Friendships and Pretend Play Complexity in Preschool

• In Event: Poster Session 02
  In Poster Session: PS 02 Topic - Social Relationships

Abstract

Peer researchers have long understood that children play more complexly with friends than with other acquaintances (Howes, 1983). Preschoolers, for instance, are more likely to pretend with friends than classmates who are not friends and their pretense is richer and longer with friends (Werebe & Baudonniere, 1991). Friends and pretend play may have similar benefits to preschoolers’ early social development. Pretend play that is more advanced cognitively and socially was associated with greater social skills in preschoolers (Li et al., 2016). Friends in preschool may unwittingly help their friends and other classmates develop social skills by encouraging and enriching their pretense. The purpose of this study was to examine how friendship status of peers was related to their social and abstract pretend play.
Thirty children (19 boys) participated in this research and the average age was 3 years old (ranged from 2 years 3 months to 3 years 11 months) at the beginning of preschool. This observational study used mixed-methods to analyze anecdotal records of children’s social play. Researchers summarized play episodes by observing groups of peers playing and noted themes of pretend play, props used and social interactions in 5 minute periods. In this study, 139 group episodes of play were collected. All anecdotes were reliably coded for whether pretend was absent, concrete (based on object or environment) or abstract (purely imaginative), and the social level of the play (parallel with peers playing next to each other or social with a common goal). Friends were determined by frequent playmate in independent play observations, teacher surveys and sociometric interviews. Each play episode was classified by friendship status of the peers playing (friends only, mixed, nonfriends only). Twenty six percent of the play episodes were composed of friends only, 30% were mixed, and 43% were composed of nonfriends only.
Friendship status of the group was shown to relate to the social level (X2 (2, N = 139) = 6.44, p < .05) and complexity of pretend play (X2 (4, N = 139) =11.07, p < .01). Groups with friends present (mixed or friends only) were more likely to have a common goal or engage in true social play than nonfriends. Abstract pretend play was the most common form of play with friends only and mixed groups and concrete pretend play was most common in the nonfriend only groups. Groups with friends were able to persist in pretend play and follow each other’s suggestions to change to more abstract themes whether they played only with friends or with friends and nonfriends. This may be because friends communicated better and had more mutual positive emotion and were able to extend these positive exchanges to classmates who were not their friends. The benefits of friendship to play complexity seem to extend to other classmates who are not friends during play with mixed groups. Preschool teachers should encourage friendships as well as pretend play to promote complex cognitive and social play for the whole class.

Authors

• Anne M Sebanc, Whittier College
  Presenting Author

• Jesse Eccles, Whittier College
  Non-Presenting Author

• Isabel Segura, Whittier College
  Non-Presenting Author

• Miranda Yzabal, Whittier College
  Non-Presenting Author

• Ciara Madigan, Whittier College
  Non-Presenting Author