The Four Types of Play of Roger Caillois

From Competition to Chance, From Mimicry to Vertigo

by Bruce Lerro / March 29th, 2023

Orientation

What is play? What are its types and its psychological impacts?

In what way is play different from other human activities? In what ways is play different across the life cycle, from childhood to adolescence to adulthood?  Do people ever stop playing? How many kinds of play are there? What is the difference in the psychological states between playing in a baseball game, playing with crossword puzzles, entering the lottery, watching a puppet show, or rolling down a hill? A child riding on a carousel in not in the same state as one who is in a state of suspenseful anticipation after betting, then watching the roulette wheel. We will find out what these differences are.

What is the relationship between society and play?

Authors such as Johan Huizinga go so far as to say that all social organization – from economics to politics to law and technology – are derived from play. Others say that the forms of play are driven by changes in human societies. For example, games of chance are primary in hunting and gathering societies because the hunt itself is a very unpredictable activity. As the food supply becomes more stable, games where the outcome is more controlled will grow greater as humans feel more stable in their economic life. So the question is – what is primary and what is secondary? The basic themes of sociology of play are that social institutions such as economics, politics and family institutions as derivable from play, just as play can be explained by economics, politics and family structures. Evolutionary biologists don’t buy the value of play. They claim that play is a useless activity in terms of Darwinian natural selection.

Why write about a book that is 90 years old?

Over 20 years ago, I became interested in environmental psychology and discovered there was a whole field in sociology called “leisure studies”. One of the main topics covered was theories of play. Besides the famous book by Johan Huizinga, I came across the work of Roger Caillois and his extremely original theory of play. I was riveted! I found his book Man, Play and Games and devoured it in about a week. However, I had no immediate use for the book either in books I was writing or classes I was teaching. I wrote a five-page summary of the book and left it at that. But I never forgot the book. I remembered it for its interdisciplinary intellectual orientation and its range in writing about every type of play. Caillois’ book was written over 90 years ago, so you are not going to find anything here about the positive and negative impact of Dungeons and Dragons on people’s psychology. Neither will you find the impact of video games on people’s level of happiness. However, despite its age, I believe it still has an enormous amount to teach us. In fact, I’ve come to feel that Roger Caillois’ book is broader and deeper than Huizinga’s famous book Homo Ludens: A Study of the Play-element in Culture.

Roger Caillois was an interdisciplinary French sociologist whose range of interests besides play include sacred studies(Man and the Sacred), cults, literature, mythology, poetry, and psychoanalysis. He hovered on the edge of the surrealist movement according to the book The Edge of Surrealism, edited by Claudine Frank, and he corresponded with Andre Breton, considered by some as the father of surrealism.

Theories of Play: Huizinga vs Caillois

Roger Caillois begins his insightful and imaginative book Man, Play and Games by challenging John Huizinga’s theory of play. Huizinga’s theory of play contains six components. Play is:

• Free – that is not serious
• It is absorbing
• It is non-material—that is not for profit
• It is separated from everyday life (done in its own place and time)
• According to fixed rules and an orderly procedure
• Done in secret

Caillois takes exception to some of these points. For example, he pointed out that some games are part of everyday life and are not done in secret as in sports or games of chance. Huizinga is not sensitive to the wide range in the spectrum of play. George Herbert Mead makes a distinction between structured forms of play, which he calls “the game”, and what Mead calls “pretend play”. Huizinga’s claim that play occurs according to fixed rules ignores pretend play which is far more imaginative. If rules exist in pretend play they are made up along the way as in “Calvinball” from the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes. Lastly, modern games are played for profit as in sports stadiums and gambling houses. In short, Caillois claims Huizinga ignores or minimized the diverse form of play. Caillois’ book sets out to correct this.

Why do People Play?

