Play (part-3)

★Therapeutic Value.

Play is therapeutic. It acts as a catharsis for the elimination of pent-up energy. In everyday life, the child needs some release from the tensions that the restrictions imposed on him by his environment give rise to. Play helps him to express his emotions in a socially acceptable way and allows him to get rid of pent-up energy in a manner that will meet social expectations and win social approval.

These purposes may be served by active physical play-in games and sports-or they may be achieved by indirect methods, such as identification with a character in a book, in a movie, or on the television screen. As the child reads a story or watches a play unfold on the screen, he can express his fears, resentments, anxieties, or even his joys to his satisfaction and thus clear his system of them. Fantasy or make-believe play also serves as an outlet for anxieties and for the tensions anxiety brings. Similarly, mass media, such as comics, movies, and television, serve as outlets for aggressions which the child cannot express directly.

Not only does play provide a therapeutic release for emotional tensions, but it provides an outlet for needs and desires which cannot be otherwise met. If they are met satisfactorily in play whether in dramatic play or through identification with fictional characters—the frustrations of daily life will then be lessened. The child who wants to play the role of a leader, for example, may not be able to achieve this status in real life, but in dramatic play, he can be the father, the teacher, or the general of his army of toy soldiers.

Furthermore, in his play, the child is often able to formulate and carry out plans which help him to solve problems that are of great importance in his private life. The child who has problems with handwriting in school, for example, can acquire skills needed for writing with some success through drawing and painting. Or, through his dramatic play, he may find a method of dealing successfully with the domination of an older sibling.

The therapeutic value of play has been employed in dealing with children's behavior problems in the form of play therapy. As Axline has pointed out, "Play therapy is based upon the fact that play is the child's natural medium of self-expression. It is an opportunity which is given to the child to "play out' his feelings and problems, just as in certain types of adult therapy, an individual 'talks out his difficulties". When a child plays house with dolls that represent different family members, for example, it is possible for the therapist to get a clue to how he feels about the different members of his family. Should he hit a doll that represents a baby or younger sibling, or should he have the mother doll slap a doll representing an older sibling, it is possible to conclude what his attitudes toward the members of his own family are.

In either free or controlled situations, an observer can learn about a child's problems, and a child can learn about his own problems and how to face them. As Conn has said, the child "not only learns what he has contributed to the total situation [i.e., his problems] but for the first time finds himself secure in a personal relationship. He can therefore begin to develop the courage that comes from self-criticism, a sense of freedom arising out of self expression and be helped in the direction of happy, healthy living”.