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Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.

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Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to stuff Mom Never told you?

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Speaker 1: From house stuff Works dot Com. Hello, and welcome to

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Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm Caroline and Caroline. You know,

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Speaker 1: one thing that I love about doing this podcast with

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Speaker 1: you is the fact that it gives us an excuse

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Speaker 1: to research things that just pique our interest at random.

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Speaker 1: For instance, we are in charge, yes, we are in

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Speaker 1: charge of this podcast. And um, we decided to talk

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Speaker 1: about imaginary friends today, not because of the subversive gender

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Speaker 1: politics of children's fantasy play, but really just because imaginary

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Speaker 1: friends came up in some of our research dealing with

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Speaker 1: only children, right, which we talked about recently. Because they're

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Speaker 1: not long, they're not lonely, just creative, they're well adjusted. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And it got me thinking about imaginary friends and where

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Speaker 1: they came from. And I thought that maybe listeners would

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Speaker 1: enjoy hearing about some scholarship on imaginary friends because similar

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Speaker 1: to the only child that well, the similar to the

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Speaker 1: only children's stereotypes as being you know, lonely introverts, kids

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Speaker 1: with imaginary friends also have some stereotypes as well. As

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Speaker 1: either being geniuses or kind of dim. Yeah, kind of

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Speaker 1: kind of strange, strange and misfitty. Um. We read this

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Speaker 1: meta study from two thousand six by s. Ben Clawson

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Speaker 1: and Richard Passman on the history not only the history

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Speaker 1: of uh imaginary friends, but the history of the study

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Speaker 1: of imaginary friends. Because um, as we've talked about before, Um,

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Speaker 1: the the idea of childhood didn't really come about until

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Speaker 1: more recently, and so they sort of looked at the

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Speaker 1: past studies on on children and on imaginary friends and everything,

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Speaker 1: and it's really changed over the centuries because not everybody

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Speaker 1: really used to care so much about kids. They were

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Speaker 1: like whatever, they're just small people, right. The actual concept

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Speaker 1: of childhood as its own distinct life phase emerged after

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Speaker 1: the seventeenth century and then um, but it wasn't even

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Speaker 1: until around the nineteenth century that it was thought up

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Speaker 1: a thought of as a crucial time of growth and

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Speaker 1: development that they should actually pay attention to. Because really, um,

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Speaker 1: in that time, kids were just seen as small workers

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Speaker 1: with little hands, little hands that can get into those

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Speaker 1: machines or real they fixed things. Um. Yeah, it's interesting

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Speaker 1: because yeah, the twentieth century, that's when we really start

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Speaker 1: to see children being viewed as these people, these small

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Speaker 1: people who have special needs and desires and need to

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Speaker 1: play and really have their imagination set loose. And that's

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Speaker 1: when we get these recorded instances of pretend companions or

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Speaker 1: imaginary friends or whatever you call them. Different researchers have

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Speaker 1: different names for them. But um, it's interesting because it

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Speaker 1: seems like these imaginary friends didn't really emerge until kids

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Speaker 1: did have set aside playtime and they were on their

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Speaker 1: own and they're playing with their toys by themselves, and

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Speaker 1: all of a sudden, they have imaginary friends. And and

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Speaker 1: there are different views of them of like whether it's

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Speaker 1: just the kid's imagination they're just playing, or whether it's

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Speaker 1: an actual spirit that's inhabiting the child or there's some

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Speaker 1: demon following them around. And um, one study of imaginary

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Speaker 1: friends in India Northern India, I thought was very interesting.

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Speaker 1: So in northern India there there are very few recorded

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Speaker 1: instances and no recognition of pretend companions. But this is

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Speaker 1: a culture where children have less playtime and little time

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Speaker 1: to be left alone, and those are conditions that could

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Speaker 1: reflect the era before childhood was really recognized as an

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Speaker 1: important period for play and exploration and speaking of UM

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Speaker 1: of India. Classon and Passman also note that UM A

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Speaker 1: lot of times pretend companions. When uh, those instances do

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Speaker 1: come up, it's usually perceived as uh, someone like a

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Speaker 1: spirit from a previous life coming to visit the child's

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Speaker 1: kind of scene, as a in a in a positive light,

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Speaker 1: whereas in the book by Peter and Sue Vanderhook and

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Speaker 1: Neil Anderson called Spiritual Protection for Your Children, Uh, pretend

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Speaker 1: companions or imaginary friends are described as proternatural powers that

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Speaker 1: can quote result in spiritual bondage. Right. So it's sort

