Fantasy-Reality Confusion a Primary Cause of Childhood Nighttime Fears

From monsters under the bed to bogeymen in the closet, most children experience nighttime fears at some point in their development. And while most grow out of them without any professional intervention, others contend with persistent and extended periods of these fears, with a risk of developing anxiety problems later in life.

As part of a large-scale project on nighttime fears funded by the Israeli Science Foundation, Prof. Avi Sadeh of Tel Aviv University’s School of Psychological Sciences is exploring how these fears fit into the normal developmental process — and when they become a problem. Together with Dr. Jonathan Kushnir, who completed his Ph.D. studies in the field in Prof. Sadeh’s lab, MA student Tamar Zisenwine, and Ph.D. student Michal Kaplan, he discovered that a child’s ability to differentiate fact from fiction has a huge impact on overcoming terror of things that go bump in the night.

In their study, published in Child Psychiatry and Human Development, the researchers found that preschoolers with persistent nighttime fears were far less able to distinguish reality from fantasy compared to their peers. The research will help clinicians and parents alike to develop interventions that can better soothe fretful children, he says, noting that a strong imagination can ultimately be used to the child’s psychological advantage.