A few weeks back I listed a poll in regards to toddlers and if they had imaginary friends.  The majority (at the time of this writing) have said no.  Here’s the poll:  Go ahead and add to it if you like.

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Here’s our story.  One day driving home from picking up lil boo, I looked in the rear view mirror (as I always do to carry on a conversation with him) and noticed him talking to someone/something next to him.  He was pointing his fingers, shaking his head and being very expressive with his communication methods but almost in a silent sort of way.  I didn’t think very much of it and just let it pass by.  A few weeks had gone by and bingo, here he was again in an all out ’silent’ conversation.  I asked the mrs. about this when she got home and she mentioned that she had see the same sort of behavior from lil boo as well.  Then one day I asked lil boo who he was talking to, and he gave me some sort of odd look like I had a third eye on my head.  Perhaps I had a pimple who knows.  He responded, o-note.  I asked, is o-note your friend.  Yes, daddy he’s my friend.  That’s when I posted the poll to hopefully find out more.

Well it has been a few weeks since then and o-note made a sudden appearance out of the blue.  I was in utter amazement, because lil boo came running down the hallway yelling o-note daddy, o-note daddy come see!!  What could this be about?  Off on our mission we went to find o-note in our bedroom.  Lil boo pointed that o-note was in the lamp, then in the closet and then over by the shades.  OMG! o-note is part of a triplet clan of imaginary whosiewhats!  Then lil boo offered me o-note, pinched in-between his thumb and index finger, here you go daddy, here’s o-note.  There I am, with that *huh* dumbfounded look on my face, well alrighty then, thank you lil boo.  That was the end of that….

Off to do some research on ‘imaginary friends’:

Patricia Henderson Shimm, parent educator and author

Don’t worry, your toddler is not only normal, she’s also very creative. Her burgeoning imagination fuels this wonderful fictitious creation, someone who accompanies her as she explores the world. Firstborns often have imaginary friends, as do very bright kids. It’s one way children learn to make distinctions between good and bad. For example, your child may blame her friend for any misdeeds, saying “Jane” made her spill the milk or pull her books off the shelves. If she passes the buck, take her explanation at face value and help her clean up, but gently remind her of the rules of the house. Try not to make a big deal about it when she mentions her buddy. That means neither contradicting her (“Oh, come on, stop pretending!”) or grilling her about it, nor expanding on it by pretending to meet or talk to her invisible pal. There’s no reason to make her feel funny about talking to someone who doesn’t exist, but if you go all out and incorporate her friend into your world, then you’ll likely have her pal hanging around for a long time. In the meantime, let her enjoy the company of her friend; she’ll soon grow out of this common childhood phase. BabyCenter

I also found this interesting study:

Imagination is alive and thriving in the minds of America’s school-age children.It is so prevalent that 65 percent of children report that, by the age of 7, they have had an imaginary companion at some point in their lives, according to a new study by University of Washington and University of Oregon psychologists.

The research also indicates that having an imaginary companion is at least as common among school-age children as it is among preschoolers. Thirty-one percent of the school-age youngsters were playing with an imaginary companion when they were asked about such activity, compared with 28 percent of preschoolers.

“This finding is fascinating in that it goes against so many theories of middle childhood, such as those proposed by Sigmund Freud and Jean Piaget. Having an imaginary companion is normal for school-age children,” said Stephanie Carlson, a UW assistant psychology professor.

Marjorie Taylor, a psychology professor at the University of Oregon, and Carlson are the lead authors of the study published in the current issue of the journal Developmental Psychology.

Having an imaginary companion appears to be an ongoing and changing process because a child doesn’t necessarily play with the same imaginary companion throughout childhood. Carlson said some children reported having multiple and serial imaginary companions. The number of imaginary companions described by children ranged from one to 13 different entities.

“It is somewhat of a revolving door. Children are nimble in coming up with these imaginary companions and sometimes we have a hard time keeping up with all of the ones a child has,” she said.

The researchers originally recruited 152 preschoolers, ages 3 and 4, and their parents several years ago. Each child and parents were interviewed separately about imaginary companions. The researchers also collected data on the children’s verbal ability and gave them a series of standardized tasks to assess development, or what psychologists call theory of mind. Three years later, 100 of those children (50 girls and 50 boys) and their parents volunteered for the newly published study. The children and their parents again were interviewed separately about imaginary companions. Parents also filled out a questionnaire about their child’s personality and the children took a series of standardized tasks that measured social understanding.

Children were considered to have imaginary companions if they said they had one and provided a description of it. If the companion was a doll or stuffed animal, children also had to include psychological details (such as “She is nice to me”) for it to be considered an imaginary friend.

Imaginary companions described by the children came in a fantastic variety of guises, including invisible boys and girls, a squirrel, a panther, a dog, a seven-inch-tall elephant and a “100-year-old” GI Joe doll. While 52 percent of the imaginary companions that preschoolers played with were based on props such as special toys, 67 percent of those created by school-age children were invisible, according to Carlson.

The study also showed that:

• While preschool girls were more likely to have an imaginary companion, by age 7 boys were just as likely as girls to have one.
• 27 percent of the children described an imaginary friend that their parents did not know about.
• 57 percent of the imaginary companions of school-age youngsters were humans and 41 percent were animals. One companion was a human capable of transforming herself into any animal the child wanted.
• Not all imaginary companions are friendly. A number were quite uncontrollable and some were a nuisance.

The researchers also were curious to know why children stop playing with imaginary friends.

“Imaginary companions are treated by children much in the same way as when they lose interest in toys or other activities,” said Carlson. “In many cases they simply go away, or children don’t remember. Other times children replace an old imaginary companion with a new one, or they go on to friendships with real kids to meet some of the same needs.”

The researchers also looked at childhood impersonation — pretending to be an imaginary character — and found it to be almost universal. Virtually all preschoolers pretended to be an animal or another person and 95 percent of the school-age children engaged in impersonation. The researchers did not look at impersonation in the same detail as they did imaginary companions, and were surprised that so many school-age children continued to engage in the activity. One tantalizing finding was that school-age children who did little or no impersonation scored low on emotional understanding of other people, according to Carlson.

She said that fantasy — interacting with imaginary friends and impersonation — plays a role in child development, both cognitively and emotionally. This kind of activity allows children to manage social situations in a safe context, such as practicing how to handle conflict with something that may or may not talk back to them. Cognitively it helps them deal with abstract symbols and thought, which leads them to abstract thought about their own identity.

“Imaginary companions have had a bad rap from psychologists for a long time, and there was the perception that parents were getting the message that having an imaginary companion wasn’t healthy,” she said. “But this study shows that nearly two-thirds of children have them and the striking fact is that children of all personality styles have imaginary companions.”

The University of Oregon funded the research. Co-authors of the study are former University of Oregon students Bayta Maring, Lynn Gerow and Carolyn Charley.

I am not to worried about lil boo and his imaginary friend o-note, heck o-note might just have his/her (non gender at this point) own segment on Peas and Bananas in the future.  In the meantime there have been no signs of damage or life threaten injuries caused by o-note or lil boo.