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Speaker 1: of like, uh, there's this. You know, certain certain people

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Speaker 1: are worried that the devil is inhabiting their children, or

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Speaker 1: that the devil is in their room. And I went

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Speaker 1: on Amazon just to kind of check this book out,

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Speaker 1: and a lot of people had a lot of readers

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Speaker 1: had written reviews of it. And one person said, you know,

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Speaker 1: I was so nervous about my child because you know,

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Speaker 1: he kept saying that there were monsters in his room

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Speaker 1: or under his bed, and I kept saying, now, you're fine,

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Speaker 1: you're fine, You're fine. And then I read this book

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Speaker 1: and I realized that Satan could be in the room

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Speaker 1: and so there, yeah, there's there's been there and that's

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Speaker 1: that's a view that's you know, gone back for for

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Speaker 1: a long time. So it's interesting that so many different

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Speaker 1: people have different views on imaginary friends. And I think

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Speaker 1: it's just something you know, we might be uncomfortable with

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Speaker 1: it because it's totally unfamiliar if you can't see this,

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Speaker 1: you know, entity that a child is supposedly having conversations

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Speaker 1: where I worry about your kid a little. Right, some parents,

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Speaker 1: UM get a little squeamish, but as we will, as

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Speaker 1: we will learn, they don't really need to be. But

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Speaker 1: let's back up UM and maybe trace the history of

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Speaker 1: UM scholarship related to imaginary friends, because there are a

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Speaker 1: lot of studies dealing with child development and this psychology

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Speaker 1: around imaginary friends. Right, the first studies on the topic,

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Speaker 1: UH did start start rolling in the late nineteenth century,

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Speaker 1: but unfortunately study practice as research practices were not as

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Speaker 1: uh maybe carefully monitored as they are now, and so

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Speaker 1: a lot of there there were studies where the common

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Speaker 1: traits of children's pretend companions were tabulated, but data were

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Speaker 1: not gathered in any sort of standardized way. So we

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Speaker 1: have stories of kids who had imaginary friends and and

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Speaker 1: you know, attributed personalities to objects. But but nothing nothing

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Speaker 1: that we can really get percentages from, right, And there's

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Speaker 1: also as a result of a wide range of analysis

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Speaker 1: regarding imaginary friends. For instance, um and early psychologist Lewis

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Speaker 1: Terman thought that um, imaginary friends were common among gifted children.

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Speaker 1: It was a good thing. Yeah, But then we have

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Speaker 1: sociologists Charles Cooley, who was a turn of the century

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Speaker 1: academic who thought that imaginary friends were evidence of the

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Speaker 1: need for socializing. Right, so yeah, coolie was saying, like,

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Speaker 1: clearly humans need to socialize, even if it is with

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Speaker 1: an imaginary entity. And how sad for you, but it's

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Speaker 1: not a real person. Um And and let's let's we

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Speaker 1: can't leave out we can't talk about children in psychology

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Speaker 1: without mentioning g Stanley Hall, Grandvill Grandville Stanley Hall. It's

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Speaker 1: kind of a jerky hurt my feelings. And that Only

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Speaker 1: Child podcast for saying that I'm a misfit. Yeah, he

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Speaker 1: had a disease. Was the developmental psychologist responsible really for

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Speaker 1: starting the whole lonely only child stereotype, And not surprisingly

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Speaker 1: he was not a big fan of imaginary friends. No,

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Speaker 1: he considered pretend companions in terms of the child's withdrawal

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Speaker 1: of attention from outside stimuli to focus instead on the

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Speaker 1: internal processes that maintain the personality of this pretend being.

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Speaker 1: So the child was, you know, wasting time. They're not

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Speaker 1: focusing on fun things like playing outside. There they've turned

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Speaker 1: all of their attention inward and you you probably should

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Speaker 1: fix that. Uh. And then there is the idea, um

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Speaker 1: that pretend companions are a way of children negotiating between

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Speaker 1: reality and fantasy. And this was put forth at the

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Speaker 1: turn of the the century, um by Naomi Nor's Worthy in

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Speaker 1: Theodore Theodora Whitley um. And they said, quote, it's usually

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Speaker 1: a lonely child. There it goes again, a lonely child

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Speaker 1: that developed these play companions, and they'll become more real

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Speaker 1: to him than his living playmates. There's a little air

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Speaker 1: of like stranger danger, and that where the imaginary friend, right. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And they they used these imaginary friends as an example

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Speaker 1: of how children might not be able to differentiate really

