higher level of creativity at a young age (Hoff, 2005).2 Additionally, adults who recall having an imaginary companion as a child outperform those who do not outperform those on creativity tests (Kidd, 2005).3
Parents and teachers have no reason to fear pretend play in young children. This type of play benefits all areas of a child’s development and gives a child tools for experiences later in life such as emotional regulation, creativity, and logical reasoning. Join in children’s pretend play to help guide their storyline, but allow children to expand their knowledge of the world around them by playing “make believe.”
 The Affective Social Competence scale (ASC) was used for measuring a child’s social adjustment. Its three indexes include: sending affective messages, receiving affective messages, and experiencing affect.
2Tests used included the Activity Questionnaire, designed to measure the correlation between
creative activities and having imaginary friends, and the Unusual Uses Test, which measures fluency of ideas (Hoff, 2005).
3 The Gough Creative Personality Scale was used for measurement, and adults who reported having imaginary companions as a child had a higher mean score.
Lindsey, E., & Colwell, M. (2013). Pretend and phyiscal play: links to preschoolers' affective social competence. Merrill-Palmer Quarterly , 59(3), 330-360. Retrieved from http://muse.jhu.edu.proxy.library.nd.edu/journals/merrill-palmer_quarterly/v059/59.3.lindsey.html
Sutherland, S., & Friedman , O. (2013). Just pretending can be really learning: children use pretend play as a source for acquiring generic knowledge. Developmental Psychology , 49(9), 1660-1668. Retrieved from http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/ehost/detail?sid=1b73336b-6c51-4dc8-a408-8fcbfd153531@sessionmgr4004&vid=1&hid=4107&bdata=JnNpdGU9ZWhvc3QtbGl2ZQ==
Rakoczy, H. (2006). Pretend play and the development of collective intentionality. Cognitive Systems Research, 7(2), 113-127. Retrieved from http://www.sciencedirect.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/science/article/pii/S1...
Hoff, E. (2005). Imaginary companions, creativity, and self-image in middle childhood. Creativity Research Journal, 17(2), 167-180. Retrieved from http://web.ebscohost.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/ehost/pdfviewer/pdfviewer?sid=ef60235a-e042-46aa-95ed-555addd364c9@sessionmgr4002&vid=2&hid=4201
Harris , P., & Kavanaugh , R. (1993). Young children's understanding of pretense. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, 58(1), 1-107. Retrieved from http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1166074?uid=3739840&uid=2134&uid=2&uid=70&uid=4&uid=3739256&sid=21103305932093
Kidd, E., Rogers P., & Rogers, C. (2010) The personality correlates of adults who had imaginary companions in childhood. Psychological Reports, 107(1), 163-172. Retrieved from http://www.amsciepub.com.proxy.library.nd.edu/doi/pdf/10.2466/02.04.10.PR0.107.4.163-172
*Rachel Hughes is a student at the University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, Indiana, USA
BLOG SERIES ON PLAY