Caillois claims that play has a natural propensity for good or evil. In both cases the same qualities can be identified:

• The need to prove one’s superiority
• The desire to challenge, make a record or merely overcome an obstacle
• The hope and the pursuit of finding out one’s destiny
• The pleasure in secrecy, make-believe or disguise
• Creating fear or inspiring fear
• The search for repetition and symmetry
• The joy of improvising, inventing or infinitely varying solutions
• Solving a mystery or riddle
• The satisfaction deriving from the arts involving contrivance
• The desire to test one’s strength, skill speed, endurance, equilibrium or ingenuity
• The temptation to circumvent rules, laws or conventions
• Intoxication, longing for ecstasy and a desire for voluptuous panic

Examples of How Play Evolved in History

Here are some examples of what play evolved from:

• The cup-and-ball and top were once magical devices
• Roundelays and counting-out rhymes were once ancient incantations
• Stagecraft, liturgy, military tactics and debate also became rules of play
• The greasy pole is related to the myths of heavenly conquest
• Football emerged from to the conflict over the solar globe of two opposing phratries
• String games had once been used to inaugurate the changing seasons
• The kite, before becoming a toy toward the end of the 18th century, in the Far East symbolized the soul of its owner
• In Korea, the kite served as a scapegoat to liberate a sinful community from evil
• Hopscotch once symbolized labyrinth through which the magical initiate must first wander
• The game of tag was once recognized as a terrifying choice of a propitiatory victim
• Games of chance were once associated with divination
• Villages, parishes and cities once had gigantic tops that special confraternities caused to spin during certain festivals
• Slingshots and peashooters have survived as toys where they were once the more lethal weapons

Naming the Four Types of Play and Their Two Fundamental Structures

Caillois divides play into four categories:

• Agon, which involves competition
• Alea which involve games of chance
• Mimicry which involves simulation
• Ilinx which involves the experience of vertigo

These four kinds of play can be grouped into two categories:

1. Paidia play is active, tumultuous, exuberant and spontaneous. This corresponds to mimicry and Ilinx and goes with Mead’s pretend play.
2. Ludus play is more restrained. It involves calculating, contrivances and requires patience and subordination to rules. Ludus play is translatable to Mead’s category of “games” and includes agon and alea.

Caillois’ hypothesis is that the basic themes of society should be traceable from the proportionate use of these four types of play. Read Table A with the four types of play together with Caillois’ and Mead’s structures of play.

Table A

Types of play	Agon Competition	Alea Chance	Mimicry Stimulation	Ilinx Vertigo
Caillois’ structures of play	Ludus	Ludus	Paidia	Paidia
Mead’s Structure of play	Game	Game	Pretend play	Pretend play

Details of the Four Kinds of Play        

Let us look in more detail into examples of each of the types of play along with the psychological states induced. Agon amusement involves competition. Agon play involves skills such as speed, endurance, physical strength, ingenuity and improvisation. The paidia example of play under agon would be wrestling or racing. This kind of play is unique to humans. The more organized type of agon, ludus play at the individual level would be doing cross-word puzzles, playing solitaire or flying a kite. Social expressions of more organized play would include sports such as boxing, football, chess, billiards, duels and tournaments. Competition involves skill. In chance games skills are minimized. In sports competition is based primarily on skill, if the outcome of a game was determined by chance, spectators would complain that the victor’s success was cheap.

The alea kind of play is the opposite of agon. It abolishes natural or acquired differences between people and leaves as much as possible to chance. Paidia forms of chance are counting out rhymes or playing heads or tails. Ludus types of chance games include playing the lottery or gambling at casinos. These activities are uniquely human and not found in the rest of the animal kingdom.

The third type of play, mimicry, involves simulation. In this a person forgets, disguises or temporarily sheds their personality into order to play a role. At the paidia level of mimicry we have masks, costumes, impersonation and games of illusion taking place. The ludus type of mimicry includes puppet shows, theatre, religious rituals, circuses, carnivals and movies. Masks spill over into non-playful situations as in the use of uniforms and in ceremonial etiquette or sympathetic magic. This type of play is also uniquely human.