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Speaker 1: between reality and pretense the way adults can. You know,

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Speaker 1: they use this as evidence of like, well, obviously adults

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Speaker 1: are mature, we've had life experience, we've learned a lot

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Speaker 1: um we know when something is fake and pretend or

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Speaker 1: whether it's real, And they just assume that children couldn't

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Speaker 1: And they say that this whole practice of developing a

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Speaker 1: an imaginary friend results in losing all of the quote

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Speaker 1: given take that comes with living children. So they're worried

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Speaker 1: about kids who have imaginary friends, especially if the imaginary

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Speaker 1: companion is at the expense of having real, live, warm

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Speaker 1: blooded friends. But a lot of those early theories are

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Speaker 1: so contradictory because on the one hand, they see imaginary

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Speaker 1: friends as a sign that a child is you know,

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Speaker 1: needs more socialization with actual children, but having the imaginary

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Speaker 1: friend will only impede them from ever being able to

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Speaker 1: socialize with kids, because they'll only be able to talk

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Speaker 1: to the you know tiger, the imaginary tiger standing next

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Speaker 1: to them. I know, you just can't get rid of

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Speaker 1: that imaginary tiger. Nuffle up against that. It's been following

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Speaker 1: me around for years. Um. One idea that's persisted into

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Speaker 1: modern research is from Gene PG who regarded conversations children's

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Speaker 1: conversations with pretend companions as retaining vestiges of self talk.

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Speaker 1: So the kid is moving from you know, just talking

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Speaker 1: to him or herself in in sort of a play way,

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Speaker 1: and like using nonsense words to developing a narrative and

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Speaker 1: being able to converse and actually speaking socially and so

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Speaker 1: having conversations with other people. So so he said that

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Speaker 1: it's it's more of a development process and similar to

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Speaker 1: UH that idea of imaginary friends is a way to

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Speaker 1: negotiate between fantasy and reality. UM. Other child psychologists have

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Speaker 1: thought that children would use pretend companions to cope with

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Speaker 1: internal and external demands, kind of how they early ways

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Speaker 1: to negotiate with their own psychological development. A lot of

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Speaker 1: times you'll you'll see UM imaginary companions termed as coping

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Speaker 1: mechanisms for kids. Right in the nineteen thirties, UM research

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Speaker 1: really starts to shift away from theory to actual empiricism,

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Speaker 1: and Margaret Spenson's seminal nineteen thirty four study is one

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Speaker 1: that gets talked about a lot with child psychology and

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Speaker 1: imaginary friends. She basically established an operational definition that we

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Speaker 1: think of today when we talk about imaginary friends. And

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Speaker 1: she looked at a group of forty Chicago school children

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Speaker 1: and found that imaginary companions appeared at the median age

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Speaker 1: of two years fifteen months, and we're three times as

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Speaker 1: often appearing to girls then boys, which okay, these things

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Speaker 1: sound normal and non offensive. But then she said in

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Speaker 1: her in the abstract that I read about her study,

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Speaker 1: says that personality difficulties were present and most of the

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Speaker 1: children timidity being most common. You know, people, why you

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Speaker 1: gotta be a hater. So basically, Margaret Svenson is the

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Speaker 1: g Stanley Hall of the the imaginary friend. I don't

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Speaker 1: know if she's so hostile, she's not quite as to pick.

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Speaker 1: I know, once you hurt my feelings, it's hard to

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Speaker 1: come back from that. And Sinson is also responsive bowl

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Speaker 1: for establishing kind of the go to definition of what

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Speaker 1: an imaginary companion is. And we should note that she

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Speaker 1: did not wouldn't categorize something like an anthropomorphized stuffed animal, um,

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Speaker 1: like a our, an actual object that kids might endow

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Speaker 1: with human personalities. Um. But this is her, This is

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Speaker 1: her go to for imaginary friends. She says that they

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Speaker 1: are an invisible character named and referred to in conversations

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Speaker 1: with other people or played with directly for a period

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Speaker 1: of time at least several months, having an air of

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Speaker 1: reality for the child, but no apparent objective basis and um,

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Speaker 1: and it's still kind of you know, the benchmark. Yeah. Well,

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Speaker 1: I think what's interesting also is that there's just this

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Speaker 1: giant lull where nobody really cares about children's imaginary friends

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Speaker 1: anymore as far as research goes, because Sencon was publishing

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Speaker 1: in the thirties and then major interest in research in

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Speaker 1: this topic didn't re emerge until the eighties. And some

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Speaker 1: of the stuff I read was saying, you know that

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Speaker 1: maybe that has something to do with what researchers were

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Speaker 1: actually interested in as far as how children's minds worked

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Speaker 1: and how children fit into our society and everything. Um.

