Key takeaways for caregivers

• In our work, parents reported that a variety of nature experiences (e.g., reading nature books, watching nature documentaries, playing in the backyard or at a park) are meaningful and valuable.
• When asked to share a story about a meaningful time they had outside with their children, parents most often recalled encounters with wild animals, particularly in their natural habitats.
• Parents remarked on their children’s psychological experiences of sustained attention, curiosity, and perspective taking. Outdoor adventures sparked children’s desire to learn, as evident in their questions about animals and ecosystems. Children showed empathy and understanding by considering the needs of animals (e.g., when raising tadpoles and learning about their changing diets).
• In nature, parents can model what is meaningful and valuable through their interactions with nature. They can also serve as guides, encouraging their children to observe the natural world, ask questions, and develop a sense of caring and connection with animals and ecosystems. These shared adventures not only deepen children’s appreciation for nature but also strengthen the bond between parents and their children.

Children and nature

Over decades of research, children’s experiences in nature – particularly those shared with caregivers – have consistently been linked to children’s healthy development (including physical, psychological, and social development), as well as their developing environmental commitments. Interactions with animals have played a key role in children’s psychological well-being and their developing concerns about conservation.

Photo by Pixabay on Pexels

In a world where many spaces and places to experience these kinds of interactions are in danger of disappearing (referred to as extinction of experience), it is important to understand the range of nature experiences and the meaning and value they offer children and their families.

Often, children explore the natural world with help from their caregivers. This may involve finding roly-polies in the dirt on a family camping trip, and being fascinated by their squirming legs and ability to roll into a tight little ball when they are accidentally flipped over. It may involve hearing the hoots of owls and the chirping of insects as the children go to bed, which creates an unusual but somehow comforting symphony.

In a study we conducted, we gathered heartwarming stories from parents of young children to explore the types of nature experiences they shared and what made these moments meaningful.

How we uncovered the meaning of shared nature moments

While many studies have outlined the benefits of children’s nature experiences, few have explored parents’ perspectives on the meaning and quality of these experiences. In our study, we asked two overarching questions: 1) What do parents do outside with their children? And 2) What makes these experiences valuable to the parents?

Forty-nine parents (82% mothers, 18% fathers) of young children (seven and 10 years old) completed a written survey in which they provided a short narrative response to the prompt, “Please describe a meaningful nature experience that you have shared with your child.” Most parents in our study were White (74%), nearly all were college educated (92%), and all lived in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States.

To understand the range and significance of parent-child outdoor experiences, we analyzed the stories to identify patterns, categorize key ideas, and accurately represent parents’ perspectives. Combining insights from previous research with a careful review of the narratives in our study, we identified themes that highlight the types of outdoor experiences parents find most meaningful, their impact on children’s emotional growth, and how they strengthen family bonds and connections to nature.

We identified three key findings:

1. A diverse typology of nature experiences matters to parents,
2. Parents reported that their children demonstrated curiosity and perspective-taking skills during these outdoor adventures, and
3. Parents valued the natural experiences for the relational bonding their children experienced with nature, their parents, and families.

Typology of nature experiences

Based on the work of Stephen Kellert, a professor of social ecology who explored ties between people and nature, we organized parents’ descriptions of nature experiences into three categories: direct, indirect, and vicarious.

Direct experiences are those that can be seen as wild (e.g., encountering a wild animal in nature). For example, when a parent shared, “When visiting Grammy in Montana, we have seen many wild animals in her yard: deer, rabbits, birds, chipmunks, squirrels,” we coded this under Kellert’s direct category since these wild animals moved spontaneously through the grandparent’s yard.

Photo by Jenny Uhling on Pexels

Indirect experiences are domesticated and controlled by people (e.g., encountering a starfish at the aquarium, or as a parent reported, “We visited the bear sanctuary outside Bozeman”).

Vicarious experiences are mediated by technological and other sources (e.g., reading a book on sharks, watching an episode of Wild Kratts, interacting with a robotic toy dog). For example, a parent told us, “We have a cousin who moved to Australia but they did have some animals she had never heard of. We went online to look them up and learn all about the ‘unknown’ animals of Australia.”

In our study, parents mentioned all three types of nature encounters, demonstrating the diversity of experiences parents find meaningful. However, most of the encounters parents described in their spontaneous storytelling were direct and wild, involving exposure to animals in their natural habitat. When parents discussed vicarious experiences, they often framed them as enhancements of a direct experience (e.g., “he frequently wrote about the trip and shared photos he had taken.”).

Exploring nature, strengthening social-emotional skills

Building on the work of Gail F. Melson, a noted authority on children’s relationships with animals, nature, and emerging technologies, we identified various psychological responses parents observed in their children during the outdoor adventures.

These activities often sparked curiosity (e.g., “She asked lots of questions about where live, how old we thought they were, what they eat, etc.”).

Parents’ stories revealed how their children demonstrated perspective taking by considering the unique needs of animals.

Nearly half the stories highlighted children’s sustained focus and fascination with nature. For instance, one parent told us, “ can spend hours searching tidal pools for creatures, or under rocks/logs in the woods searching for bugs.” Reported another: “The water had receded quite a distance and we could get right up to the rocks to look at the starfish, urchins, anemones, and other tidal pool creatures.”

Parents’ stories revealed how their children demonstrated perspective taking by considering the unique needs of animals. For example, one parent shared, “We gathered tadpoles from a neighbor’s pond and raised them up into frogs. It was fascinating to watch the excitement when changes were discovered. Also, the ever-changing food needs as they grew bigger gave lots of opportunities to research tadpole, froglet, and frog dietary needs.”

Relational bonding

Relational bonding is about building and strengthening connections – between parents and children, and between children and the natural world. When children share outdoor experiences with their caregivers, these moments not only promote psychological and physical health but also nurture a lifelong commitment to caring for the environment.

Research by Louise Chawla on children and nature highlights four key ways parents influence their children’s connection to nature:

1. Emphasizing that caring for the land is an important part of the family’s identity and well-being
2. Disapproving of harmful or destructive practices in nature
3. Expressing joy and pleasure when spending time outdoors
4. Showing fascination with natural wonders and phenomena

Parents play a crucial role in getting their children outside and helping them develop a sense of well-being and connection to the world around them. What caregivers focus on during these shared adventures – whether admiring a bird’s song, examining bugs under a log, or marveling at a sunset – teaches children what is meaningful and worth appreciating and protecting.

The parents in our study talked about bonding through shared interests. For example, one said, “We also listen to the birds in the park and we talk about them. I can’t think of a particular conversation or experience – I think of all these chats to/from school as part of a larger whole.”

Parents also shared their emotions; for example, one said, “In the summer of 2012, we went to Yellowstone National Park and visited geysers and saw lots of wildlife. My child was very moved by the whole experience.” These moments do more than just deepen children’s love for the outdoors; they also strengthen the bond they share with their parents.

Tips for building relationship between your child and nature

Building from our data and the rich literature that structures and guides us, we offer 10 tips on how caregivers can connect with their children in outdoor spaces.

