What do rats, apes and children have in common?
How rough-and-tumble play is a biological - and psychological - necessity
When you have children, you have to encourage them to take risks, because they have to grow up. You can’t protect them too much because if you do, you can destroy them.
- Jordan B Peterson
As the world’s neurotic obsession with keeping children safe continues, we are losing sight of how physical and mental discomfort is essential to development in an inevitably uncomfortable world. We have become determined to supervise everything and step in when things become too dangerous, instead of leaving children alone to discover their own, and others’ physical limitations. This leads to an overemphasis on what is dangerous, rather than what should be explored. Play is exploratory, slightly dangerous and therefore fun.
The biological need for physicality
Physical play is a fundamental part of biology, observable across many species, and used to develop an awareness of appropriate social interactions. Even the submissive act of ‘pinning’ an opponent has been observed in the likes of apes, rats, and dogs, in order to indicate hierarchical dominance whilst avoiding unnecessary violence. Maternal instincts crucially keep infants safe during the first couple of years of development, but once children start to feel more comfortable in their environment - typically around the terrible twos - their predisposition to push boundaries starts to emerge. At this point, it is vital to reset the household hierarchy and foster essential social and physical skills.
The benefits of rough-and-tumble
Innate and observed behaviour will emerge to test the waters (patience), for a variety of reasons, which children will later use to establish themselves within their social group. If a child is fun to play with - and understands social and physical boundaries - other children want to play with them and adults will want to teach them. Unsocialised children, however, struggle with the likes of school, where we are seeing play-inhibiting drugs - like Ritalin and Adderall - prescribed more regularly. They also face a higher likelihood of long-term challenges with employment, substance abuse and mental illness, which are damaging to the individual and society as a whole. Rough-and-tumble play provides an appropriately safe environment for children to cultivate essential social skills and test their physical - and emotional - limits. The key benefits are:
Physical competence: distinguish between true aggression and play, what is safe for their current ability and appreciation for what hurts and what actually hurts
Emotional regulation: handling provocation, keeping excitement, fear and frustration under control and not letting emotions control their actions
Social awareness: empathy for personal boundaries and pain is developed alongside the art of cooperation and negotiation
Problem-solving: physical challenges that require quick thinking and effective cognitive strategies in real-time
Parent-child bonding: respect for authority, trust, empathy, emotional connections and, most importantly, it’s fun.
Effective strategies
The act of rough play comes naturally to less protective parents, so it’s important to understand that risking injuries and tantrums is a natural part of the process which shouldn’t be discouraged. Here are some strategies to incorporate it:
Start simple: off-balance games are low-risk and allow for all physical capabilities to participate, while still gaining the benefits.
Stand on one leg - maybe on a ledge - and see if your opponent can pull you off balance, scale up from arm only, then gradually add other body parts. This progression method can be applied to many games
Establish clear physical and emotional rules of play, especially when starting out.
These should become unwritten rules as they develop a natural understanding of boundaries and expectations
Stop when lines are crossed, rules are broken, or they go too far
Reflect on why, only if they don’t know. Too many lectures take the fun out of it, especially when it should be obvious what line was crossed.
Praise and encourage positive behaviours demonstrated during or after play
The adult must be dominant most of the time
Aim for a 70/30 win rate. An excessive sense of dominance in children can increase anti-social behaviour and never winning leads to a loss of interest
Introduce physical activities like contact sports, parkour, martial arts and wrestling which will continue to challenge and stretch their physical capabilities.
Rough and tumble play is more essential now than ever as children are outdoors less, have access to virtual adventures on tap - without real-life physical interactions - and are then expected to sit in a classroom perfectly regulated.
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