The fourth type of play is called Ilinx. This type  of play is  primarily physiological. It destroys the stability of perception and imposes a kind of playful panic on the person. At the paidia level of Ilinx is where we find children whirling, swinging on monkey bars, sleigh riding and later on, horseback riding. These states often create a feeling of ecstasy. In the more ilinx forms of play are skiing, mountain climbing, tightrope walking and going on the rides at amusement parks or fair grounds. Mammals will also engage in experiencing vertigo, as anyone who has watched monkeys swing on ropes at the zoo can attest.  Table B at the end of this article summarizes the manifestation of play and their psychological effects.

However, are people constrained to keep these four types of play separate? Perhaps you might feel it is too simplistic to group the types of play into four separate categories. Maybe you think of play as involving more than one category. If so, which ones might work together and which combinations don’t work? We shall see.

Fundamental Types of Relationships Between Types of Play

Agon and ilinx

While a baseball game involves competition, the exuberance over a great catch to end a game or a homerun to win the game involves vertigo or Ilinx on the part of both players and fans. In fact, Caillois argues that certain forms of play constitute fundamental relationships with similar underlying principles. For example, games of chance and games of competition both presuppose absolute equality from the start. The pleasure derived from these games comes from one having done as well as possible in a situation not of their creation. There is satisfaction in overcoming voluntarily accepted obstacles. In this case, it is quite easy to see that playing this game prepares a person for real life.

Mimicry and ilinx

Another kind of fundamental relationship is between mimicry and vertigo or ilinx. Here there is equality but with less roles. There is constant improvisation and trusting in a guiding fantasy. A conjunction of a mask or an illusion is that perception is distorted and leading into a trance. The magic in tribal societies results from a combination of mimicry and ilinx to real social life.

Contingent Relationships Between Types of Play

Alea and vertigo

The second set of relationships as called contingent. Games producing vertigo and chance are contingent as games of chance have a special kind of vertigo which seizes both the lucky and unlikely.  However, this does not allow the suspension of the rules of the game.

Mimicry and agon

Mimicry and agon are also contingent in that every competition also involves playing a role, not only among the players but also by the audience. An audience in a competition act must make believe they are no longer in real life. They are in a theater suspending the rules of everyday life in order to enjoy the competition. Their make-believe is also an act of mimicry.

Forbidden Relationships Between Types of Play

Ilinx and agon

The last set of relationships are forbidden. I think Caillois overstates what this relationship means when it is called “forbidden”. All this means is that the types of play work at cross-purposes and undermine each other. I would say they “clash”. The first set is between ilinx and agon. The regulated rivalry of competition would be undermined if players abandoned themselves to vertigo in the middle of the competition. It would negate the controlled effort and undermine skill, power, calculation and respect for rules. So too, the thrill of vertigo would be ruined if the revelers were expected to come back from their revelry and focus on playing a specific role with specific rules of a game.

Mimicry and alea

The second set of forbidden relationships is between mimicry and chance. In order for a game of chance to maintain its coherence, there must be no ruses. To engage in this is to cease to be playing and to be engaging in sympathetic magic, the object of which is to compel the future. On the other hand, magic would be undermined by admitting that the results of mimicry were subject to chance. Magic is based on the notion that if you do the ritual right, nature will be compelled to respond to the ritual.

To summarize:

Fundamental relationships:

• Mimicry and ilinx
• Alea and agon

Contingent relationships:

• Ilinx and alea
• Mimicry and agon

Forbidden relationships:

• Ilinx and agon
• Mimicry and alea

Play and the Sacred

According to Caillois, many games have their roots in sacred traditions. For example,

masks were once sacred objects that were used in initiation ceremonies. Later they became accessories to ceremonies – as in dance and theater. Now they are playthings at parties for children and erotic balls for adults. With Christianity the design became elongated and simplified reproducing the layout of a basilica. In sacred situations, ilinx type of play is induced by fasting, vision quests, hypnosis, and monotonous or strident music. Games of chance were once associated with divination, as in the case of tarot cards.

In tribal societies, ilinx and mimicry were primary in both games and in sacred traditions inducing magical states of consciousness. With the rise of state civilizations, ilinx and mimicry become forbidden for the lower classes to practice. To the extent it was still used, it was the domain of the priestesses and priests. It was in forms of play that ilinx and mimicry continued for the lower classes.

