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PaperclipPerfector  10mo ago (text post)   2586 thread views

Friday Fun Thread for June 23, 2023

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Fun article I found: East Asians rarely have imaginary friends as children, whereas Westerners have imaginary friends at a prevalence of 50%. On the other hand, East Asians are more likely to personify inanimate objects. The authors say that this is for cultural reasons, but i’m actually leaning toward deep genetic differences in tendency — Western religion, poetry, and music are much more likely to extol brotherly affection than those of East Asia, which (imo) favors an emphasis on place, natural objects, and strict hierarchy.

I’ll join the chorus of commenters who are extremely skeptical of the 50% claim. For what it’s worth, I had a “special blanket” that I semi-personified and emotionally imprinted on, to the point that I was totally distraught when my parents eventually had to throw it away because it was falling apart. I’m as warmly-inclined toward HBD explanations as many other people here are, but this particular claim does not seem to resemble my personal experience whatsoever.

The concept was culturally salient enough for Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends to be a cartoon people could understand the premise of (an orphanage for imaginary friends once children stop believing in them). I had one, but I've never mentioned it to anyone I know, because who the hell cares about a non-existent character I talked to from ages 3-6(?)

TheMotte is probably going to be self-selecting for the cohort least likely to have an imaginary friend, in a similar way that 19th century scientists self-selected for those who did not typically visualize with the mind’s eye (see Scott’s essay on that, whose title I forgot). A hyper-rationalist offshoot is probably genetically influenced to be less social, or at least not so social that their mind creates for themselves imaginary companions. How many of our parents were hyper-social butterflies who conceived of the world in primarily social relational experiences?

https://dacemirror.sci-hub.ru/journal-article/d377cfd09d86cd27a6b469d4af9998be/klausen2007.pdf?download=true

Metaphysical explanations for pretend companions are not at all limited to the wast because, to some extent, they have existed even in recent times. Studying pretend companions in the early 20th century, Harvey (1918) found that many parents provided spiritual explanations for pretend companions. Even at the end of the century, some groups within America still described pretend companions in terms of possession and as preternatural powers that sometimes "will result in spiritual bondage" (Anderson, Vanderhook, & Vanderhook, 1996, p. 196) or that need to be exorcized (Allison, 2000). Perspectives on pretend companions from before the Euro-American repudiation of metaphysical explanations may also be inferred from research conducted in villages of Northern India (Barker & Pasricha, 1979): Pretend identities, a phenomenon similar to pretend companions in which an imagined personality is assumed rather than projected by the child, were explained in terms of spiritual connections with previous lives. Research in India on pretend companions suggests another reason why few reports of pretend companions have survived from previous centuries. Mills (2003) reported that there is no recognition of the concept of pretend companions in India.

Even when allowing for the belief that some children have interactive memories of past lives, the prevalence of pretend companions was calculated to be only 0.2% (Barker & Pasricha, 1979).

Early research in 1930s reported a 13% prevalence: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1935-01508-001 . 1969 reports 30%: https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1970-02218-001 . We also have a study from 1930s (Harriman) alleging one-third of all children have imaginary friends

So I’d say that there are three possibilities:

  • The first is that this is learned from media (very unlikely given that the earliest research shows a prevalence despite its absence from media)

  • the second is that it is culturally transmitted and children are “practicing” the skills in the form of play, because Western culture was more friendship-oriented than other cultures, and permitted children to play

  • the third is that Europeans are genetically oriented to be more social in the form of fraternal bonding. This would fall in line with what we know about European history, religion, art, dance, and music culture. There’s also the prevalence of blue eyes in Europeans, which is found only in domesticated animals [goats, dogs, some foxes], and blonde hair, which is found in the more social and friendly dog breeds [compare: “golden retriever boyfriend”].

My mom did an absolute cop-out and told me that the mailman had taken my "blankie" away, so from ages 3-6 I was absolutely hostile to the postal service.

My replacement was a platypus (search for folkmanis folktails platypus for the specific one) which I semi-personified and was more fully personified by my dad in freeform bedtime stories.

50% sounds odd. I grew up in America and never heard of a child with an imaginary friend. Did anyone on this board have an imaginary friend? I suspect imaginary friends are double-imaginary in the sense that the friend does not even exist in the child's imagination--rather they are imagining that they have an imaginary friend and are pleased that the adults are playing along.

