Most children love to pretend - a chair becomes a train, giants live in the sandcastle and dressing-up clothes transform their world. Imaginings can become very real and, as a result, it is often difficult to tell whether a child is telling the truth or not.
Take the case of Michael. Aged three-and-a-half, he makes little distinction between fact and fiction. His love of storybooks appears to have fuelled his imagination, leaving him with no apparent idea of what is real and what is fantasy.
Michael's tales about playschool have sometimes left his mother unsure what to believe. On one occasion, she arrived with jam tarts for a party, only to discover that there was no party. On another, she asked playschool staff what time the policeman would be coming to talk to the children, only to find the policeman existed only in Michael's imagination.
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