1. Going outside is physically and psychologically beneficial to children, boosting creativity and critical thinking, building social connections with family, and supporting lifelong commitments to care for the natural world. The outdoors can be a big and wild place (e.g., a national park) or your backyard or a nearby park. The key is to find more time to bring nature into your lives together. What caregivers focus on during these shared adventures – whether admiring a bird’s song, examining bugs under a log, or marveling at a sunset – teaches children what is meaningful and worth appreciating and protecting
2. Reflecting to a child about your shared nature experience supports bonding and boosts awareness of the world around the child. Many of the nature experiences shared by parents in our research highlighted meaningful activities and the ways they support family connections and shared love and concern for the natural environment. You can reflect on what happens, what you see and do, and how the experiences support your relationships as a family and as part of the wider wilder natural community.
3. Paying attention is a powerful element in the interaction. Much has been written on the importance of being present and in the moment. Taking this practice to nature, and with your child, can deepen the relationships you are fostering. Parents in our study said how meaningful the shared experiences were when they were attending to the moment and the child’s experience of that moment.
4. Educating children about the natural world by learning with them builds a sense of love and respect for animals and the outdoors. Engaging in outdoor activities, such as bird watching, gardening, and raising animals, may foster new and exciting conversations. It can feel challenging to not know an answer to an eager child’s question, but this is a good opportunity to learn together about an animal’s habitat or lifestyle or a plant’s place in an ecosystem.
5. Encouraging questions is another way educating and learning can occur, and while caregivers may help answer some of their children’s questions, they can also ask a question about what they are seeing, which in turn can encourage them to pay attention to natural processes and the five senses (e.g., “What do you hear? The birds chirping…” “What do you see? Paw prints in the dirt…”). Asking questions about what children are feeling can encourage appreciation of nature, while also deepening their understanding of their emotions by having them reflect on those feelings.
6. Diversifying nature activities in your own neighborhood can provide a way to deepen exploration. In our study, parents talked about experiences in national parks, at zoos and beaches, and in their backyards, including experiences with their own pets and school projects about sea creatures. All nature experiences (direct, indirect, vicarious) are important to children and when parents diversify the activities, it gives their children a fuller picture of what nature can mean. While a big trip to a national forest may not be an option for everyone, looking in a small patch of grass outside your front door or taking a walk and seeing what lurks in the trees in a local park are great ways to look for different creatures close to home.
7. Valuing wilder places is also important. The words nature, wild, and natural have different cultural meanings and definitions that require some thoughtfulness. The idea of valuing wilder spaces is meant to encourage seeing plants and animals in a place that is natural to them and appreciating how the world works without human intervention.
   

   Photo by Agung Pandit Wiguna on Pexels

8. Discussing the animals and plants you see with your child can encourage talk about your shared values. Whether these talks take place at the dinner table or on a car or bus ride, discussing shared nature experiences can encourage consideration of what conservation means, as well as talk about shared beliefs and ways of seeing the world.
9. Acknowledging the varied ways you and your child interact with nature is another important activity. Whether you check out a library book about butterflies, observe a crow in a tree, or watch a documentary on dolphins, these activities represent important ways of learning about the world.
10. Bringing in your own interests. When a child sees that you like something, that shared activity can deepen your bond and increase their care for the world. Whether your interest is in fishing, skipping rocks, pressing flowers, or making a whistle out of a blade of grass or an acorn top, talking about those activities and even engaging your child in the activity can be a joyous experience. You may also want to invite your child to show you their favorite animal or rock.

The post Nature nurtures: Sharing outdoor experiences with children appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

• Social exclusion harms individuals of all ages, leading to feelings of loneliness, decreased self-esteem, and even changes in brain activity.
• Humans’ ability to recognize and react to social exclusion emerges early, suggesting the importance of considering and addressing ostracism even when caring for very young children.
• Babies are sensitive to social clues: In one study, when 13-month-olds were excluded from a ball-tossing game with unfamiliar adults, they became fussy and frustrated, a shift in behavior compared to their happy engagement when they were included in the game.
• By creating inclusive and nurturing environments from the very beginning, caregivers can foster their children’s emotional well-being and social development. This lays the foundation for strong social skills, empathy, and healthy emotional regulation later in life.

Have you ever noticed how young children light up when another child wants to play?

It is amazing to watch them grow, not just physically but also in their social and emotional skills. Parents often wonder when children start understanding complex social situations, like when they are being included in a game or left out.

Two children playing in a shared space. Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels

As researchers, we turned this curiosity into an experiment. Our research suggests that 13-month-olds are sensitive to social exclusion from strangers. What are the implications of this finding for caregivers? In this post, we offer tips to foster inclusive environments for young children.

What is ostracism and why does it matter?

Everyone knows the sting of being left out. In social settings, people sometimes ignore or exclude other people, leaving them out. That’s ostracism.

Think about a child at playtime who is not invited to join a game or a young person who feels isolated during a group conversation. Ostracism, a common experience, can have far-reaching effects, influencing individuals’ psychological well-being and behavior.

Being left out can leave children vulnerable to low self-esteem and academic difficulties

Research has shown that, starting from school age, ostracism can negatively affect fundamental psychological needs, such as feelings of belonging and having a positive sense of self-worth.

For example, it can lead to feelings of loneliness and decreased self-esteem in children. Ostracism can even trigger physiological changes, such as an accelerated heart rate, indicating a physical stress response. It also influences behavior by heightening sensitivity to others’ emotional expressions and leading individuals to adopt either prosocial or antisocial attitudes, depending on the situation.

Ostracism, a common experience, can have far-reaching effects, influencing individuals’ psychological well-being and behavior.

Research also suggests that persistent ostracism by peers from kindergarten through fifth grade can result in   Thus, recognizing that children, even at a very young age, are sensitive to this phenomenon can offer insights into their emotional development.

Exploring infants’ sensitivity to ostracism with a ball-tossing game

In research my colleagues and I conducted at the Child & Baby Lab in Milano (Italy), we investigated the effects of ostracism on 13-month-olds on 84 infants (approximately half boys and half girls), primarily of Caucasian ethnicity.

Infants played a ball-tossing game with two experimenters. At the start of the game, an experimenter tossed the ball to the infant, retrieved it, and then tossed it back to them to establish a pattern of interaction. In the next part of the game, the experimenter either continued to include the infant or switched to ostracizing them.

For infants assigned to experience inclusion, the experimenter continued tossing the ball back and forth between the infant and a second experimenter for the remainder of the game. For infants assigned to experience ostracism, the first experimenter continued tossing the ball, but only to the other experimenter, deliberately ignoring the infant for the rest of the game.

A child plays alone in a ball pit. Photo by Lisa Fotios on Pexels

Do infants behave differently when they are ostracized?

Since infants of this age typically cannot verbalize their feelings, we video-recorded their facial expressions, vocalizations, and body movements during the ball-tossing game to understand their emotional state during the activity – happy, frustrated, or somewhere in between.

Our findings shed light on humans’ early awareness of social dynamics. Infants who were left out of the game showed fewer signs of happiness, like smiling and laughing, than infants who were included. Furthermore, ostracized babies were fussier and showed more signs of frustration, like crying or angry expressions.

Many factors, such as simply not receiving the ball as often, could have contributed to the observed differences in behavior. However, given what we observed during our study and what we know from other research, our findings suggest that, by 13 months, infants can pick up on social exclusion and react to it emotionally.

Ostracized infants showed signs of trying to get back into the game by reaching out more frequently and spending more time looking toward the experimenters rather than focusing on the ball. These behaviors suggest that infants were proactively reaching out for adults’ attention, prioritizing social re-inclusion over simply wanting the ball to play with.