Corruptions of Play

There is a distortion of play which Caillois calls corruption. All play is based upon the ability of the participants to separate play from reality and be clear where one ends and the other begins. Where play is corrupted, it blurs the relationship between play and reality. This is the realm where the habits of play become obsessions and compulsions. Each of the four types of play has its own form of corruption.

Corruption of agon and alea

Distortions of agon (competition) are wars and unbridled economic competition which becomes lethal or detrimental to most members of society. A corruption of the game of chance is the stock market, where life savings can be wiped out instantaneously with no one able to predict anything. In the spiritual dimension, card playing games of chance can be twisted into actually foretelling the future with the use of tarot cards.

Corruption of mimicry and ilinx

A distortion of mimicry and simulation are through psychological disorders such as multiple personality disorder. In multiple personality disorder, the roles of a game are not dissolved at the end of the game, but become permanent without a central personality to reign them in. In the case of schizophrenia, the masks of people are believed to be real and not temporary. Lastly, the corruptions of Ilinx are alcoholism and drug abuse such as speed which substitutes chemical power for physical effects as a way of life rather than a temporary state. 

Reification

I’ve added a category that I think fits but is not part of Caillois book. Play gets out of control not only through the corruption of fusing play with reality but when play becomes reified and takes on a life if its own. From an evolutionary point of view the purpose of play is to test the waters of a new situation under safe circumstances. Play is subordinated to reality. Reification occurs when the process of testing becomes a thing which takes on a life of its own. An example of the reification of agon is when fans get so caught up in rooting for the home team that they get into fights with opposing fans or when they lose sleep or become depressed over a team’s losses. The reification of alea is when games of chance cause the working class to lose most of their paychecks at the lottery. The reification of mimicry or simulation is the extent to which an actor or an actress becomes so caught up in the role that the role becomes their entire identity and they can’t function outside the role. Lastly, the reification of ilinx is when a person repeatedly puts themselves in dangerous situations through seeking sensations like race-car driving, skydiving or mountain climbing. You might review Table B again for an overview with examples from the entire article.

Table B

Play Classifications, Their Psychological Affects

Corruption, Reification

Types of Play	Agon Competition Hinges on skill—speed endurance, strength, memory, ingenuity	Alea Chance Abolishes natural or acquired differences	Mimicry/ Simulation Forgets, disguises or temporarily sheds personality in order to trick another	Ilinx Vertigo, thrills Destroys the stability of perception and inflicts a kind of playful panic
Range of species application	Uniquely human	Uniquely human	Uniquely human	Human and animal
Examples of Play	Wrestling/racing (not regulated)	Counting out rhymes; heads or tails	Masks, costumes, impersonation, games of illusion	Children whirling, horseback riding, swinging, racing downhill, sleigh riding ecstasy
Examples of Play- individual	Crossword puzzles, solitaire, kite flying
Examples of play- social	Sports Boxing, football chess, billiards, duels tournaments	Lotteries, casinos	Puppet shows, theatre, religious rituals, circuses, carnivals, movies	Skiing, mountain climbing, tightrope walking, amusement rides, amusement parks fairgrounds
Structures of play	Ludus Mead’s game	Ludus Mead’s game	Paidia Mead’s pretend play	Paidia Mead’s pretend play
Corruption (Clash) Blurring the boundaries between play and reality Habits become obsessions or compulsions Applies the rules of play to real life	Wars, unbridled economic competition	Playing the stock market   Cardplaying turned into Tarot	Multiple personality disorder Schizophrenia: believes the mask is real	Alcoholism, drug abuse (speed) Substituting chemical power for physical effects as a way of life
Reification	Sports fans who get carried away with team losses by fighting or depression	Losing a great deal of money at the lottery   being obsessed with “lucky” numbers	An actor or actress whose roles seems more real than their identity in everyday life	Putting oneself in needless danger with constant race-car driving, skydiving, mountain climbing

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Bruce Lerro has taught for 25 years as an adjunct college professor of psychology at Golden Gate University, Dominican University and Diablo Valley College in the San Francisco Bay Area. He has applied a Vygotskian socio-historical perspective to his three books found on Amazon. He is a co-founder, organizer and writer for Socialist Planning Beyond Capitalism. Read other articles by Bruce, or visit Bruce's website.

