"Imaginary Friend"

Many children from an early age have an imaginary friend with whom tend to hold long dialogues, this friend is cause for concern for many parents who end up seeking specialist help, but the truth is that psychological positions on this phenomenon is quite dichotomous. Thus, we can find specialists who claim that imaginary friends are a harmless fruit of imagination and creativity in children while there are other professionals who scare parents with an alleged and so-called "childhood psychosis." How much truth and uncertain in these different positions?

The imaginary friend is a quite common phenomenon (65% of American children under 7 years at some point in its short life has had an imaginary friend) but still not known with certainty why it appears this fellow personality .
In La Trobe University in Melbourne, surveyed 330 college students in order to determine whether they had an imaginary friend in childhood. Results? Students who had an imaginary company showed better communication skills and were more empathic and creative than the rest of his teammates. In addition, also showed a tendency to lean professionally for art and poetry.
Similarly, in collaboration with the University of Manchester, investigated 44 children aged three to six years, half of whom had imaginary friends. It was found that the latter had a richer vocabulary and were more creative than the rest of his teammates.
Why? It appears to be in charge of the two parts of the communication facilitates the development of communication skills, not only because it expands the vocabulary of small but also because it helps them to move off and understand reality from another's perspective, achieving greater development in the cognitive domain. On the other hand, imaginary friends help children to express their feelings and sometimes act in a cathartic, decreasing any aggressive or violent behavior.
However, in rare cases, the appearance of an imaginary friend can be considered a small attempt to satisfy their emotional deprivation. At other times (usually when the child starts school) imaginary friend appears as a scapegoat to shield serves to explain behaviors that are rejected in the family. Then it is necessary that parents and educators are aware as this fantasy figure has emerged to express any difficulties, lack or trauma that is showing the child.
However, beyond the pathologizing, the imaginary friend is often common in children who are constantly surrounded by young adults or those more sensitive to show great imagination and fantasy. A recent study developed in Hermosillo, Mexico, says that children who spend more time watching television are also more likely to create imaginary friends.
How old were away this friend? Usually the imaginary companion vanishes when the child begins to socialize on an ongoing basis with other children, usually when you start school, around six years. But ... Beware! this is a generalization that is ready to collapse because researchers at the University of Oregon and Washington, say that far from disappearing imaginary friends become more important. It appears that 31% of the surveyed children between 6 and 7 years had invisible friends while this phenomenon was evident only in 28% of preschoolers. Do these changes in age of onset of imaginary friend is due to greater scientific depth in the phenomenon or are variations on the peculiarities Etara due to cultural factors? It is an issue that undoubtedly will give way to future research.

In general, we can summarize that, while for psychoanalysis and cognitivism imaginary friends are an expression of immaturity or signs of an incipient neurosis, the new generation of psychologists reinforces the benefits of this phenomenon: the ability to experience empathy, switch points of view, try new sequences of dialogues, situations change, revise interpretations, speculate, get in the other's perspective ... However, any generalization in this area can lead astray, each person is a world unto itself, so the appearance of an imaginary friend may also have dissimilar causes and consequences.