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Speaker 1: And now a lot of times imaginary friends are seen

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Speaker 1: as a vivid merging point between fantasy and reality. That

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Speaker 1: it's not a bad thing that these kids are have

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Speaker 1: such vivid imaginations and can you see these characters? Um,

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Speaker 1: But that it's actually it's a good thing, and that

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Speaker 1: they're actually good benefits, good benefits. It's incredibly redundant, there

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Speaker 1: are benefits of having imaginary friends, right, And according to

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Speaker 1: depending on what study you read, I'll just say a

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Speaker 1: lot of kids have imaginary friends. Um. Some some articles

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Speaker 1: I read said it was sixty percent. Some have said half.

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Speaker 1: But you have to also take into account what are

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Speaker 1: they counting as an imaginary friend? And are they counting

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Speaker 1: you know, your blankie or your stuff tiger that you

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Speaker 1: put a personality on as a personified object or are

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Speaker 1: they just counting the imaginary guy that's over in the

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Speaker 1: corner right I was. I was reading all of this

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Speaker 1: stuff on imaginary friends. I was going into it thinking, well,

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Speaker 1: I never had an imaginary friend. I didn't have hobbs um.

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Speaker 1: But I did realize though, that my puffle lump named Ducky,

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Speaker 1: who was one of my best friends. I took her everywhere. Um.

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Speaker 1: She she kind of fit all of the criteria as

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Speaker 1: an imaginary companion. We spent a lot of time together.

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Speaker 1: What kind of personality did she have? She rocked? She

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Speaker 1: was really easy going, like to have a good time.

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Speaker 1: And I also would give her flying powder so that

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Speaker 1: she could fly around. Was that kool aid? Umassi sticks?

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Speaker 1: It magical? It was lipped an iced tea. Actually was

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Speaker 1: not expecting that. I know we're your parents mad that

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Speaker 1: you were taking the iced tea. No, no, I think

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Speaker 1: I've probably snuck it. So I'd give Ducky this a

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Speaker 1: little sip of tea, and by ducky, I do mean

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Speaker 1: I would drink it myself because I loved tea, and

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Speaker 1: and we would go on flying adventures so fun. No,

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Speaker 1: my blankie did not take me on any flying adventures.

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Speaker 1: I I went into this, into this thinking the same thing.

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Speaker 1: I was like, I didn't have an imagine a friend. Actually,

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Speaker 1: I remember being in my parents room watching TV and

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Speaker 1: thinking like, wow, kids my age, I feel like it's

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Speaker 1: really calm because I I obviously talked like that when

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Speaker 1: that was however old. You know, kids today really seem

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Speaker 1: to think these imaginary friends are pretty cool. I'm imagining

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Speaker 1: a little Caroline maring a monocle holding up a bubble pipe. Um.

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Speaker 1: I was like, you know, I'm kind of bored, boredom

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Speaker 1: child alone, you know, left alone watching TV and I'm

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Speaker 1: an only child, you know whatever, seeking stimulation. I'm like,

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Speaker 1: let's see what this is all about. So I remember

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Speaker 1: hopping down off the bed and getting on the floor,

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Speaker 1: off legged, and and looking into the blank space across

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Speaker 1: from me and being like, okay, let's go come on, imagination.

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Speaker 1: No one is here, and this is I'm gonna watch Nickelodeons.

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Speaker 1: Make me a friend. Brain. But I did, but I

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Speaker 1: did have a blankie that I that that had quite

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Speaker 1: a nurturing and maternal um personality. So what does what

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Speaker 1: does that kind of fantasy play that we engaged in

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Speaker 1: like so many other children, mean, Caroline, Well, it just

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Speaker 1: could it could be anything. I mean, it could really

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Speaker 1: I mean not to not to totally cop out here,

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Speaker 1: but it could just be a child playing. It could

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Speaker 1: be a coping mechanism. Like you said, Um, it's just

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Speaker 1: it's not uncommon. Really, it's normal. It is normal, and Um.