Parents underestimate the importance of guided play in education, finds US study

US parents are aware of importance of play, but need to learn about the power of playful learning

Peer-Reviewed Publication

FRONTIERS

Child psychologists have long known that play is essential for children’s cognitive development because it boosts their social, physical, and emotional skills. But beginning in the 21st century, specialists repeatedly sounded the alarm that ‘play is under siege’ for US children. Kids were playing less, and – it was feared – with a lesser quality.

But are today’s parents sufficiently aware of the importance of letting their children play? Yes, found a team of researchers who tested this through a survey of the opinions of 1,172 US parents. Their results showed that today’s parents understand how important play is for children’s well-being. However, they also showed that work needs to be done to educate parents about the value of playful learning (or ‘guided play’) for learning goals in reading and math.

“Here we show that US parents understand that play can be more powerful for learning than direct instruction,” says first author Charlotte Wright, a senior research associate at Temple University College of Liberal Arts, Philadelphia.

“Until recently, people generally considered play to be the opposite of work and learning. What we see in our study is that this separation no longer exists in the eyes of parents: a positive development.”

Parents rate free play the most

Parents were interviewed aged between 18 and 75, with children aged between two and 12. Parents were White (68.9%), Hispanic (14.4%), Black (10.3%), Asian (3.4%), mixed race (2.6%), or American Indian or Native Alaskan (0.4%). Household income ranged from less than $25,000 to more than $100,000. Their level of education ranged from lacking a high school diploma (4.4%) to having a postgraduate degree (11.9%)

The results showed that parents tended to rate free play as best for learning, followed by guided play, games, and direct instruction, respectively. This held true, both when these types of education were explicitly named, or when they were only implied in given scenarios.

The higher the parent’s level of education, and the higher their household income, the more they tended to rate free play as the most effective method for learning. Likewise, parents of girls were more likely to rate free play as most educational than parents of boys. In contrast, Black or Hispanic parents were more likely to rate direct instruction higher than forms of play.

An example of guided play

The current research consensus is that guided play is more effective than free play for children to learn skills such as mathematics, language and literacy, and the spatial awareness necessary for STEM skills.

Guided play, possible in the home and in the classroom, differs from free play in being initiated by the adult, while letting the child drive her learning towards a specific goal. For example, learning in Montessori classrooms and children’s museums is always initiated by an adult who reflects on learning goals. But children themselves drive the exploration within such guided learning environments – giving them choice and voice.

The authors gave an example scenario of guided play: “Raouf’s father, Ola, says to Raouf, ‘I wonder if we can build a tall tower with these blocks.’ Ola follows Raouf’s lead as Raouf tries to build the tower, asking questions to support him, when necessary (eg, ‘Hmmm, our tower keeps falling when we put the blue block on the bottom! What is another block we could try?’).”

Adults thus become the support team, but not the directors, of guided play.

Wright et al. concluded that “many US parents hold perceptions that do not align completely with evidence-based research, such as attributing more learning value to free play […]  compared to guided play.”

The results also showed that when parents were better informed about current theory on child cognitive development (as measured by questions from the Knowledge of Infant Development Inventory (KIDI) questionnaire), they tended to value guided play more.

The concept of different kinds of play, such as guided vs free play, was only recently introduced in research and may not yet be evident to the public. Guided play also requires that parents engage with their children during a play experience, which might lead them to undervalue guided play in favor of free play.

Importance of educating parents

“While free play is crucial for children's well-being, recent research emphasizes that guided play is a more effective approach to support children’s learning in reading, STEM, and learning-to-learn skills like attention, memory, and flexible thinking,” said Wright.

Senior author Dr Kathy Hirsh-Pasek, a professor at the same institute, said: “We need to help refine parents’ knowledge about the importance of play so that they can create guided play opportunities in everyday experiences like doing laundry, taking a walk in the park, or playing with a puzzle. As parents come to see these as ‘learning’ moments in everyday play, their children will thrive, while they will have more fun being parents.”