Infants who were left out of the game showed fewer signs of happiness, like smiling and laughing, than infants who were included.

Implications for parents and caregivers

Social interactions are crucial for children’s development because individuals learn constantly when they interact with others. This makes it important to foster inclusivity as well as to teach and model social skills to help children navigate social situations confidently from early in life.

Our study revealed that 13-month-olds are sensitive to exclusion, suggesting that they have an earlier grasp of social dynamics than previously thought. This sensitivity likely forms the basis for more complex social behaviors later in life.

Behaviors in ostracized infants reflect how adults react to exclusion

In addition, the behaviors we observed in ostracized infants (e.g., fussiness, attention seeking) are similar to how older children and adults react to exclusion. This suggests that the mechanisms for detecting and addressing social rejection begin developing very early in life.

The early signs of sensitivity to social exclusion

Understanding early signs of sensitivity to social exclusion is crucial not just for researchers but also for caregivers. As parents interact with their children, they might notice a child:

• Fussing more when they are not included in playtime with other children during playdates;
• Reaching out, crying, or babbling to try and get the caregiver’s attention if they feel ignored during mealtime; or
• Losing interest in activities when consistently sidelined.

These reactions mirror those observed in our experiment, highlighting the need for nurturing environments in which children feel like they belong and are active in social interactions.

Create nurturing environments to promote children’s social-emotional development

Our study’s findings underscore why creating a sense of belonging and emotional security for children is so important. Repeated experiences of exclusion can harm children’s emotional well-being in the long run by affecting their self-esteem, ability to form healthy relationships, and capacity to manage their emotions effectively.

Parents and caregivers can create a more nurturing environment by understanding these early signs of sensitivity to exclusion. This helps children feel safe, secure, and loved, laying the foundation for healthy emotional and social development.

A child shares her toy with another child. Photo by cottonbro studio on Pexels

Practical tips for caregivers

To create a more nurturing environment for children, parents should:

• Model inclusive behaviors: From a very young age, children absorb everything we say and do. Demonstrate welcoming behavior by including others in activities and conversations. Show children the importance of kindness and respect toward everyone.
• Encourage social interactions: Create opportunities for shared experiences with peers. Provide toys and activities that encourage interaction, like building blocks or dress-up clothes. Facilitate playdates by offering simple suggestions for how children can play together, like taking turns building a tower. Use positive reinforcement and point out when your child shares a toy or interacts with another child.
• Acknowledge feelings: Promote your child’s understanding of their own feelings, either positive or negative, in different situations by labelling them. Even negative feelings are okay; help your child navigate them.
• Teach empathy: Help your child understand the feelings of others by discussing emotions and perspectives. Encourage them to share their toys, take turns, and listen to their friends’ stories.
• Address ostracism: If you notice exclusionary behaviors in your child’s interactions, address them with empathy. Explain the impact of exclusion on feelings and emphasize the importance of including others.

Because children’s emotional and social skills develop rapidly in these early years, providing supportive and inclusive environments can lay a strong foundation for future interactions and relationships.

By recognizing the importance of social inclusion from an early age, parents and other caregivers can help children become socially confident, empathetic, and emotionally resilient individuals.

The post Do infants feel excluded? Early signs and why it matters appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Key takeaways for caregivers

• Playing with toys is an important activity for caregivers and infants to do together to support healthy development.
• When caregivers read manufacturers’ descriptions of toys, they were more likely to choose technological toys, but research suggests that these toys may have significant drawbacks, such as decreased engagement between caregivers and infants and less language use while playing.
• Reading toy descriptions with a critical eye is a good way to purchase high-quality toys for infants.

Choosing certain toys can positively affect child development

Many parents, caregivers, and family members face the challenge of selecting a toy as a gift for a child. What will they like? What do they already own? What toy will be best for them? And most confusing, how do I select which toy out of what seems like hundreds and hundreds of options? No wonder the choice feels so overwhelming: Toys are big business – a $40 billion dollar industry in the United States in 2022.

Beyond their role in the marketplace, though, toys are important for infants’ development because they play a critical role in supporting and encouraging play. Toys can encourage physical activity, such as tossing and catching a ball or pushing a toy train around a room. They can also provide a jumping off point for fostering social interactions between individuals, for example, when two children share and play with a toy together.

Toys can also expand children’s thinking as they use them to represent other objects, such as a toy phone in place of a smartphone. And they can also support the expression of creativity, as occurs when children use blocks to build a structure.

Playing with toys is not only about the toy itself, but also about how individuals interact with each other while they are playing.

The importance of playing with toys for infants’ development is well-established. But another important factor is critical to consider – the idea that interactions between caregivers and infants during play (with and without toys) help support babies’ cognitive and social development.

For instance, when caregivers and infants engage in back-and-forth interactions focused on the same topic or object of interest, infants can learn new words and develop an understanding of how to take turns in a conversation. In other words, playing with toys is not only about the toy itself, but also about how individuals interact with each other while they are playing.

Choosing technological toys may negatively affect children’s development

Toys are powerful tools for development and they can support important caregiver-child interactions. But are all toys created equal in terms of their potential to foster high-quality interactions?

In short, probably not. In particular, research suggests that technological or electronic toys – those that need batteries to operate – might have negative effects on how caregivers and infants play together and talk during their playful interactions. For example, when using electronic toys, caregivers might talk more about how to make the toy work (e.g., using more commands like, “Push the button”) instead of letting infants direct the interaction or asking open-ended questions.

How do caregivers approach decisions about buying toys?

Since toys are important tools for supporting cognitive and social development, and the types of toys caregivers and children play with may differentially affect important interactions, we need to better understand how caregivers approach purchasing toys for their infants.

To examine this matter, we conducted a study with caregivers. We asked how they approached purchasing toys for their infants. We also investigated whether and how manufacturers’ claims about the specific developmental benefits of toys affected caregivers’ purchasing decisions. In our study, we examined three questions:

• What types of toys do infants and caregivers play with?
• What are caregivers’ preferences for electronic versus traditional toys?
• How do advertisements of the developmental features of toys affect caregivers’ toy selections?

Photo: Polesie Toys. Pexels.

Examining how and what caregivers think about toys

Sixty-three primary caregivers of infants (0-24 months) across the United States took part in the study. Most caregivers were White (78%), 3% were Black, 5% were Asian, 13% were Latinx, and 1% were of another ethnicity. Caregivers’ highest level of educational attainment ranged from a high school diploma (3%) to a graduate degree (79%).

In our survey, caregivers were asked to report how often their infant engaged in playing with blocks, dolls or stuffed animals, electronic toys (i.e., toys with batteries), electronic and non-electronic books, electronic and non-electronic puzzles, and other toys.

Next, caregivers viewed eight images of infant toys without descriptions. Four of the eight toys were electronic, with features including lights and sounds, and required batteries. The other four toys were traditional or otherwise identified as non-electronic toys (e.g., shape sorters, stacking blocks, puzzles). Caregivers were asked to identify four toys they would be interested in buying.

Next, caregivers answered questions about their toy purchasing behaviors and opinions about toy marketing. Then the same eight toys were shown again (in a different order), this time with manufacturers’ descriptions. The descriptions included the toys’ developmental benefits (e.g., fostering fine motor skills, an understanding of cause and effect, or counting skills), and disclosed whether or not the toys were electronic. Finally, caregivers were again asked to select four toys they would be interested in buying and answered the same set of questions about toy buying.

