Is Santa real? Examining children's beliefs in cultural figures and
'non-real' people

Date:
June 17, 2020
Source:
PLOS
Summary:
Young children understand dinosaurs and The Wiggles are (or
were!) real, and that fictional characters like Peter Pan and
Spongebob are not real - - but cultural figures like Santa or
the Tooth Fairy occupy an ambiguous place in a child's pantheon,
a new study suggests.



FULL STORY ========================================================================== Young children understand dinosaurs and The Wiggles are (or were!) real,
and that fictional characters like Peter Pan and Spongebob are not real --
but cultural figures like Santa or the Tooth Fairy occupy an ambiguous
place in a child's pantheon, suggests a study published June 17, 2020 in
the open-access journal PLOS ONE by Rohan Kapita'ny from Keele University,
and colleagues.


========================================================================== Children as young as three are capable of understanding the difference
between "real" and "non-real." However, there's little research into how children evaluate different types of non-real people or figures relative
to one another, as well as in comparison to real people.

In order to better understand children's beliefs, Kapita'ny and colleagues asked 176 Australian children two to eleven years old to rate how real
they considered thirteen different figures (ranging from real people
like The Wiggles to more ambiguous figures like Santa Claus, ghosts, and dinosaurs, as well as fictional characters like Spongebob Squarepants and Princess Elsa) using a zero (not at all real) to eight (extremely real)
point Likert scale.

The authors hypothesized that their results might show a hierarchy
between real and unreal, with some unreal figures perceived as more
real by children depending on indirect evidence or cultural rituals at
play -- like setting out milk and cookies for Santa that have "vanished"
by Christmas morning. For comparison, they also assessed 56 adults.

The data suggested the majority of children conceptualized the thirteen
figures into four groups, based on score endorsements: ranked most highly
as "real" were figures like dinosaurs and The Wiggles (with a score of 7 points); the next-highest score went to cultural figures like Santa and
the Tooth Fairy (6 points), followed by ambiguous figures like aliens,
dragons, and ghosts (4 points) and fictional characters like Peter Pan, Spongebob, and Elsa (4 points). In comparison, adults (and older children,
from seven years up) tended to group figures into three groups: real,
not-real, and ambiguous (ghosts and aliens).

Although this study is limited in that there was no standard definition
of "real" provided to the participants (which may have had an impact in
cases where children might have "met" figures in costume -- for instance, approximately 40 percent of the surveyed children said they'd seen Santa
in real life, the same proportion who said they'd seen The Wiggles in
real life), the relatively high belief in cultural figures among younger children remains notable. The authors plan future work to understand how
ritual participation and other factors lead children to understand what
is real (or not real) in their world, particularly when children might
have no direct relevant experience.

The authors add: "What we show is that children tend to have a nuanced understanding of reality, moreso than many expect, and we show it across a 'pantheon' of figures who naturally vary in their degree of 'reality' and cultural support. We argue that rituals are a particularly potent signal
for kids when it comes to accepting things like Santa Claus as real."

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by PLOS. Note: Content may be edited
for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Rohan Kapita'ny, Nicole Nelson, Emily R. R. Burdett, Thalia
R. Goldstein.

The child's pantheon: Children's hierarchical belief structure in
real and non-real figures. PLOS ONE, 2020; 15 (6): e0234142 DOI:
10.1371/ journal.pone.0234142 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/06/200617150036.htm

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