Young children's play: a matter of advanced strategies among peers

The study investigates how kindergarten children negotiate participation in play. The study focuses on how children build relationships, negotiate rights and exclude and include each other in play.

The results show that even young children can perform advanced social actions in order to achieve a hierarchical order that distinguishes between different social roles and relationships in play. They use various forms of verbal negotiation (challenges, provocations, inclusion, exclusion, creating alliances and shifting alliances), but also non-verbal strategies (nagging, pointing, hitting and ignoring).

Five children between the ages of three and five in a Swedish kindergarten were observed in everyday play for a period of ten months. The children’s play, outside and inside, was video recorded and analysed with a focus on both verbal and non-verbal actions.

Cederborg, A.-C. (2020). “Young children's play: a matter of advanced strategies among peers”. Early Child Development and Care, 190(5):778-790.