Caregivers should ask themselves whether manufacturers’ claims about toys are supported by research or if they just feature buzzwords to sell the product.

What types of toys do caregivers and infants play with?

The youngest infants (0-6 months) used electronic toys most frequently (88% used them at least once per day), while fewer than 70% of the infants used traditional toys at least once per day. This indicates that technological toys are already part of infants’ daily routines, even at very young ages. Depending on age, between 33% and 46% of older infants (7-24 months) also used electronic toys at least once per day.

What are caregivers’ preferences for choosing between electronic and traditional toys? 

Before being exposed to the toy descriptions, caregivers were significantly more likely to select traditional than non-traditional toys for their infants. But after reading the descriptions, there was no difference between their selections of traditional and technological toys. That is, they were equally likely to choose either type of toy when descriptions were provided.

This indicates that caregivers were likely influenced by the presence of descriptions when making their selections and that reading these descriptions tended to bias them toward selecting more electronic toys, relative to when they were not given descriptions to read.

How do advertisements of the developmental features of toys affect caregivers’ toy selections?

Caregivers more often agreed with the following statements after reading the toy descriptions than before they read them: “Toy descriptions are accurate representations of toys,” “My toy purchasing decisions are impacted by the developmental benefits of toys,” and “Toys positively impact the cognitive development of infants.” This suggests that the descriptions influenced how caregivers perceived the toys’ ability to affect infant development.

Photo: PNW Production. Pexels.

Recommendations for caregivers when buying toys

The findings from our study suggest that being critical consumers of manufacturers’ toy descriptions can be beneficial for caregivers. Additional research is needed to determine how these findings generalize to other contexts, such as different types of toys, toys for different age groups and for other demographic groups, and actual toy-buying decisions. Understanding the power of toy descriptions for technological toys, in particular, is important because the market for these types of toys is expanding rapidly globally and is expected to grow another 16% between 2019 and 2025.

Caregivers should ask themselves whether manufacturers’ claims about toys are supported by research or if they just feature buzzwords to sell the product. It can be hard to know if claims are trustworthy, so caregivers can consider whether the toy helps support back-and-forth interactions and conversations between caregiver and child or between children.

Toys can be especially beneficial if they have the potential to spark social interactions, imagination, and creativity, or if they foster learning about concepts like math, spatial skills, or new vocabulary words. Caregivers may also want to consider if any additional features of a toy support these high-quality interactions rather than just being superficially distracting.

Finally, it is important to remember that supporting children’s healthy development does not require purchasing toys at all! Caregivers can engage in the kinds of back-and-forth interactions that support learning and social interaction through other types of play, such as playing with everyday objects like pans or boxes, as well as everyday conversations.

The post How do caregivers decide what toys to buy for infants? appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Where are the teachers? Although they remain in the background, they have an important role: to be close and attentive observers who document the ongoing learning processes by taking pictures or videos. This documentation is later combined with drawings by the children expressing what they found interesting during the day so they can reflect together about the experience. Importantly, this practice is child directed, that is, it is driven by the children’s interests and fascinations.

Problems with reflective practices at school

This exercise in child agency – known as the progressive pedagogical approach “Anji Play” – highlights how children can learn about the world and test their capabilities in a self-directed manner. In doing so, the learners enhance their proficiency in a skill that is a central human challenge – understanding how to survive in an uncertain and often volatile world. The reflective practices aid in consolidating experiences and making sense of surprising events. Such skill development is helpful for children at any age.

“Reflection is triggered by an unusual or perplexing situation or experience . . . the element of surprise is of critical importance.”

Contrast these experiences to those in most schools, where reflective practices look very different. At a typical school, students are often bored by questioning at the end of an exercise which asks them to write what they have learned during the day. In our research, we find that such reflection prompts rarely lead the student to wonder about issues that have yet to be resolved. Instead of eliciting meaningful reflection, these prompts often result in a guessing game where students try to gauge what the teacher might want to hear from them. For many students, the word reflection becomes a term with negative associations.

“I really hate doing , they are boring, and usually formatted in an uncreative way,” explained one student. “And sometimes these are questions that are extremely hard to answer or formulated in a weird way. Too many questions!”

Reflection has become a key concept in formal education

Student antipathy to such “reflections” may seem ironic since reflection has become a cornerstone of education in the 21^st century. Across the world, numerous commissions, organizations, and state educational boards have highlighted reflection as a standard and a skill toward which students, as well as teachers, should strive. Yet there is little agreement over what reflection really is and how best to facilitate it.

The scientific literature on reflection (and especially the work by Russell Rogers) offers a couple of key insights. It suggests that reflection is triggered by an unusual or perplexing situation or experience and requires active engagement on the part of the individual. It involves examining one’s responses, beliefs, and premises in light of the situation at hand and results in integrating the new understanding into one’s experience. We believe that the first of these insights – the element of surprise – is of critical importance.

Photo: caterooni. Creative Commons.

The brain as a prediction machine

In recent years, researchers in computational neuroscience have approached the question of how the brain works in new ways. They start with the premise that the brain is a prediction machine. An essential function of the brain is trying to predict the future – what will happen next. As the brain makes predictions about the world and takes note of whether these predictions match what actually happens, it gradually learns about the world, getting better at predicting it.

“We need to create opportunities for learners to be genuinely surprised . . . Play and open-ended activities are great ways to do this.”

This is where play and reflection come in. When children (and also adults) play, they experiment and test options at the edges of their knowledge. In doing so, the brain and play enhance proficiency in a skill that is a central human challenge – understanding how to survive in an uncertain and frequently volatile world. Being better at prediction means that we expend as little energy as possible trying to interpret a world that sends an exhausting stream of information to us. This is a central element of reflection: the conscious processing of surprise.

How can we use these insights to facilitate meaningful reflection? Our research offers five lessons:

1. Invite surprise into the classroom

If surprise elicits reflection, we need to create opportunities for learners to be genuinely surprised. This entails shifting agency toward the learner by designing learning environments that are open ended. Play and open-ended activities are great ways to do this because they allow for easy entry points to get started. They also provide an opportunity to reach sophisticated levels of complexity. For inspirations on how to begin, see Mitch Resnik’s book “Lifelong Kindergarten” and the Pedagogy of Play website.

2. Be clear about the purpose of reflection

Ask yourself why you want students to reflect in the first place. Are you trying to gain access to their thought processes or do you want students to consolidate their knowledge on a given subject matter? Remember that asking students to share their thinking with you will alter their reflective processes.

3. Think about reflection as an ongoing process

Surprises occur all the time, not just at the end of a lesson. Think about reflection throughout the learning process, not just as an exit-ticket exercise. To help students reflect in a more ongoing manner, at the beginning of class, you might ask students about what they already know and what their expectations are. This can also help make changes in their thinking visible and allow them to revisit their earlier assumptions later. The “I used to think – now I think” thinking routine, developed by Project Zero, is a useful exercise in this regard.

4. Recognize that students can reflect in more than one way

Reflection can be facilitated beyond language. Reflection exercises can also involve drawing or building things. Nonverbal reflection practices can support second-language learners, who may struggle with constructing the past, present, and future sentences needed to talk about changes in experiences.

