Play has always mattered. Our art reveals it. The French writer François Rabelais, in his 1542 novel Gargantua, recounts more than 200 games that his fictional hero plays. Translating the work, German, English, and Dutch writers added hundreds more games. In his 16th century poetry, Mellin de Saint-Gelais wrote about ball games and jeu de prime, a popular card game. Pieter Bruegel’s 1560 oil painting “Children’s Games” depicts a village square where more than 200 children are playing more than 80 games.

Yet over the last half-century, a confluence of forces has wrung free play out of childhood. In the British Journal of Sociology, University of Kent sociologist Adam Burgess, who studies risk, describes how “hustle culture” has led many people to obsess about performance and to avoid anything perceived as frivolous.

Between 1981 and 1997 the time children spent in free play decreased by 25 percent. Along the way, children lost their connection to nature, and screens soaked up more and more time. As a result, today’s childhood experiences radically depart from those of the early 20th century, a period the historian Howard Chudacoff describes as the “golden age of free play.” Boston College psychology professor Peter Gray points to the 1960s, when supervised activities began squeezing out time for children to play together on their own.

While play can contribute to cognitive development, problem-solving skills, language development, and capacity for children to form social relationships, the impracticality of randomized trials has limited our knowledge. Absent ways to assign some children to play-deprived lives and others to play-rich lives, researchers have employed other methods to gain insights.

Australian National University researcher Lynda Sharpe examined how young mammals may use play to improve motor skills, increase physical strength and endurance, practice skills they will need to flourish as adults, manage stress, foster social cohesion, and build relationships. Given the costs of play, which include energy expenditure, risk of injury, spread of disease, and exposure to predators, Sharpe writes that play “must provide players with measurable benefits or it would cease to exist.” Yet we still are figuring out exactly how play may contribute to these outcomes.

Ways to play

Play takes on various forms. In free play, children create their own experiences. A meta-analysis found that free play among children ages three to seven led to increases in physical activity, motivation to be active, and healthy risk taking. The study found limited effects on emotional and social wellbeing. A Hong Kong study of children ages four to six found free play contributed to increased happiness scores.

Before they are 24 months old, children engage in pretend play where they project “an alternative representation on to reality, often in a spirit of fun,” according to University of Virginia psychology professor Angeline Lillard. Pretend play holds appeal around the world, much to the bafflement of most adults (including researchers). Thalia Goldstein, who directs George Mason University’s PLAY Lab, conducted an experiment with preschool students and found that engaging in pretend play was associated with improved emotional control. She found no changes in prosocial behaviors. Hamden-Sydney psychology professor Rebecca Bauer found that preschoolers oriented toward imaginative play and fantasy scored higher on assessments of executive function, vocabulary, and social-emotional development.

Guided play attempts to heighten children’s engagement the way that free play does and build skills and knowledge the way that structured play seeks to do. While guided play blends approaches, ultimately it “is led by the child and is designed to be fun and flexible.”

In outdoor play, children encounter risks that build resilience and foster healthy behaviors, and time spent outdoors is associated with positive mental and physical health. Therapists sometimes recommend outdoor play as treatment for children.

Neglecting play 

Britain’s National Children’s Bureau points to a painfully straightforward explanation of why we have come to neglect play. Children are wired to play, and adults in charge are wired to get the children back on task.

Angeline Lillard, who directs the University of Virginia’s Early Development Laboratory, studies the role of play in social and cognitive development. Reflecting on how we position play for children, Lillard said that “it is very odd in the US—if I may exaggerate a little, some seem to think before age 6 children should only pretend, and once one is talking about school-aged children, we act like play is dispensable. I attribute the latter to Behaviorism and its strong place in our schools, something Europe did not have to contend with. There is not a lot of soul in Behaviorism: Give rewards and punishments and shape behavior. In the school culture wars, this is one side of the pendulum. Perhaps the push to have children pretend a lot before school is partly in reaction to that—let them be free and fantasize because soon it’s all going to be over.”

Revival

The nonprofit organization Playworks trains grade-school students to lead games during recess. Its Game Library, a free guide to hundreds of activities, brings to life the playful world depicted in Pieter Bruegel’s village. In “Pumpkin Face, Raisin Face,” a call-and-response game, first-graders stretch and contort their bodies and expressions based on cues from the leader. Playing “Tornado,” third-graders whip a ball around a circle while a fellow student performs dizzying spins inside the formation. “Lava Game” challenges students to hop from stone to stone to escape the imagined volcanic eruption.

For children, of course, making pumpkin faces is a world apart from methods questions that dominate adult conversations on play. When LEGO asked children why they like to play, the children say playing makes them feel good. In an EU project that interviewed children about play, the children said:

“You don’t have to read instructions. You can make anything.”

If I had a magic wand, “I would get wings on my dogs.”

“I like playing and don’t want to go in.”

Let’s listen to the children. Play: No instructions needed.

John Bare is a writer and photographer with more than two decades of experience working in philanthropy. His latest novel, My Biscuit Baby (2024), is the second installment in the Lassie James Mystery Series.