Fernyhough Charles, Bland Kirsten, Meins Elizabeth, Coltheart Max
Department of Psychology, Durham University, UK.
J Child Psychol Psychiatry. 2007 Nov;48(11):1094-101. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2007.01789.x.
Previous research has reported a link between imaginary companions (ICs) in middle childhood and the perception of verbal material in ambiguous auditory stimuli. These findings have been interpreted in terms of commonalities in the cognitive processes underlying children's engagement with ICs and adults' reporting of imaginary verbal experiences such as auditory verbal hallucinations. The aim of the present study was to examine these relations using improved methodology and a younger sample of children for whom engagement with ICs would be expected to be particularly salient.
Data on young children's (age range: 4-8 years) reporting of ICs were gathered in two studies (total N = 80). Responses to ambiguous auditory stimuli were investigated using the new Jumbled Speech task, which measures participants' likelihood of perceiving words in meaningless but speech-like auditory stimuli.
Reporting hearing words in the Jumbled Speech task was associated with having a parentally corroborated IC. Hearing words on the task and having an IC were unrelated to age, gender, verbal ability, and understanding of the stream of consciousness.
Findings are consistent with the hypothesis that engaging with ICs is one aspect of a general susceptibility to imaginary verbal experiences. We consider the implications for the assumption of continuity in psychopathological experiences between childhood and adulthood.
先前的研究报告了童年中期的想象同伴（IC）与对模糊听觉刺激中言语材料的感知之间的联系。这些发现已根据儿童与IC互动以及成人报告想象的言语体验（如幻听）背后的认知过程的共性进行了解释。本研究的目的是使用改进的方法和更年幼的儿童样本（预计他们与IC的互动会特别显著）来检验这些关系。
在两项研究中收集了幼儿（年龄范围：4至8岁）关于IC的报告数据（总样本量N = 80）。使用新的“混乱言语任务”研究对模糊听觉刺激的反应，该任务测量参与者在无意义但类似言语的听觉刺激中感知单词的可能性。
在“混乱言语任务”中报告听到单词与有得到父母证实的IC相关。在该任务中听到单词以及有IC与年龄、性别、语言能力和对意识流的理解无关。
研究结果与以下假设一致，即与IC互动是对想象言语体验普遍易感性的一个方面。我们考虑了这对童年和成年期心理病理体验连续性假设的影响。
