; the animals and people who populate children's fantasy lives come in all sizes, ages, genders, and species, including Martians, ghosts, angels, superheroes, and monsters, as well as invisible girls and boys and many types of animals.