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Imaginative processes in children are not particularly imaginative

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  18 November 2022

Deena Skolnick Weisberg Open the ORCID record for Deena Skolnick Weisberg [Opens in a new window]  and
David M. Sobel
Deena Skolnick Weisberg
Affiliation:
Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, Villanova University, Tolentine Hall, Villanova, PA 19085, USAdeena.weisberg@villanova.edustarlabkids.org
David M. Sobel
Affiliation:
Department of Cognitive, Linguistic, and Psychological Sciences, Brown University, Providence, RI 02912, USAdave_sobel@brown.edu; causalityandmindlab.wordpress.com
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Abstract

The authors argue that children prefer fictions with imaginary worlds. But evidence from the developmental literature challenges this claim. Children's choices of stories and story events show that they often prefer realism. Further, work on the imagination's relation to counterfactual reasoning suggests that an attraction to unrealistic fiction would undermine the imagination's role in helping children understand reality.

Type
Open Peer Commentary
Information
Behavioral and Brain Sciences , Volume 45 , 2022 , e303
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Copyright
Copyright © The Author(s), 2022. Published by Cambridge University Press

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