Imaginary Friends, Stimming, and Other Things You Were Told to Worry About
Published May 12, 2026
Several common autistic behaviours — imaginary friends, stimming, special interests, repetitive play — are often flagged as concerning. Most aren't. A guide to what these behaviours actually mean.
Imaginary Friends, Stimming, and Other Things You Were Told to Worry About
A pattern many autism parents experience: a teacher, relative, or therapist points out a behaviour as "concerning" — and you spend two weeks worried until you realize it's actually fine. Some autistic behaviours look unusual to people unfamiliar with autism but are normal, healthy, or even beneficial.
Imaginary friends
Many autistic children develop imaginary friends — vividly, with personalities, voices, preferences.
What research and lived experience show: - Autistic children with imaginary friends tend to have better social skills than autistic children without them. - Imaginary friends are a form of pretend play, which is often delayed in autistic children. When it emerges, it's a positive developmental sign. - An autistic child who says "this is my friend Sam who only I can see" understands Sam isn't visible to others — they're playing.
For most childhood imaginary friends in autistic children: enjoy the creativity, ask about the friend, let it be.
Stimming
Self-stimulatory behaviour — flapping, rocking, spinning, finger movements, vocalizations, repeated phrases. Stimming is one of the most defining and most misunderstood autistic behaviours.
What stimming actually does: - Regulates the nervous system. Stimming releases stress, manages sensory overload. - Expresses emotion. Many autistic children flap when excited, rock when stressed. - Aids focus. - Provides sensory input the body is seeking.
Most autism advocates and current best practice: don't suppress stimming unless it's causing harm.
Acceptable stimming: hand flapping, rocking, jumping, spinning, repeated noises, repeated phrases.
Stimming that needs intervention: - Self-injurious behaviour — head banging hard enough to hurt, biting through skin. Replace with safer alternatives meeting the same sensory need. - Behaviours that genuinely interfere with daily life. - Behaviours causing real social harm at school — but the goal is usually to add a discrete alternative, not eliminate.
A common older approach was "quiet hands" — training children to stop visible stims. Most of the autism community now considers this harmful.
Special interests
A child who knows everything about trains, dinosaurs, vacuum cleaners, weather systems, and talks about it constantly.
What it actually is: a special interest — a deep, intense engagement with a topic that is one of the most rewarding parts of being autistic.
Special interests: - Are often a strength, not a problem. Many autistic adults build careers around early special interests. - Provide regulation and joy. - Can be a connection point with peers who share the interest. - Develop skills — vocabulary, research, memory, attention.
The work is to: - Use them as motivators for skills the child needs. - Build social connection around them when possible. - Manage social expectations so the child learns when peers are tired of the topic.
Lining up toys, sorting, repetitive play
What it actually is: - A form of play, with sensory and visual rewards. - An organizational and pattern-finding cognitive activity. - Often a precursor to more elaborate play. - Calming and regulating.
If the child does this alongside other types of play and interaction, leave it alone.
Echolalia
Repeating phrases — from videos, family members, books — sometimes immediately, sometimes hours or days later.
What it actually is: a major step in language development for many autistic children.
The work isn't to suppress echolalia. It's to: - Listen for the meaning behind the phrases. - Map the phrases to situations and feelings. - Build from gestalts — many autistic children begin breaking phrases apart and recombining as language develops.
A speech-language pathologist trained in gestalt language processing can help.
Repetitive questioning
A child who asks the same question 100 times.
What's often actually happening: - The child has anxiety about the answer. - The child needs the certainty more than they need the answer. - The phrasing is a verbal stim — saying the words is calming.
Strategies that help: - Visual schedules the child can look at instead of asking. - A "answer once" plan — answer the question, write the answer down, point to the written answer when asked again. - Reduce uncertainty proactively.
Lack of eye contact
What's actually true: - Eye contact is physically uncomfortable for many autistic people. - Many autistic individuals listen and engage better when not looking at the speaker. - Forced eye contact is harmful — it reduces information processing, increases anxiety, and trains masking.
Current best practice: don't force eye contact. For social skills coaching with older children, teach "looking near the face" as an alternative.
"Inappropriate" laughter or smiling
What's often happening: - Difficulty modulating expression to match social expectation. - Anxiety presenting as laughter. - Stimming-like response — laughter and smiling can be self-regulating.
Most autistic individuals have empathy, sometimes intensely. They struggle to express it conventionally.
Walking on toes
Most young autistic children outgrow toe-walking. For most, no specific intervention is needed.
When to address: - Persistent toe-walking past age 6–7, especially with tight Achilles tendons. - Pain or balance issues.
Rocking, pacing, repetitive movements
It's not concerning unless it interferes with eating/sleeping/learning, causes physical injury, or is a sudden change from previous patterns.
What every parent eventually learns
- Most "weird" behaviours your autistic child does are not problems.
- The instinct to fix them is sometimes coming from concern about how others will perceive them.
- The autism community — including autistic adults talking about their childhoods — is a useful corrective.
- Suppressing autistic behaviours teaches your child to mask. Masking has long-term mental health costs.
- A child who is allowed to be themselves builds a stronger foundation than a child taught to perform neurotypicality.
Your child's stims, special interests, repetitive play, and unique expressions are not problems to manage. They're who they are.