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Speaker 1: The stereotype that imaginary friends are linked to shyness or

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Speaker 1: maladjustment has been pretty thoroughly debunked. UM The I eighteen ninety,

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Speaker 1: a little bit dated but stills book called The House

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Speaker 1: of Make Believe by Dorothy G. Singer from Yale and

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Speaker 1: Jerome Singer, who is now a Professor emeritus of psychology,

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Speaker 1: UM said that kids who are choosing to create imaginary

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Speaker 1: friends tend to be more sociable and have more friends

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Speaker 1: than the only children, and it might possibly be because

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Speaker 1: they have better communication skills. Certain research suggests could be

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Speaker 1: because they've spent all that time talking in a thin

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Speaker 1: air and and they've had to come up with both

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Speaker 1: sides of the conversation. So they're they're used to maybe

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Speaker 1: thinking of possibly what the other person would be thinking.

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Speaker 1: You know, because not all um imaginary friends are Ducky

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Speaker 1: or Blankie, you know, they're some of them. Kids actually

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Speaker 1: argue with their imaginary friends. Yeah, there was. I was

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Speaker 1: reading in Marjorie Taylor's book Imaginary Companions and the Children

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Speaker 1: Who Create Them, which is fascinating, if only for the

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Speaker 1: interviews with kids about their imaginary companions and the I

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Speaker 1: mean the elaborate descriptions these six and seven year old

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Speaker 1: children will offer to researchers is incredible. One of my favorites,

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Speaker 1: of which UM was a girl who was really into dolphins.

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Speaker 1: She loved dolphins, and so her parents gave her a

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Speaker 1: stuffed dolphin, and um she named the dolphin Dipper. But

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Speaker 1: if you ask her to describe Dipper, she would tell

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Speaker 1: you that he was the size of a door and

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Speaker 1: covered in sparkles and stripes, and lived on a star

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Speaker 1: just as any Lisa frank Ranther would and lived in

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Speaker 1: a trapper keeper. But it was great. There was a

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Speaker 1: There was also Cucumber Boy. Yeah, Cucumber Boy was offered

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Speaker 1: up as an example in this breakdown of who has

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Speaker 1: what type of imaginary friend, and according to research by

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Speaker 1: Gabriel Trianfi and Elaine Reese Um, imaginary companion play, like

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Speaker 1: we said, is more common in first point born children

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Speaker 1: and in girls, boys are more likely to impersonate a character,

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Speaker 1: which is interesting. But their breakdown, UH, of kids they

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Speaker 1: studied had one imaginary companion, had too, and a very

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Speaker 1: large chunk had three or more imaginary friends. And I

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Speaker 1: really like the breakdown of what those friends were. Half

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Speaker 1: of the companions, a full half were identified as people

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Speaker 1: some type of person hanging out another kid or whatever.

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Speaker 1: Fourteen percent were identified as animals. Twenty five percent were

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Speaker 1: identified as fantasy beings such as cucumber boy. And there

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Speaker 1: is no more details. Yeah, that was the only there's

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Speaker 1: no explanation, just like cucumber boy, just like cucumber And

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Speaker 1: I'm like, well, of course, cucumber boy. I what I

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Speaker 1: need something more than that. I need a chapter on

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Speaker 1: cucumber boy. And then eleven percent the identity was unclear

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Speaker 1: of the imaginary friend. Marjorie Taylor Uh notes so one

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Speaker 1: point a case with a child who had an ongoing

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Speaker 1: and she says, rather stormy relationship with a chest of

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Speaker 1: drawers in his bedroom. I have never heard of anything

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Speaker 1: like that. And I mean that's I don't know that

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Speaker 1: would necessarily be categorized as an imaginary friend, well, but

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Speaker 1: definitely a personified object much Blankie or Deckie and um.

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Speaker 1: And she also says, uh that in I think it's

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Speaker 1: of kids with imaginary friends have said that they will

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Speaker 1: get angry with their imaginary companions at times and even

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Speaker 1: have arguments with them. Right. Um. The New York University

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Speaker 1: Child Study Center tells parents not to worry. Um, if

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Speaker 1: your kid is has an imaginary friend, it's not nothing

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Speaker 1: to worry about. And if your kid does not have

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Speaker 1: an imaginary friend, don't worry. It's not that they're going

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Speaker 1: to be stupid or not be able to pass their

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Speaker 1: verbal s a t section, um, but that you should

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Speaker 1: just let it happen, you know, and embrace that that

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Speaker 1: fantasy play. Right. So if they are arguing with their dresser,

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Speaker 1: it's not it's not necessarily that you're being too strict

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Speaker 1: of a disciplinarian, or they're watching mommy and daddy fight

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Speaker 1: and so they're fighting with a dresser. It's more just

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Speaker 1: that your kid is developing. There's this little person, and

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Speaker 1: they're getting used to the world and they're getting used

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Speaker 1: to new ideas, and so it's just their way. Like

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Speaker 1: we said, it's a coping mechanism. So they're learning how

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Speaker 1: to what you know, what does discipline mean? How do

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Speaker 1: I interact with other things? Furniture? It seems like for

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Speaker 1: for parents at least what Marjorie Taylor writes about her

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Speaker 1: own experience with her daughter who would have imaginary friends.

