Provided by ICPA.
Risky Play
Fear, you would think, is a negative experience, to be avoided whenever possible. Yet, as everyone who has a child or once was one knows, children love to play in risky ways—ways that combine the joy of freedom with just the right measure of fear to produce the exhilarating blend we identify as thrill.
A theme underlying my new Substack series is that Mother Nature (the goddess of natural selection) endowed us, especially when we are young, with strong drives to play in ways that have life-promoting benefits. So why, if that is true, did she endow children with a drive to flirt with danger in their play?
I’ll get to that, but first, here’s a bit on the common forms of risky play observed in children worldwide.
Six Common Categories of Risky Play
Ellen Sandseter has identified six categories of risky play that are common to children everywhere. These are (with my elaborations):
- Great heights. Children climb trees and other structures to scary heights.
- Rapid speeds. Children swing on vines, ropes, or playground swings; slide fast on sleds, skis, skates, or playground slides; shoot down rapids on logs or boats; and ride bikes, skateboards, and other devices fast enough to produce the thrill of partly losing control.
- Dangerous tools. Depending on the culture, children play with knives, bows and arrows, farm machinery, woodworking equipment, or other tools known to be potentially dangerous.
- Dangerous elements. Children love to play with fire and in or near deep bodies of water.