Katie Dickison

LBST 392

Nancy van Groll

June 12, 2020

                                         Reading Reflection 4

Leif Edward and Ottesen Kennair’s article titled Children’s Risky Play from an Evolutionary Perspective: The Anti-Phobic Effects of Thrilling Experiences is an analysis of Ellen Beate and Hansen Sandseter’s study on risky play to determine the specific evolutionary functions and anti-phobic effects of risky play. What stood out to me the most when reading the article was the distinction between risks and hazards. Even though this wasn’t a central point of the article, I believe it’s important to note how different they are when looking into risky play and determining what constitutes a hazard vs. a risk. Because generally, there’s a misconception that risks and hazards are synonymous – that risk-taking is an adverse action that always leads to injury. By way of having a skewed perception, risky play is then given a bad rap. However, to discourage such perspective, Edward and Kennair believe that risk-taking should be seen “as a situation in which we are required to make choices among alternate courses of action where the outcome is unknown” (261). – That risk-taking is essential in order to be prepared to meet risks and manage them, whereas hazards are more dangerous because they are something that a child does not see. Therefore, the role of the parent should not be to eliminate risks but to eliminate hazards. Learning this information was so beneficial because it then answered a previous question I had as to what the ideal role of a caretaker would be in a situation where you want to promote risky play, but also keep their safety in mind. Now I know, that as a caretaker, “we should try to eliminate hazards that children cannot see or manage without removing all risks so that children can meet challenges and choose to take risks in relatively safe play settings” (Edward & Kennair 261).                                                                            

Something else that stood out to me was the fact that the overestimation of a child’s perceived ability is a more common cause for injury than the characteristics of the play equipment. The leading cause of injury is not due to the play equipment itself, but a child using the equipment in a way it was not intended. For example, when they decide to walk on top of the monkey bars or go head first down the slide. “No matter how safe the equipment, the children’s need for excitement seems to make them use it dangerously” (Edward & Kennair 259). Also interestingly enough, it’s important to mention that a child more common to overestimate or engage in risky play is a boy rather than a girl. Now, this in no way surprises me because it’s a well-known fact that boys tend to be a lot more reckless than girls, and I do have a brother so I can confirm this from personal experience. But what was interesting to me was that this might have something to do with our evolutionary roles. The roles being that men were the ones who hunted and protected the family from predators, and women stayed at home performing gathering tasks and taking care of their children. This means that the men were engaging in high-risk activities’ whereas the women were more cautious to survive as they would be the primary caregiver for their children.

Another topic that stood out to me was the section on risky play and hypophobia. This idea that risky play involves a certain degree of hypophobia or a lesser fear of being hurt in a potentially harmful situation (Edward & Kennair 263). Now, in learning about the benefits of risky play and the need to be able to manage certain risks, you forget about the risk involved in having a lack of fear towards a potentially risky activity, such as playing with dangerous tools. When a child has hypophobia towards dangerous tools, they have a higher risk of injury because they are unaware of the danger involved and therefore are less cautious when using the tools. Edward and Kennair suggest this may have something to do with a mismatch between our ancestor’s environment that we have adapted to and our current environment. That because dangerous tools never existed in the past, we never evolved with fear towards them (Edward & Kennair 271). But what’s interesting is that play with dangerous tools is somewhat of a catch 22. That somehow having a lack of fear and not being afraid to interact with hazardous tools allows you to learn how to use them properly and understand how potentially dangerous they are. A perfect example of this is when a parent perceives a great deal of risk when children are interacting with dangerous tools, but the child doesn’t see the perceived risk and instead sees it as a fun activity. It’s the fact that every adult was once that child with a hypophobia towards dangerous tools but has since developed an understanding of the danger involved. So with that being said, how can parents expect their child to perceive their own risk when they refuse to let them experience risk in the first place? Don’t they remember that to learn anything, you must experience it for yourself first?