Children clearly have a reasonably sophisticated understanding of what is real and what is pretend  Once they have acquired a command of language, we can ask them which is which, and they generally get it right  Even a much younger child who runs away when she sees her father roaring and prowling like a lion does not act as though she thinks her father is actually a lion  If she believed that, she would be terrified
The pleasure children get from make-believe would be impossible to explain if they could not distinguish the real from the pretend
The pleasure children get from make-believe would be impossible to explain if they could not distinguish between what is real and what is pretend.