5. Work with your learning community to define reflection

It is helpful to develop a shared understanding of reflection — and language around it — in your community. Consider the word ‘reflection’ as a group and make your individual and shared understandings visible. Remember that reflective practices, as well as play, are embedded in the larger cultural context. Norms of how, and what, we reflect upon are set by our local community. Bringing people – especially those from a diverse background – together in a shared understanding of reflection is a vital nurturing ground to develop meaningful reflective practices.

The Project Zero Thinking Routine Toolbox provides helpful starting points for facilitating such a conversation. For younger learners, be sure to look into the Teaching Tool “Cracking Open Words.”

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In times of adversity, children should be given space to use different forms of play as a coping mechanism to explore their emotions and adapt to their current situation. In this article, we draw on the findings of three qualitative studies conducted in various countries with different levels of economic development to demonstrate how children use play to cope with challenges associated with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Play serves a protective function even in the most difficult of circumstances.”

Models of adversity and resilience outline the multisystem influences on how families and children respond to difficult experiences (e.g., war, statelessness, poverty, natural disasters) across cultures. At the heart of resilience is the human capability to face, adapt to, and gather strength from adversity. One way children demonstrate resilience is through playful activities.

Play serves a protective function even in the most difficult circumstances, unmasks the psychosocial difficulties (e.g., anxiety, depression, emotional distress) children may encounter, and highlights the adaptive qualities they use to cope with adversities. Play permits children to express emotional connectedness, a perspective that aligns well with the contention that play is key to emotional survival.

At different stages of the ongoing COVID–19 pandemic, researchers examined how children used playful activities to cope with social isolation and school closures, and to gain an understanding of the virus itself. An examination of the play of Israeli children during the early stages of the pandemic revealed an increase in play interactions with siblings and parents, and marked changes in the nature and themes of sociodramatic play (i.e., acting out imaginary stories and situations; Cohen & Bamberger, 2021).

Photo: Cyprien Hauser. Creative Commons.

Sociodramatic themes reflected attempts to cope with fear of the virus through imaginary protection, seeking refuge from COVID-19, and beating it. Children turned to humor and displayed acts of moral concern for others in the family. According to parents, children grew in self-care, language, and motor skills.

In India, amid tight lockdowns, parents from low-income backgrounds in rural and peri-urban areas reported that they noticed few changes in their children’s play activities (Chaudhary, Kapoor, & Pillai, 2021). In urban settings, confinement prompted children to find new play spaces (e.g., under stairways, in the corner of a terrace) and to venture to street corners to play, often evading the scrutiny of authorities. Solitary and parallel play increased and interest in outdoor play rose. With dramatic increases in technology use, children in more well-off families turned to online games. Children were creative in modifying existing games by inserting themes they invented. As the pandemic progressed into the second year, parents noticed that their children continued to play in diverse ways and that they had become more considerate of others.

As in Israel and India, in neighborhoods of Toronto, Canada, photographs of children’s outdoor play demonstrated a tremendous sense of hope (Brownell, 2022). By participating in animal scavenger hunts for Teddy Bears in windows, locating stuffed animals hidden in trees, playing “I spy” games, and designing bunny trails, children learned to play with anonymous others on their street and around the block.

“Children continue to turn to play activities, either alone or with others, to navigate their way through the pandemic.”

Chalk sketches on sidewalks (e.g., hopscotch, galaxies, UFOs, underwater creatures, blue skies, grassy knolls, flowers) served to transport people to experiences beyond the immediate present. “Chalk talk” extolled hope (“you can do it,” “you are not alone,” “it will pass”) and prompted others to be safe (“stay six feet apart,” “no Halloween candy due to COVID”). These outdoor activities were not synchronous in that specific groups of children were involved. During a pandemic, they reflect children’s desire to invite others to play in their absence and offer hope to those in their neighborhood.

Amid daily challenges — online education, home schooling, and anxieties about the COVID–19 pandemic — these accounts indicate that children used various adaptive strategies to invent play spaces and engage in different play activities. In doing so, much emphasis was placed on different modes of play and children’s cognitive and social skills development.

As they do when dealing with other difficult circumstances, children continue to turn to play activities, either alone or with others, to navigate their way through the pandemic. At the bottom of it all, play permits us to express our humanity, examine our vulnerabilities, and extend social and moral concern for others in a global world community.

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It might sound strange to encourage children to spend more time on their phones, laptops, or computer consoles. But a large body of research has identified nothing intrinsically damaging about these activities, provided they do not displace sleep, exercise, schooling, and healthy eating. In short, screen time does not in itself turn children into gambling addicts or overweight, uneducated zombies. And provided children are kept safe, using social media is also okay.

Bad outcomes are much more likely to be caused by eating poorly, missing out on learning, spending too much time on the sofa, or not resting enough. So a parent’s most productive focus should be to encourage physical activity, sleep, good nourishment, and learning – and make sure that time online is not getting in the way of those healthy activities.

Fears of digital media unjustified

Research has failed to justify the understandable fears of many parents who are concerned by the sudden changes over the past two decades in how childhood is lived. It is difficult to identify any clinically relevant impacts of the increased use of screens or social media. Where slight effects are found, they are drowned out by the established effects – such as genetics, socioeconomic circumstances, time adults spend with children, and parental education – that we have known, for 50 years, determine child development.

However, research does demonstrate that children are more likely to respect family rules about good ways to live when those rules are developed though sound and shared reasoning, and when they respect children’s perspectives and as well as adults’ preferences. Children can recognize parents’ wishes for them to have enough sleep, keep fit, learn and eat properly, and spend family time together. However, very strict rules, focussing on a prescribed number of minutes for this or that activity, can lead to added secrecy on the part of a child. They can also damage a child’s trust that their parents will be able to help and understand them, should they, for instance, encounter distressing experiences online.

As a trained neuroscientist, I want parents to follow the science. However, unevidenced “neuro-myths” – often really fears masquerading as science – are now used to justify concerns about screen time and child development. This is understandable. In just a few years, the digital world has disrupted traditional childhood by taking a distinctive place – and considerable time – in children’s upbringing. We did not have iPads in the home until 10 years ago. Internet bandwidth could not support online gaming 15 years ago. Seemingly overnight, gaming has become a cultural mainstay. Social media are everywhere. People are understandably worried about the impacts.

Inevitably, scientific research has lagged in providing reliable evidence about the effect of this dramatic shift. How do scientists prove the long-term impact of something that has not existed for very long? It takes time and science has been predictably slow to reach a conclusion.

The foundation of “neuro-myths”

As a result, people initially sought answers in other fields that seemed relevant. Alert to the psychological rewards computer gaming offers children, they explored studies on outcomes for children who are unable to defer gratification – the so-called marshmallow experiment. They also looked to more gloomy studies of children’s television viewing back in the 1980s and 1990s, and to research on rats allowed to administer dopamine-stimulating drugs to themselves. This work appeared to justify fears that exposure to digital media undermined children’s capacities to concentrate and led them to live more sedentary lives.

But time has demonstrated that these analogies are false and misleading. It turns out that children’s attitudes about marshmallows and lab rats doing drugs do not offer useful insights into the impacts of screen time. Research has not identified the kinds of screen time used today, in itself, as correlated with diminished general cognitive control, capacities to concentrate, or physical well-being. A recent review found the effects of screen time today to be quite similar to those of television time in the 1950s.