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Speaker 1: She said, the hardest thing about it was sometimes if

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Speaker 1: if they kind of can't turn turn the imaginary friend off,

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Speaker 1: especially if they She's saying that she went to a

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Speaker 1: dinner party or something and her daughter saw a dog

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Speaker 1: at the person's house and immediately just became a dog

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Speaker 1: for the night and that was it. And we if

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Speaker 1: she would ask her, you know, like, are you done

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Speaker 1: with your dinner? Like she just she would not respond

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Speaker 1: in in in people people speak, I'd rather just have

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Speaker 1: a dog. Um. Well, it could depend on your birth order, yes, Um.

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Speaker 1: Birth order and imaginary companion status both both uniquely predicted

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Speaker 1: children's narrative skill later in life. So it's interesting. I mean,

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of switching gears here. It's interesting because you know,

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Speaker 1: we've talked about only children and firstborns, how they're perfectionists.

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Speaker 1: There's a lot of pressure on them, both internally and

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Speaker 1: from their parents to really perform well. But these kids

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Speaker 1: who are talking to imaginary friends have been practicing their

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Speaker 1: narrative skills and you know, figuring out what this imaginary

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Speaker 1: other person is thinking. Um, so that's a good predictive

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Speaker 1: of narrative skills. But so is birth order. And like

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Speaker 1: I've said, firstborns didn't have more imaginary friends than other

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Speaker 1: people other kids, So that's that's a good sign for

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Speaker 1: your s A T scores And it's interesting because tire

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Speaker 1: it's actually both of these are higher for kids whose

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Speaker 1: mothers knew about the the imaginary friend, because they're assuming

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Speaker 1: that if the mother knows about the friend. This isn't

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Speaker 1: a study from New Zealand. Um that it means that

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Speaker 1: there's been some interaction that the kid has told the

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Speaker 1: mother about the imaginary friends, so there's been some conversation

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Speaker 1: about it, whereas kids whose imaginary friends were kept hidden,

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Speaker 1: maybe there wasn't any conversation about what is this person thinking.

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Speaker 1: Because if you have an imaginary thing that the parent

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Speaker 1: doesn't know about, it has to be completely explained. So

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Speaker 1: this kid has to come up with an entire narrative

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Speaker 1: and personality on their own. Dippie the dolphin that lives

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Speaker 1: on a star on a star incredible. Um. Well, in

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Speaker 1: regard to status and imaginary friends, there was one notable

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Speaker 1: gender difference, and this is coming out of the research

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Speaker 1: from Gabriel Trione Fee and Elaine Reef. And apparently girls

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Speaker 1: tend to create imaginary friends of lower of a lower status.

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Speaker 1: A lot of times they'll be slower, or they'll be

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Speaker 1: kind of dumpy um and and the girls will sometimes

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Speaker 1: pick on on their lower status imaginary friends or to

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Speaker 1: use them, uh to kind of get away with things

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Speaker 1: like oh sorry, I you know, I'm late for breakfast

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Speaker 1: because Trudy couldn't get her shoes on fast enough. Whereas

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Speaker 1: boys tend to create imaginary friends of equal status kind

398
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Speaker 1: of they like to have someone to pal around with more, okay,

399
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Speaker 1: but boys are less likely to create imaginary friends. So

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Speaker 1: I don't I don't know what what does it all mean?

401
00:24:33,200 --> 00:24:35,439
Speaker 1: Why are we Why are we creating people to pick on?

402
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Speaker 1: Are we practicing for high school? What's going on? Well?

