School of Psychological Science, Tel Aviv University, 69978, Tel Aviv, Israel.
Child Psychiatry Hum Dev. 2013 Feb;44(1):186-99. doi: 10.1007/s10578-012-0318-x.
Nighttime fears are very common in preschool years. During these years, children's fantasy-reality differentiation undergoes significant development. Our study was aimed at exploring the links between nighttime fears and fantasy-reality differentiation in preschool children. Eighty children (aged: 4-6 years) suffering from severe nighttime fears were compared with 32 non-fearful controls. Fears were assessed using child and parental reports. Children viewed images depicting fantastic or real entities and situations, and were asked to report whether these were imaginary or could occur in real life. The results revealed that children with nighttime fears demonstrated more fantasy-reality confusion compared to their controls. These differences in fantasy-reality differentiation were more pronounced in younger children. Additional significant associations were found between fantasy-reality differentiation and age and specific characteristics of the stimuli. These preliminary findings, suggesting a developmental delay in fantasy-reality differentiation in children with nighttime fears, have significant theoretical and clinical implications.
夜间恐惧在学龄前儿童中非常常见。在这个年龄段，儿童的幻想与现实的区分正在经历显著的发展。我们的研究旨在探索学龄前儿童夜间恐惧与幻想与现实区分之间的联系。我们比较了 80 名（年龄：4-6 岁）患有严重夜间恐惧的儿童和 32 名无恐惧的对照组。通过儿童和父母的报告来评估恐惧。儿童观看了描绘奇幻或真实实体和情境的图像，并被要求报告这些是虚构的还是可能在现实生活中发生的。结果表明，与对照组相比，患有夜间恐惧的儿童表现出更多的幻想与现实混淆。这种幻想与现实的区分差异在年幼的儿童中更为明显。还发现了幻想与现实的区分与年龄以及刺激的特定特征之间存在显著的关联。这些初步发现表明，患有夜间恐惧的儿童在幻想与现实的区分上存在发展延迟，具有重要的理论和临床意义。
