Poster #25 - Assessing Imagination in Preschool: The Development and Validation of the Child Imagination Scale

• In Event: 3-106 - Poster Session 11
  In Poster Session: PS 11 Section - Cognitive Processes

Integrative Statement

Background: Previous research has documented both cognitive and socio-emotional benefits associated with pretend-play (e.g., Black, 1992; Carlson et al., 2014; Gilpin et al., 2015; Thibodeau et al., 2016). Through this work, we have learned that children differ with respect to how they incorporate fantastical elements into their play, leading to the use of the term fantasy orientation (FO) in children’s play literature. FO refers to a child’s proclivity towards highly imaginative play involving fantastical components (e.g., fairies, dragons; Taylor, 1999) and is associated with numerous developmental outcomes (e.g., Gilpin et al., 2015; Pierucci et al., 2014). However, there is little support for the validity and reliability of existing FO measures, which are often confounded by many factors such as a child’s recent experiences (e.g., how recently they have watched certain movies or read certain books). The purpose of the present study was to address the psychometric shortcomings of current FO measures by validating the Child Imagination Scale (CIS), a more robust, sensitive, and comprehensive measure of a child’s tendency to engage in various styles of play (i.e., fantastical, representational, or realistic).

Method: Preschoolers (N=114, 3-6 years old) were tested on two occasions separated by at least two weeks. During each testing session, children completed the CIS in addition to a battery of 4 existing measures of FO. Unlike many current FO measures that require children to freely respond to questions such as “what is your favorite game,” each of the 30 CIS items gave children a choice between three generic activities that varied in the degree of fantasy involved. For example, children were asked “what would you rather play with more?” and given a choice between a magic wand (fantastical choice – 2 points), a teddy bear (representational choice – 1 point), or marbles (realistic choice – 0 points). Pictures were included for each item to orient a child’s attention to the question being asked and allow for nonverbal responding. Parents also reported on each child’s imaginative tendencies.

Results: Preliminary results support the reliability and construct validity of the CIS. The CIS demonstrated high internal consistency (alpha=.87 averaged across all time points), especially in comparison to existing FO measures (average alpha=.65, alpha range=.34-.79). In addition, we found reasonable stability in CIS scores across testing administrations (r=.74, p<.00; ICC=.74 based on an absolute-agreement, 2-way random-effects model; Koo & Li, 2016). Finally, evidence of convergent validity was demonstrated by significant correlations between the CIS and parent reports of their child’s imaginative behaviors on the Child Imagination Questionnaire (alpha=.89; r=.40, p<.05; Gilpin et al., 2017) as well as parent reports of their child’s FO (r=.47, p=.01; Gilpin, 2009). See Tables 1 and 2.

Implications: The aforementioned data support the CIS as a stable and reliable measure of FO in early childhood. Given the improved psychometric properties of the CIS over existing FO measures, the introduction of the CIS into children’s play literature will provide much needed psychometric support to future studies on imagination, thus increasing the validity of the work in this field.

Authors

• Rachel Thibodeau, University of Missouri
  Presenting Author

• Danielle Turley, University of Missouri
  Non-Presenting Author