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Speaker 1: In two thousand five, uh Slate published an article kind

404
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Speaker 1: of looking at all of these different studies on imaginary friends,

405
00:24:46,600 --> 00:24:51,680
Speaker 1: because it really has been analyzed up down, sideways and diagonal,

406
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Speaker 1: and the writer suggests that, hey, you know what, maybe

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Speaker 1: maybe they're just playing yeah, And that's Slate article also

408
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Speaker 1: mentions your friend Marjorie Taylor, who's two thousand five study

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Speaker 1: with Stephanie Carlson found that kids are slightly more likely

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Speaker 1: to have imaginary friends later. So whereas earlier we talked

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Speaker 1: about a study uh Spenson study that found imaginary friends

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Speaker 1: came out around two years fifteen months, this one says

413
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Speaker 1: that of six and seven year old say they have

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Speaker 1: imaginary companions compared with twenty eight percent of preschoolers. And

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Speaker 1: it makes sense that, you know, six and seven year

416
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Speaker 1: olds would be most common among that age group, because

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Speaker 1: that's really when you know, I'm starting to go to school,

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Speaker 1: You're really starting to form your Yeah, there's a lot

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Speaker 1: of new stuff coming your way, and it probably would

420
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Speaker 1: help to have a friend or a ducky or a

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Speaker 1: blankie or barbies. I was all about barbies, and I

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Speaker 1: you know, I kind of have to be like, all right, look,

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Speaker 1: I had a pretty good verbal score on my s

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Speaker 1: A T I've played barbies all the time, and I

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Speaker 1: was creating a narrative. I had the horsh for goodness sakes,

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Speaker 1: So I mean I was creating all sorts of storylines

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Speaker 1: with Ken take a long romantic drives down the wood

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00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:12,440
Speaker 1: and in their their wind up jeep be it pink

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00:26:12,560 --> 00:26:15,720
Speaker 1: or red. So the original question that I had in

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00:26:15,760 --> 00:26:18,400
Speaker 1: my head when we were going over the only Children

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00:26:18,840 --> 00:26:22,199
Speaker 1: research and I started thinking about only friends or imaginary friends,

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00:26:22,560 --> 00:26:24,439
Speaker 1: was where do they come from? And the answer is

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00:26:24,520 --> 00:26:27,399
Speaker 1: they just come from kids brains and it's a normal

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00:26:27,440 --> 00:26:32,520
Speaker 1: and healthy part of child development that has been scrutinized

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00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:37,280
Speaker 1: now for or century, which is incredible. But if you

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00:26:37,280 --> 00:26:39,200
Speaker 1: you know, if your child has an imaginary friend, or

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00:26:39,200 --> 00:26:42,200
Speaker 1: if you had an imaginary friend, it's it's a good thing.

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00:26:42,280 --> 00:26:45,200
Speaker 1: It sounds like now if you still have an imaginary friend,

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00:26:45,600 --> 00:26:47,960
Speaker 1: that could be that could be some sort of psychotic

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00:26:48,000 --> 00:26:50,360
Speaker 1: break with reality. That would be probably a pretty intense

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00:26:50,440 --> 00:26:53,600
Speaker 1: kind of coping mechanism, right, And if you, if you do,

442
00:26:53,720 --> 00:26:55,960
Speaker 1: please tell us we can hear about it. Yeah, I

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00:26:56,680 --> 00:26:59,359
Speaker 1: would love to hear from people who have the just

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00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:03,800
Speaker 1: toetill imaginary friend, like no, not a personified object um

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00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:08,480
Speaker 1: and the real stories. Let us know about your imaginary friends.

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00:27:08,880 --> 00:27:12,359
Speaker 1: I can't wait to hear about all of them. And

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00:27:12,520 --> 00:27:14,600
Speaker 1: if you anyone out there had a cucumber boy, oh

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00:27:14,600 --> 00:27:15,919
Speaker 1: my god, I want to know what it is. Is

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00:27:15,960 --> 00:27:18,480
Speaker 1: it the Veggie Tales thing? Do you think or do

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00:27:18,480 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 1: you think this kid came up with cucumber point. He's like,

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00:27:20,840 --> 00:27:22,760
Speaker 1: he saw his mom chopping a cucumber and he's like,

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00:27:23,720 --> 00:27:26,480
Speaker 1: I mean the yeah. Just the interviews with children about

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00:27:26,480 --> 00:27:30,320
Speaker 1: their imaginary friends are so are so incredible that it

454
00:27:30,760 --> 00:27:35,240
Speaker 1: could be just someone, you know, picking up a cucumber boy. Yeah,

455
00:27:35,640 --> 00:27:38,359
Speaker 1: So let us know mom stuff and how stuff works.

456
00:27:38,520 --> 00:27:45,159
Speaker 1: Dot com is the place to write. Meantime, we've got

457
00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:48,040
Speaker 1: a couple of emails to read. This is from Elizabeth

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00:27:48,080 --> 00:27:51,200
Speaker 1: in regard to our sex said to Parter, and she writes,

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00:27:51,240 --> 00:27:55,000
Speaker 1: I had a strict Christian upbringing, including a private Christian school,

460
00:27:55,200 --> 00:27:58,360
Speaker 1: sex said did not exist for me at all. She says,

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00:27:58,400 --> 00:28:01,560
Speaker 1: one thing I would like to discuss are that chastity contracts.