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JOURNAL

Frontiers in Developmental Psychology

DOI

10.3389/fdpys.2023.1267169 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Survey

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

U.S. Parents' Attitudes Towards Playful Learning

ARTICLE PUBLICATION DATE

15-Dec-2023

 

Why do male chicks play more than females? Study finds answers in distant ancestor

Sex differences in the frequency of play by chicks can be explained by sex differences in behavior of adults

FRONTIERS

 

VIDEO: 

MALE CHICKS OF THE DOMESTIC CHICKEN PLAY MORE THAN FEMALES

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CREDIT: REBECCA OSCARSSON

Play is widespread, but far from ubiquitous, across the animal kingdom. Especially common in mammals, play is also known to occur in taxa as diverse as birds, fish, octopuses, and even insects. But what is its function, given that natural selection never selects fun for its own sake? One prominent hypothesis is that play is beneficial to individuals because it allows them to practice skills needed later in life.

Now, a study in Frontiers in Ethology has shown that male baby chickens play far more than females. This result is of interest given that domestic chickens are directly descended from a species – red jungle fowl – with a pronounced difference between the sexes in morphology, coloration, and behavior.

“Here we show for the first time that there are clear sex differences in the age-related development of play in chickens,” said first author Rebecca Oscarsson, a PhD student at Linköping University in Sweden.

“This difference is mainly because males engage more in social and object play.”

Red junglefowl were domesticated by humans between 7,000 and 8,000 years ago in mainland Southeast Asia. Multiple hybridization events took place since then, so that modern domestic chickens also carry genes from green, Sri Lankan, and grey junglefowl. In each of these species, males are more colorful, aggressive, and vigilant than females, and provide food for their mates.

Playpens

The researchers incubated white leghorn eggs from a farm, and determined the sex of each newborn chick from the length of its wings. They kept the chicks in cages with a sawdust floor, a heat-roof, and food and water throughout the experimental period. They then transferred the chicks to larger arenas or ‘playpens’ twice per week. The scientists observed the chicks for 30 minutes in these playpens and scored the occurrence within 15-second intervals of play by each chick. The chicks were observed on 15 different days, when they were between six and 53 days old.

The researchers distinguished 12 distinct play behaviors. Examples of locomotor play were frolicking and wing flapping. Object play included chasing an object or pecking at it or exchanging it with another chick. Social play included sparring, jumping, and sparring stand-offs.

10 minutes into the observations, the observer introduced a fake rubber worm into the playpen. This served to stimulate another type of object play: worm-running, where a chick carried the worm in its beak and ran around with it. Worm-running may be the play equivalent of ‘tidbitting’, a series of courtship behaviors while manipulating food items, which is done exclusively by adult males and directed at females.

Males play more

Object play was more frequently seen than social play, while locomotor play was least common. Both females and males showed every type of playful behavior. However, the frequency of play differed between them: male chicks played more overall than females. This was due to males engaging more often in object and social play, while there was no difference between the sexes in the frequency of locomotor play.

The frequency of play also depended on age since hatching: for males, this peaked around 43 days for males, and around 36 days in females, before gradually declining at later ages.

The researcher concluded that these sex differences in chicks in the frequency of play can be explained by the high degree of sexual dimorphism of adult junglefowl. This means that male chicks would benefit more from practicing various skills related to physical ability and social tactics.

Practice for later in life

“We still don’t know the adaptive function of play for any species,” said author Dr Per Jensen, a professor at Linköping University and Oscarsson’s academic supervisor.

“However, the present study indicates that a possible function is to prepare animals for specific challenges they may encounter later in life. In a species like the chicken, where only males compete for territories, it makes sense that they engage in more social play as young.”

“Many questions remain unanswered with respect to the adaptive functions of play, for example its effects on later cognitive abilities. We now plan to look into the neurobiological and genetic mechanisms of play. For example, it’s possible that the early development of the cerebellum is linked to play behavior,” said Jensen.