Moreover, scientists now better understand that the research into high levels of television viewing was not particularly instructive about the impacts of television viewing, even back in the 1990s. Closer examination showed that this research really told us more about the socioeconomic circumstances of different families: The prevalence of high levels of viewing was skewed toward low-income families. These families tended to have smaller homes, less outside space, a culture of having the television on more often than more privileged groups, and fewer alternative activities. Poverty and lack of opportunity were preventing healthier childhoods; TV usage was largely a symptom, rather than a cause, of the deprivation.

It is difficult to identify any clinically relevant impacts of the increased use of screens or social media.

Research does not find brain damage

Studies also show few, and only slight, correlations between children’s use of social media and their general well-being or mental distress symptoms such as anxiety and depression. Research has found nothing of this nature for boys. In girls, there is a slight relationship between time on social media and psychological distress. But it is small – as a comparative example, wearing glasses seems more damaging to a female teenager’s social well-being than spending a lot of time on social media, according to the same datasets.

Photo: Emily Wade. Unsplash.

Young children’s low exposure

Our research should also reassure parents who may be concerned that young children are exposed to high levels of screen time. We measured the time children are on digital media in Danish kindergartens, where they typically spend about five to eight hours each weekday between the ages of 3 and 6. In general, children were exposed to digital media about five to 10 minutes on these days in the kindergarten environment, which we generally view as a good thing. Technology is part of the world in which children live and provides teachable moments, even for the young ones.

Let us assume that, on weekdays, some children spend another two hours a day of digital time at home, perhaps in the early evening when they are tired, allowing parents time to finish housework and emails. This means that, on most days, these young children’s lives are about 90 percent free of digital inputs. It is understandable that parents might still be worried because much of that time is during the few hours in the evening when children are at home – probably feeling cranky and tired – before they go to bed. However, our research, which looked across the children’s days, suggests that parents should worry less about minutes and hours; young Danish children still have ample opportunities to develop in other ways.

Risk of gambling addiction

Some parents are concerned that their children will become addicted to gambling through their exposure as children to digital media and gaming. Studies have not found causal connections between such use and a greater risk of gambling addiction in typical populations. However, we studied children whose parents were worried about the general effect of gaming on their offspring, and then compared them with children who parents were not worried. We found that the brains of the two groups of children were indistinguishable. But the children with worried parents experienced more stress and conflict between their wishes to game and their need to sleep, do homework, and have dinner with their parents.

It makes sense to worry about preserving lifestyles that we know are good for children – playing, time with friends, being outside – but unwise to confuse this desire with unjustified and unevidenced arguments about the dangers that digital media pose to children’s brains.

Encouraging rather than controlling children

Other research shows that the more restrictive and reactive parenting styles are around media use, the less children internalize and respect parents’ reasons. A more effective strategy is one in which children feel that their wishes and interests are being understood, and they can share their parents’ reasoning about the need for exercise, sleep, and education rather than be part of a strategy based on a groundless fear of digital media.

In a study at the Interacting Minds Centre in Aarhus, Denmark, my colleague Stine Strøm Lundsgård and I found that the parents who were the most worried about digital media were those who placed the most value on different kinds of play. The parents who were most concerned that their children enjoy a traditional upbringing – for example, playing outside with other children – tended to be the ones most worried about screen time. These parents had a strong sense of what constitutes a good childhood and they feared that screen time was displacing it.

This is a very reasonable concern. It makes sense to worry about preserving lifestyles that we know are good for children – playing, spending time with friends, being outside. Parents are right to focus of the importance of these aspects of childhood; they should concentrate on the merits of such childhoods and encourage those shared values in their children. But they would be unwise to confuse this desire with unjustified and unevidenced arguments about the dangers that digital media pose to children’s brains.

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We might also better understand why and when attempts to become playful misfire, those moments when we see a chance to play and get creative but it does not work out. We can come to see that this probably happens because one or more of the stepping stones is missing.

Our research has identified four stepping stones that seem essential to becoming playful: autonomy, absorbed interaction, surprise, and feeling competent.

First, individuals at play need to feel autonomous. The choice about what to do, say, or make should belong to the player. It should not be claimed by another person who is orchestrating what is going on, whether an ambitious parent or a stressed boss at work.

Second, when people become playful, they lose themselves in what they are doing and become absorbed in the interaction. There is a blurring between them and the materials or the activity in which they are engaged. In tinkering with a material or a person, sensing the possibilities of an interaction by making them happen, it is no longer clear how a result came into being. Who built this tower? Who got that idea? Was it me, the other person, or the Lego bricks?  It was all of us.

Surprise is the third key feature of becoming playful. In the interactions described earlier, players tend to be less circumscribed by a set plan of what to do. They engage in actions not previously thinkable, which can introduce surprises. Things happen that are unexpected and have not been designed deliberately.

This unmapped exploration, leading to surprises, delivers the fourth feature of playfulness: a sense of increased competence. Surprising oneself is a big deal. In our research, we found that people gained an unexpected boost about what they felt able to do, and this motivated them to see how much further they could go.

Becoming concrete by building ducks

Our research does not start with definitions or discussions of playfulness. Rather, we arrange an encounter and let people walk us through their experience of turning a specific situation into a playful interaction.

For example, in one study, we gave five small plastic bags to 22 adults. Each bag contained six Lego bricks of varying sizes. Four were yellow – one of which had an eye on either side – and two were red. We then asked the participants to use the bricks to build five ducks across two rounds. In the first round, they were asked to build the ducks in ways that felt playful.

In the second, they were encouraged to build them in ways that did not feel playful. Immediately after each round, we asked the participants how they had approached the task and what they had experienced during different parts of the process.

We found that the change of mindset made a big difference. When advised to become playful, participants said they felt a conscious need to become autonomous, to not think about the experiment but, instead, to do whatever they liked. Some even decided not to build ducks at all, but to construct cars or buildings or whatever they felt like.

In contrast, when asked not to be playful, participants told us they tried to get into a mechanical mode, building according to the instructions. Typically, they built five identical ducks, often the same as a prototype we had shown them.

They also described different ways of touching the Lego. Being playful seemed to make them engage in a more tentative way, sensing the bricks before beginning to build. Their sense of autonomy seemed to allow ideas to flow freely within this absorbed tinkering. It was as if the bricks took over, they said.

It was only when being playful that people surprised themselves with the novel-looking ducks that emerged. Being surprised by their own actions led them to feel competent. “Oh, I made this!” they said.

They felt like they wanted to make more ducks that would be more novel and surprising.  Because they felt autonomous, they would say, “Let’s do it again.” They were motivated to see what else they could make.

In contrast, very few participants described the non-playful condition as enjoyable and motivating. The following of advice mechanically does not lead to many surprises. It might be somewhat fun to get faster at building, but such joy can quickly turn into boredom when confronted with an easy, repetitive task.

Playfulness supports a virtuous circle of experimentation.

Playfulness enhances motivation to learn

This experiment demonstrated how playfulness enhances and increases intrinsic motivation: it provides a drive to do things out of personal interest, not because of some external demand or incentive.

This fostering of an internal drive helps explain why learning is enhanced by playfulness.  Learning requires motivation for individuals to return again and again and not get tired of what they are doing. Playfulness supports a virtuous circle of experimentation, creativity, and learning, which generates personal rewards that encourage people to repeat the process again and again.

Photo provided by the author.