I had one. It's hard to say how much I believed in it. Do four year olds really believe in anything other than the omnipotence and omniscience of their parents, and their own worthiness of infinite candy? I suspect it was just a form of pretend, much like the time I spent insisting I was a dinosaur. I don't know when it stopped, but I would bet starting school was near the tail end of it.

I grew up in Canada, did not have an imaginary friend, and have not heard of anyone I know having an imaginary friend.

I have never heard an Indian child claim to have imaginary friends.

If I had to guess, I'd say it's a socially contagious phenomenon largely unique to the US.

Growing up in Soviet space, I don't remember anybody ever talking about imaginary friends. I mean, there were stories and games that would probably be classified as "imaginary friend" type by a US person, but nobody thought about it that way really. I think you're right, it's a Western - and likely American - thing.

Growing up in Soviet space, I didn't have imaginary friends, but my younger cousin had a whole imaginary family. I, however, have my internal monologue structured as an internal lecture, so I kinda have an imaginary audience of one.

Oh man, I knew I should have read the whole thread before replying to problem's echopraxia review. I do something similar, although it's more a conversation than a lecture and multiple mes participate - although when I was young they weren't other mes they were facsimiles of (mostly adult) family and acquaintances. But I knew they weren't real, I called them the dream version (dream mum, dream dad, dream Mr Harrison and so on.)

My little brother had an imaginary friend though, and we were pretty certain he imagined him as opposed to just pretending to imagine him. My other brother and I tested it, and when he believed his imaginary friend had done something his behaviour was sincere and completely different to how he behaved when he was lying about not doing something. I remember once he used two towels after a bath - his own and my other brother's - and insisted his imaginary friend had used the second, and he broke down crying when we didn't believe him.

That's different, I don't think talking to one self counts. I do it a lot, but I don't imagine a whole separate person for this.

my younger cousin had a whole imaginary family

People invented imaginary older brothers and uncles, which will come and kick the opponent's ass (or buy them expensive things, or tell them secrets that nobody else knows), all the time. But I don't think it is the same thing.

Is it just me or does 50% sound outrageously high? I never had an imaginary friend, and have never met anyone who had an imaginary friend (if it matters, I'm a white Californian who grew up in the 90s). I and a few kids I knew went through the motions of "creating" one because TV and childrens books were so adamant that they were normal that we felt weird not having one, but I can't recall a single instance where a child I was interacting with seemed to genuinely believe in an imaginary friend. Am I being too restrictive in my definition of "had an imaginary friend?" Or was I just an unusually uncreative child surrounded by other unusually uncreative children?

I forced myself to pretend I had an imaginary friend because I thought everyone else did. It was always a lame and worthless concept IMO.

I remember seeing mentions of it in literature and such and I always thought it was just kids playing pretend.

Then I read about a paper that claimed when kids with such were stuck in a NMR reported talking to their imaginary friends, it looks like they're having auditory hallucinations.

Which surprised me.

I had several imaginary friends when I was little, but I never thought of that as being an unusual position. I'm not sure how much media I was consuming when I was 3-4, but I certainly wasn't talking to people about what society thought was normal for me at that age.

I had an imaginary friend as a kid, but don't really talk about it after the age of maybe 12.

I have also only ever encountered the concept of an imaginary friend in fiction and would have been weirded out as a kid if I ever met someone who truly believed they had one. Perhaps it was a brief fad in the mid-20th century that happened to coincide with a greater interest in child psychology research at that time.

I'd guess it is more that changes in the way children were raised eliminated the need for it, or something along those lines rather than it being a "fad". Two people who were kids in the 90s say they didn't. I was a kid in the late 70s/early 80s and had one. I'm not sure the ages of the other people who had or didn't have one but it could point to a generational difference.

Late 70s early 80s for me too!

Yeah, I'm confused about imaginary friends. Grew up in the Southwest US in the 90s, and never had an imaginary friend, nor knew anyone who ever talked about having one as far as I can remember. The main thing that comes up for me is the character in Inside Out.

Are imaginary friends a sign of lonliness?

I wanted to say it sounds like a distinctly American thing, because I only ever heard about on TV, but you have a point and it might be not even that, but a distinctly American TV thing.

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