 

Male chicks of the domestic chicken play more than females

CREDIT

Rebecca Oscarsson

CAPTION

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JOURNAL

Frontiers in Ethology

DOI

10.3389/fetho.2024.1392378 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Observational study

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

Animals

ARTICLE TITLE

Male chicks play more than females – sex differences in chicken play ontogeny

Reshaping modern play spaces for children's health

by University of South Australia

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

A world first review of the importance of nature play could transform children's play spaces, supporting investment in city and urban parks, while also delivering important opportunities for children's physical, social and emotional development.

Conducted by the University of South Australia the systematic review explored the impacts of nature play on the health and development of children aged 2-12 years, finding that nature play improved children's complex thinking skills, social skills and creativity.

Led by UniSA masters student Kylie Dankiw and researcher Associate Professor Katherine Baldock, this study is the first to provide evidence that supports the development of innovative nature play spaces in childcare centres and schools.

"In recent years, nature play has become more popular with schools and childcare centres, with many of them re-developing play spaces to incorporate natural elements, such as trees, plants and rocks. But as they transition from the traditional 'plastic fantastic' playgrounds to novel nature-based play spaces, they're also looking for empirical evidence that supports their investments," Dankiw says.

"Our research is the first to rigorously, transparently and systematically review the body of work on nature play and show the impact it has on children's development. We're pleased to say that the findings indicate a positive connection between nature play and children's development.

"For early childhood educators, health practitioners, policymakers and play space designers, this is valuable information that may influence urban play environments and re-green city scapes."

Comprising a systematic review of 2927 peer-reviewed articles, the research consolidated 16 studies that involved unstructured, free play in nature (forest, green spaces, outdoors, gardens) and included natural elements (highly vegetated, rocks, mud, sand, gardens, forests, ponds and water) to determine the impact of nature play on children's health and development.

It found that nature play improved children's levels of physical activity, health-related fitness, motor skills, learning, and social and emotional development. It also showed that nature play may deliver improvements in cognitive and learning outcomes, including children's levels of attention and concentration, punctuality, settling in class (even after play), constructive play, social play, as well as imaginative and functional play.

"Nature play is all about playing freely with and in nature. It's about making mud pies, creating stick forts, having an outdoor adventure, and getting dirty," Dankiw says.

"These are all things that children love to do, but unfortunately, as society has become more sedentary, risk averse and time-poor, fewer children are having these opportunities.

"By playing in nature, children can build their physical capabilities—their balance, fitness, and strength. And, as they play with others, they learn valuable negotiation skills, concepts of sharing and friendships, which may contribute to healthy emotional and social resilience."If in doubt, let them out: Children have the right to play

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More information: Kylie A. Dankiw et al, The impacts of unstructured nature play on health in early childhood development: A systematic review, PLOS ONE (2020). DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0229006

Journal information: PLoS ONE 

 

Play it forward: lasting effects of pretend play in early childhood

Psychologist cautions how modern society ignores best way to educate young children

Florida Atlantic University

 

image: 

Pretend play is associated with a host of enhanced cognitive abilities such as executive function, language and perspective taking, which are important to education, making the minimization of pretend play unwise.

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Credit: Florida Atlantic University

From developing social skills to fostering creativity, pretend play in young children is likened to being a “metaphoric multivitamin” in an editorial published in the journal Neuroscience and Biobehavioral Reviews by Florida Atlantic University’s David F. Bjorklund, Ph.D.

As the school year kicks into full gear, Bjorklund, associate chair and professor in the Department of Psychology within FAU’s Charles E. Schmidt College of Science, highlights the plethora of robust benefits of pretend play on cognitive, social and emotional development in children and cautions how “learning through play” has changed with the demands of contemporary society.

Given natural selection’s shaping of childhood for the acquisition and refinement of species-adapted social-cognitive skills – much through pretend play – Bjorklund says it is unfortunate that modern culture is ignoring the evolved wisdom of how best to educate young children.

“Throughout our species’ history and prehistory, and in hunter-gatherer and traditional cultures today, young children acquired important cultural knowledge and skills through play and observation, with much adult behaviors being imitated during play,” said Bjorklund. “Pretend play is associated with a host of enhanced cognitive abilities such as executive function, language and perspective taking, which are important to education, making the minimization of pretend play unwise.”

