Some parents might find it bizarre if their child was friends with a 160-year-old world traveler, or a dragon that reads the legends of King Arthur or a pair of birds that bicker incessantly.
But University psychology professor Marjorie Taylor, who recently published an article on children and their imaginary companions, said it’s common for children to have these sorts of unusual imaginary friends. In fact, Taylor’s study shows that the phenomenon occurs in children much older than experts initially expected, and in some cases, in adults.
“What we found is that by the age of 7, children are just as likely to have an imaginary companion (as when they were younger),” Taylor said.
Before Taylor’s research, psychologists typically assumed children stopped having imaginary companions around age 4 or 5, but the only research done on the subject was with children with psychological problems. In the mid-1990s, Taylor interviewed a sampling of normal 3- and 4-year-olds and then checked up with them three years later. Her results were surprising.
“Sixty-five percent of children have a history of play with imaginary friends,” she said. “So it’s a lot more common than we expected.”
The study also found that children with imaginary friends tend to have “more advanced social understanding” than children without imaginary friends.
“Mostly there were no differences, but (the study’s findings) tend to favor the ones that have them,” she said. “Children with imaginary friends seem to be better equipped to understand that other people are not exactly like themselves.”
According to the article, published in Developmental Psychology, the composition of the imaginary companions changed as the children got older. The study found that younger children are more likely to have imaginary companions based on props, such as when a child animates a stuffed animal or toy. But as children grow older, companions are more likely to be purely imaginary.
Taylor could find no pattern regarding the companions themselves, and while the characters are occasionally inspired by television or movies, they are more frequently created from scratch in the child’s imagination.
“There’s incredible diversity in the form the friends take,” she said. “It’s true that they’re sometimes adopted, but mostly they’re idiosyncratic characters that you’ve never heard of.”
Taylor encountered a number of interesting characters in the course of her study, including “Cream,” a palm-sized baby, and “Elephant,” an elephant that wears tank tops and shorts.
Liesel Sylwester, now 15 years old, participated in the study when she was 7 and described “Simpy,” an invisible girl with blue skin and funny clothes. In retrospect, Sylwester said she felt like the impetus for “Simpy” was the study itself and she’s not sure if “Simpy” was a genuine imaginary friend.
Sywester said she lost interest in “Simpy” soon after the study was completed.
“I remember getting tired of it because you had to make up both sides of the dialogue,” she said. “I figured it would be easier just to talk to someone.”
The study found that many children had conflicts with their imaginary friends, as if they were acting autonomously. One girl complained that “Elephant” was occasionally mean to her.
“They have a sense of independence,” Taylor said. “How is it possible cognitively to create an imaginary friend and have it act independently?”
This question was the segue into Taylor’s new project: She examines how fiction writers create their characters and how these characters develop a sense of independence from their creators. In an article published in 2003 in Imagination Cognition and Personality in conjunction with University associate professor of psychology Sara D. Hodges and former University master’s student Adele Kohanyi, Taylor described a phenomenon called the illusion of independent agency.
“The illusion of independent agency occurs when a fictional character is experienced by the person who created it as having independent thoughts, words and/or actions,” the article said.
Taylor’s study found that of the 55 authors interviewed more than 92 percent had experienced the illusion of independent agency. The study also found from diaries and interview transcripts that authors from Henry James to Alice Walker have had characters that act with a sense of independence.
Honors College professor Henry Alley, also a published novelist, said most authors, including himself, think of their characters as having some degree of autonomy.
Alley said that in one instance he spent nearly 15 years with the same set of characters as he rewrote a story eight or nine times.
“These characters, in a sense, became companions with me,” he said. “They were trying to help me out.”
Alley added that in creating his characters, he often “develops a certain respect for (the characters).”
“Sometimes the characters seem to exist separate from the plot,” he said. “They have their own integrity.”
Taylor is currently working on a book about the phenomenon of the illusion of independent agency in fiction authors. The book will feature Taylor’s interviews with several prominent authors, including Philip Pullman, author of the “Golden Compass,” and murder-mystery novelist Sue Grafton.
Ultimately, Taylor said she hopes her work will contribute to a greater understanding of the human mind.
“I’m trying to understand the human mind and I think imagination is a very important part of it,” she said.