Enhance the features of playfulness

These experiments tell us that, if we want to support playfulness and learning, we should try to enhance the four stepping stones or experiences, mentioned earlier: autonomy, absorbed interaction, surprise, and feeling competent. How do parents, teachers, and others responsible for supporting children’s (and adults’) development encourage these features?

Let us start with autonomy. In a kindergarten or other classroom, a teacher should explore the opportunities for children to be autonomous. Is the environment unnecessarily restrictive, forbidding, or intimidating? Which rules are absolutely necessary? Which could be replaced by more open frameworks?

Some kindergartens have “yes” wristbands that represent a simple agreement: The child can do anything that day as long as his or her actions do not hurt anybody or damage equipment. Teachers love this simple idea, with many saying that it allows them to avoid constantly saying “no” and thus interrupting or hindering play.

What about art galleries or even public libraries? Many feature a lot of rules for what visitors can or cannot do. People are expected to remain quiet and not interact with other visitors. They have to move carefully. They cannot eat or drink. There are alternatives: The Aarhus Library in Aarhus, Denmark, has large, dedicated playgrounds indoors and outdoors.

It has a large café, but visitors can bring their own food and drink and consume them wherever they like. People of all ages and backgrounds mix and mingle there. For those who need silence, the library has soundproofed, silent reading and working rooms.

Similarly, the Trapholt Museum in Kolding, Denmark. shows its permanent collection in a setting where visitors are asked to curate their own personal exhibitions. They can view the artworks and if they like a particular one, hold a chip to its nametag that saves the details electronically. Visitors are then asked to create their own exhibition, starting with this artwork, creating a title, and bringing together other artworks that fit the theme or intention.

Once visitors have collected eight artworks, they can visit a virtual room to place them in an exhibition space that others can visit virtually. While the visitors have never touched any of the artworks, they have engaged with them, selected them, thought about them, brought them into relationships with each other, and placed them into their own exhibition.

They have exerted agency and probably had fun. Often, strangers show their personal exhibitions to each other and laugh about their ideas.

We should try to enhance four stepping stones or experiences: autonomy, absorbed interaction, surprise, and feeling competent.

Supporting absorbed interaction

How might children be encouraged to become absorbed with materials? Simply by offering them interesting materials and asking them to get engaged with them (without telling them precisely what to do). For example, an adult might roll out some old wallpaper in the yard and place fingerpaint nearby. He or she could tell the children that they cannot find the brushes and ask them to help find something else to paint with.

Can they paint with a stick? With its sharp end only? How does it look if, instead, the stick is rolled over the paper? What about using leaves? Stones? Feet? Yes, it can get messy, but if the adult makes sure nothing valuable gets in the way, children will play for hours.

Adults should take care not to throw away children’s artwork after they are finished. Instead, they can hang it on a line to dry and next time, ask them to cut or rip the works into interesting pieces and glue them onto postcards to make birthday cards. Playfulness produces so many possibilities.

Generating surprise and competence

Adults should also think about what generates surprise. One day, my daughter and I were walking through a wooded area and I asked her, “What if everything we see stares back at us? Like the tree, for example.” She looked a bit puzzled. “The tree?” she asked. “Yes!” I replied. “But it has no eyes!” she answered. “Are you sure? I feel it sees us. And did you know that cabbages pull their leaves closer when snails are approaching?”

She giggled. And then she whispered, “The tree is my friend.” “How do you know?” I asked. “I can feel it! It likes my green trousers!” Then she came closer and whispered, “But I think the dandelions are afraid of Solveig (my second, 2-year-old daughter) – they know she will feed them to the sheep.” I giggled, too. “But maybe it just tickles getting eaten?” I suggested. We went on for quite a while, going from surprise to surprise. And I found that I learned a lot during this conversation.

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However, the three are, in fact, playing nicely together. They are communicating, though not through back-and-forth verbal dialogue. Each closely follows the others’ hand movements in the construction process, and these hand actions are like taking turns in a conversation. Bursts of songs signal togetherness. One child hums the famous “Halleluiah” section of “The Messiah,” while another follows by humming, in falsetto, a less well-known part of the oratorio. One child rolls the die and declares in imitation of Fortnite, “I am the One.” Another child does something with her hands. “Wow,” exclaims her friend.

This type of close observation highlights how autistic children do, indeed, relate to each other, but not in neurotypical language or in ways that neurotypical people instantly recognize. It can be difficult for people unfamiliar with children with autism to understand what is happening. This can easily result in erroneous conclusions, such as the mistaken view that autistic children dislike social relationships and prefer to play alone. Such misunderstanding can endanger autistic children because a major threat to their quality of life is loneliness and a dearth of friendships. Play-based social learning can help them avoid these dangers.

Parallel play among autistic children is a route to social play, not at odds with it.

Differences in autistic children

Autistic children value play with their peers and many are able to play with each other. However, they may communicate more visually and with their hands, rather than in the more verbal way of other children. They may need different facilitation strategies and more support than their neurotypical peers.

The benefit of carefully watching how autistic children play is that it can help others create environments that support the way they actually play, rather than spending time and effort instructing them how to play in neurotypical ways.

Inside parallel play

Some autistic children like to play in parallel. In general, the neurotypical world does not consider this type of play “social” play, but rather as an isolated, solo activity. But in our observations, we have seen that parallel play can be very social. For example, we watched three children building on their individual Lego boards. One was building a house, another was constructing a forest, and the third was building a TV set. We realized that the third child was watching the TV inside the house in the forest. This experience shows the need to cherish parallel play and let it continue until windows of connection occur, as they inevitably do. If we ask ourselves how we can support and strengthen these opportunities for connection, we will recognize that parallel play among autistic children is a route to social play, not at odds with it.

Photo provided by the author.

Understanding this can help teachers support the social dynamics of autistic children and tinker with those dynamics to support togetherness. In one game, we gave each child a Lego board and suggested that they build a bridge and they had to meet in the middle. In another game, children built a tower. Each child had bricks of a particular color, but the game stipulated that they should not place a brick of one color on top of a brick of the same color. As a result, the children enjoyed open-ended play, which gave them agency. The color rule supported the interaction of their parallel play. Simple games like this may be repeated with slight variations to create learning environments that are predictable, but not tedious, to support autistic children in developing their unique ways of socializing through hands-on experience.

Helping articulation of frustration

Accepting that autistic children can and do communicate  – albeit in atypical ways that may eschew direct language  – helps us support them when they become frustrated. In our work, we try to encourage children to tell the stories of their frustrations, recognizing that verbal explanations may not come easily. For example, in a play session involving a child with two younger children, the older and more experienced child became frustrated with the slowness of the others. To explain, he built a train track with three children on the platform, communicating that he felt like he was waiting for a train, which was frustrating. By ensuring that he had a way to express his feelings practically, we made it easier for him to manage his emotions and be patient.

Try to understand the social strategies the child uses to play with others. Create environments in which those strategies are easy for the child to use.

Suggestions for parents and teachers

We offer three suggestions for those who want to support children who are on the spectrum to ensure that they have access to play-based social learning. First, try to understand the social strategies the child uses to play with others. Create environments in which those strategies are easy for the child to use.

Second, do not be concerned if a child seems to play in parallel with others. At some point, as in the examples mentioned, a window between two parallel players will open. See parallel play as a route to social play.

