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From this article on the Psychology Today website: Taylor and her colleagues found that 77 percent of these children said “yes” when asked if they had a preten
by rikroots 7y ago
From this article on the Psychology Today website:
Taylor and her colleagues found that 77 percent of these children said “yes” when asked if they had a pretend friend, and 40 percent spontaneously remarked at some point during the interview that they were talking about a pretend friend. The children offered statements such as, “Her is a fake animal,” “I just made him up in my head,” and “He’s not in real life.” Only one child was adamant that her invisible friend was real.
https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/growing-friendships/201301/imaginary-friends https://www.psychologytoday.com/gb/blog/growing-friendships/...
- scott_s 7y agoI don't think that addresses what I was wondering about. That a child acknowledges that their made-up friend is in fact made-up does not mean they're faking the made-up friend.
- rikroots 7y agoSorry - I misunderstood. Are you talking about kids who will claim to have made-up friends because of peer pressure? I've not heard of that sort of thing before, but I suppose it's possible - some people/kids will tie themselves into knots just to fit in with the other kids. (Personal example: I deliberately lied about not understanding how to do long division just so I wouldn't look too clever in front of my peers - I kept up the pretence for several months.)
- scott_s 7y agoPerhaps it's simplest to refer to the comment I replied to: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20565292 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20565292