He explains that direct teaching of children by adults is rare in traditional cultures, and likely was for our hunter-gatherer ancestors. However, with the advent of increasingly complex technologies such as reading and mathematics and the need for universal education, formal schooling became necessary, and this has recently extended to early childhood.

“The prevalence of preschool education has increased over the decades in many developed countries, and unlike earlier days when ‘learning through play’ described the basic curriculum, contemporary preschool education instead often emphasizes direct instruction, characteristic of pedagogy designed for older children,” said Bjorklund. “This reflects an evolutionary mismatch between young children’s evolved learning abilities and the demands of contemporary society.”

Pretend play occurs voluntarily and spontaneously, especially when the individual is relaxed and not under stress and typically lacks any immediate practical purpose.   

“In the context of pretend play, skills encompass imagination, the ability to think about possibilities that differ from reality, mental time travel, and imitation, among other symbolic capabilities,” said Bjorklund.

He explains that pretend play functions as an experience-expectant process, enhancing the brain’s readiness for focused learning.

“It’s not clear whether the extended period of childhood and juvenile development created more opportunities for play or if this playfulness emerged as a result of that extended period,” said Bjorklund. “However, this evolution of childhood, along with the prolonged neural plasticity it brings, may have been a crucial adaptation for the development of the modern human mind.”

He says pretend play likely plays a crucial role in developing and refining psychological skills rather than being solely necessary for their emergence.

“Advanced pretend play is most evident during the extended juvenile stage in humans,” said Bjorklund. “This extension has led to a distinct childhood stage, lasting until about age 7, characterized by greater independence and social interaction.”

During this time, children engage in more complex play while their cognitive abilities continue to develop. Bjorklund emphasizes that this prolonged juvenile period and its neural plasticity are essential for fostering our unique social-cognitive skills.

Research comparing play-based preschool curricula to those focused on direct instruction has consistently shown that while direct instruction may yield immediate benefits, play-based approaches offer more significant long-term advantages in both academic performance and students’ attitudes toward school.

“One of the most comprehensive studies on the long-term effects of direct instruction for preschoolers from low-income backgrounds found that although there were initial academic gains, these benefits diminished over time,” said Bjorklund. “By third grade, children in the control group outperformed those in the direct-instruction program, and this gap widened by sixth grade.”

These findings led the researchers to reevaluate the effectiveness of heavily drilling children on basic skills and to consider the potential benefits of play-oriented preschool programs, particularly for children at risk of intellectual challenges.

Bjorklund says recess and opportunities for free play for older school-aged children also have been declining in developed countries, sometimes replaced by adult-directed play, again at odds with what is known about children’s evolved learning abilities.

“These practices may not only make learning more arduous, but negatively impact children’s sense of autonomy with respect to learning,” said Bjorklund. “Pretend play evolved to enhance children’s acquisition and refinement of important cultural knowledge and skills during an extended juvenile period. The abilities needed by modern children have changed and may require new means of learning, but we should not lose sight of the substantial benefits that pretend play can still afford our species’ youngest members.”

- FAU -

About Florida Atlantic University:
Florida Atlantic University, established in 1961, officially opened its doors in 1964 as the fifth public university in Florida. Today, the University serves more than 30,000 undergraduate and graduate students across six campuses located along the southeast Florida coast. In recent years, the University has doubled its research expenditures and outpaced its peers in student achievement rates. Through the coexistence of access and excellence, FAU embodies an innovative model where traditional achievement gaps vanish. FAU is designated a Hispanic-serving institution, ranked as a top public university by U.S. News & World Report and a High Research Activity institution by the Carnegie Foundation for the Advancement of Teaching. For more information, visit www.fau.edu.

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Journal

Neuroscience & Biobehavioral Reviews

DOI

10.1016/j.neubiorev.2024.105805 

Method of Research

Commentary/editorial

Subject of Research

People

Article Title

The evolution of pretend play and an extended juvenile period and their implications for early education