Third, always assume that children are competent. Whether someone is silent, says “um,” or repeats a sentence, it is all meaningful. Think carefully about what children are doing because their actions provide a window into the way they are interpreting the situation. For example, when a child is tapping, there is something behind that. Behavior is communication.

We think of play as a way of learning – and not just for children. It is also a way for adults to learn about children. Just as we want children to learn from the play situation, so should adults. Be curious in the same way you want children to be curious. Try to adjust the environment to fit how the child is feeling that day – no day is ever the same as another and you never know in advance how a child is feeling.

If you wish to learn more, we have a resource tool kit for playing with children on the spectrum.

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Yet fear is often conceived of as an emotion to be avoided and a feeling that exists to keep humans and other animals away from experiences that could be dangerous. Often, people think children should experience this emotion as rarely as possible. How then do we explain the paradox of horror? How do we explain why we are drawn to fear and why we enjoy certain forms of such experiences, even when we are children?

In our Recreational Fear Lab in Denmark, we have conducted research that aims to answer these questions. In our work, we also explored whether carefully regulated scaring of young children may be happening in preschool and child care settings, sometimes even before children have learned to walk.

‘There seems to be a sweet spot when it comes to recreational fear … where delight is related to a manageable amount of fearful surprise that a person can deal with and ultimately learn from.’

In our study, we found that Danish nurseries commonly engage in scary activities. A singing game about a sleeping bear ends with all the children roaring “Rrrrrrr” at each other and collapsing into laughter. In another game, a child sits on an adult’s lap as if riding on a horse and then, at the end of the game, the adult pulls his or her legs apart and the child falls through the middle. Again, there are squeals of surprise and laughter.

Getting scariness right for toddlers

In these scary games, the adults are being careful. They do not frighten the children mindlessly. They try to get the level just right – not too much, not too little. And they choose the time for such play carefully – early in the day, when the children are well fed and rested and able to handle it. Even though this process is not part of their formal training, educators are committed to it and when asked, they are eager to discuss it.

The game and the surprise are not always the same. Sometimes, the children hear the story of the “Three Billy Goats Gruff” in which an ogre controls a bridge across which three goats must pass; the story is animated with dolls. Each time a goat tries to cross, the ogre declares in a deep, scary voice, “I’m going to eat you,” and the goat responds, “No, no, you should wait to eat my brother. He’s bigger!” The story ends with the third and largest brother crossing the bridge and beating up the troll.

If the teachers see that children are enjoying this tale, they sometimes take the story to the next level. They might add a bit of theatre, dressing up and acting out the scene on the bridge to make it a bit scarier, a little more real. But they do this only if they feel the children are ready for an added dose of scariness.

Learning to handle scares is key to brain development

Most of these games share a common feature – a predictable pattern of suspense. They are trying to teach children that, in a moment, they are going to be given a scare. The children are learning to anticipate – and manage – a soft jump in their fear, similar to what they may encounter at points in their lives.

Many Danish nursery and preschool teachers see it almost as an obligation to expose children to these types of experiences because children need to learn to deal with the unexpected and the scary. It is a way to counteract “helicopter parenting” or what Danes call “curling culture,” in which parents sometimes anticipate and sweep away difficulties in their children’s lives, leaving them possibly less able to deal with future problems by themselves.

We believe that children have fun and feel good during these scary experiences because, in the process, they are making something unpredictable more predictable. This exercise fits some of the main cognitive principles about the brain, which works like an advanced prediction machine, constantly trying to predict or guess what the future will bring (see Play in Predictive Minds: A Cognitive Theory of Play).

How to spot the right level of scariness

In general, play appears to be a deliberate quest for measured doses of unpredictability. When we play, we explore the borderlands of our sphere of knowledge. Totally unpredictable play is not much fun. It can feel chaotic. And predictable play is not fun either – it can be boring. The trick is finding the sweet spot, the perfect path through our personal borderlands.

‘A moderate scare can be good because it gives us an opportunity to learn how our bodies respond in certain ways to certain experiences.’

This theory of play applies to scary experiences, too, when they happen at the right level for children and are playful. Children often give signals when they are at their sweet spot – a shriek of laughter and surprise, signs that they are having fun, not being traumatized. Parents should be guided by signals that their child is handling the experience well, learning, and figuring out how to predict what will happen next.

Such sweet-spot moments have also been identified in reports of scary experiences by older children and adults. They have even been observed physiologically. We conducted a study of adults and children over age 12 who visited a haunted attraction. They completed questionnaires about how they experienced various moments and we mapped those answers against variations in their heart rates, which were monitored during the frightening experience.

The physiology of scary play

We found that enjoyment in the haunted attraction was related to just-right fluctuations in participants’ heart rate. In other words, “fun” coincided with moderate whoops and deviations in the heart’s fluctuations. In contrast, participants who reported that they did not enjoy the scary experiences either had larger variations in their heart rates, suggesting an overwhelming experience, or showed no change in heart rate, suggesting that they may have disassociated from or become bored by the experience.

Photo: Shutterstock.

We should not be surprised that joy springs from such an apparently negative emotion as fear. Nearly 300 years ago, David Hume, the Scottish philosopher, observed in his essay “Of Tragedy” that there is “an unaccountable pleasure, which the spectators of a well written tragedy receive from sorrow, terror . . . and other passions, which are in themselves disagreeable and uneasy. The more they are touched and affected, the more are they delighted with the spectacle.”

Paul Bloom, the esteemed Yale psychologist who is now a professor at Toronto University, underscores Hume’s observations and was among the first to suggest that many enjoyable experiences are also typically characterized by hitting a sweet spot. For example, a hug should be neither too hard nor too soft, and coffee should be neither too hot nor too cold. Similarly, there seems to be a sweet spot when it comes to recreational fear – those occasions when individuals derive pleasure out of fear – where delight is related to a manageable amount of fearful surprise that a person can deal with and ultimately learn from.

Overall, this is reasonable. It makes sense that a successful organism, such as a human being, should have a reward mechanism associated with learning so it can adapt to more circumstances and enhance its capacities to survive and thrive.

Bodily experience of playful fear

The haunted attraction experiment may highlight how we sometimes learn not only about phenomena outside of ourselves, but also about our own physiological responses. A moderate scare can be good because it gives us an opportunity to learn how our bodies respond in certain ways to certain experiences. We may then be more prepared to manage those responses in a better way if they happen again. We suspect that this is one reason children – and adults – repeat scary experiences, so they can go through the physiological impact again and learn how to recover more effectively.

‘The children are learning to anticipate – and manage – a soft jump in their fear, similar to what they may encounter at points in their lives.’

Some researchers argue that anxiety is epidemic among young people today not only because we are better at diagnosing it. They suggest that the increase might also be linked to the decline in the incidence of risky play, in part because of urbanization, less outside space for play, a focus on preventing children from getting hurt, and increased technology for play in the home. Taken together, these factors are reducing forms of risky play that are often the very circumstances in which children seek out appropriately scary experiences for themselves. So people today may be less experienced at being scared in a safe way, which may, in turn, contribute to the overall increase in general anxiety.

In summary, it is important not to misunderstand the fun derived from recreational fear. This is not a suggestion that parents hide in the closet and jump out to scare their kids. Rather, it is a reminder to look for those times when children squeal and laugh and shriek with delight. There is a good chance that these are signs that they are learning.

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