A study examined the role of audience in preservice mathematics education students' writing experiences. Subjects, students in two mathematics education classes taught by the same teacher, completed writing assignments explaining the principles of mathematics to elementary school pupils. Students in one class wrote to actual students, serving as pen pals and math mentors, while students in the other class wrote to imaginary students. Subjects completed questionnaires at the beginning and end of the semester on their writing attitudes and their attitudes about the writing assignment. Selected students from the top, middle, and bottom of each class were interviewed. Preliminary results indicated that: (1) at the end of the semester, students in both classes felt more creative, witty, energetic, and enthusiastic while writing and less rushed, angry, frustrated, and stupid; (2) the decline in anger and the increase in energy were sharper in the group that wrote to real students than the group that wrote to the imaginary students; (3) students characterized their previous experience of college writing in general negatively; (4) for some students, the reader-writer relationship was characterized by a pretense of objectivity covering the reality of partiality; and (5) students who wrote to real pupils expressed different emotions than those expressed by students who wrote to imaginary pupils. Findings suggest that it is wise to vary the real audiences for whom students write. (RS)