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00:28:01,920 --> 00:28:05,480
Speaker 1: Simply put, I hate them in my experience. Christianity definitely

463
00:28:05,520 --> 00:28:09,560
Speaker 1: stamps any sexual related activity before marriage as bad. We

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00:28:09,640 --> 00:28:12,480
Speaker 1: are told to flee al temptation and avoid anything that

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00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:17,000
Speaker 1: could potentially bring us bring this bad thing into our lives.

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00:28:17,320 --> 00:28:19,359
Speaker 1: It could have been rather easy for me to sign

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00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:22,160
Speaker 1: a contract to remain chase when I was thirteen years old,

468
00:28:22,440 --> 00:28:25,280
Speaker 1: because while I very much liked boys, I didn't know

469
00:28:25,640 --> 00:28:28,560
Speaker 1: what chastity included, or that sex at the right age

470
00:28:28,600 --> 00:28:30,920
Speaker 1: and with the right person could actually be a great thing.

471
00:28:31,280 --> 00:28:34,160
Speaker 1: I guess I find these contracts to be so damaging

472
00:28:34,200 --> 00:28:37,399
Speaker 1: because if anyone who has signed one does engage in sex,

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00:28:37,480 --> 00:28:40,440
Speaker 1: the shame that comes with breaking that contract could psychologically

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00:28:40,480 --> 00:28:43,360
Speaker 1: sour their sex lives and sexual identity for a very

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00:28:43,400 --> 00:28:47,240
Speaker 1: long time. So that's a that's an interesting take on

476
00:28:48,200 --> 00:28:51,520
Speaker 1: sex and the church. Okay, this is an email from

477
00:28:51,600 --> 00:28:56,240
Speaker 1: Jenny who she says, I'm currently eighteen and live in Canada.

478
00:28:56,440 --> 00:28:59,960
Speaker 1: My last sex side classes when I was sixteen Grade eleven,

479
00:29:00,360 --> 00:29:02,320
Speaker 1: I would say in the majority of public schools in

480
00:29:02,360 --> 00:29:06,560
Speaker 1: Canada were taught comprehensive sex education. I found our sex

481
00:29:06,600 --> 00:29:09,000
Speaker 1: said class pretty helpful because I've never been that comfortable

482
00:29:09,040 --> 00:29:12,120
Speaker 1: discussing sex with my parents. Our class has provided a

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00:29:12,120 --> 00:29:15,200
Speaker 1: lot of information about contraceptives, which is great information to

484
00:29:15,280 --> 00:29:17,080
Speaker 1: have because I am so much more aware of my

485
00:29:17,200 --> 00:29:21,120
Speaker 1: options now. Unfortunately, I would say, the one class in

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00:29:21,160 --> 00:29:25,120
Speaker 1: which we discussed abstinence wasn't particularly effective. No one really

487
00:29:25,160 --> 00:29:27,800
Speaker 1: took the class seriously, and I personally found the woman

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00:29:27,840 --> 00:29:31,240
Speaker 1: who taught the class to be fearmongering. I feel like

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00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:33,720
Speaker 1: abstinence classes need to be taught in a more positive

490
00:29:33,760 --> 00:29:36,000
Speaker 1: way instead of simply pushing all the terrible things that

491
00:29:36,040 --> 00:29:41,200
Speaker 1: can occur from sex. Good point, Jenny, excellent point, and again.

492
00:29:41,240 --> 00:29:43,720
Speaker 1: If you want to send us an email, Mom Stuff

493
00:29:43,760 --> 00:29:45,880
Speaker 1: at house stuff Works dot com is our email address,

494
00:29:46,000 --> 00:29:49,440
Speaker 1: or you can leave a comment over on Facebook, or

495
00:29:49,480 --> 00:29:52,760
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496
00:29:53,400 --> 00:29:57,520
Speaker 1: or you can write a common the bogs stuff Mom

497
00:29:57,600 --> 00:30:04,440
Speaker 1: Never told You at how stuff works dot com. Be

498
00:30:04,560 --> 00:30:07,200
Speaker 1: sure to check out our new video podcast, Stuff from

499
00:30:07,200 --> 00:30:10,040
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500
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501
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502
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