Jaak Panksepp called the seventh affect system the Play System.
Seven Primary Affect Systems
You might not think of PLAY in terms of affective neuroscience, but according to Jaak Panksepp’s years of lab research, it definitely is. Playfulness is the source of one of the most positive social-affective feelings our brains can generate.
Neuroscientists and psychotherapists have tended to ignore play as a systematic part of psychotherapeutic contexts. But PLAY is a fundamental brain system common to all mammals and perhaps other animals as well. Research suggests that the PLAY system may be especially important in the epigenetic development and maturation of the neocortex.
Further understanding of this system may hold a key to addressing certain problematic childhood emotional problems. Playfulness has to be part of the overall equation. The universal recognition of every child’s need to play may help shape social and educational policies in the future.
Plato said that our children cannot become fully human without play. He extolled the benefits of free childhood play in his treatise “The Laws {VII,794}.”
Why does a play urge exist?
By exploring sight, touch, sound, smell, and taste, children learn about themselves and their environment. Through play, children learn behaviors that facilitate social bonding and social cooperation, leadership and an ability to communicate effectively. PLAY is important for acquiring aggressive, courting, and creativity, even sexual skills.
PLAY stratifies children into a social network that may last a lifetime. They learn with who they can develop cooperative relationships and who they should avoid. They learn who they can dominate and to who they must submit to or accept defeat. They learn who they can bully and who can bully them.
Nonsocial functions of play include enhancement of physical fitness, cognitive functioning, and the ability to innovate and think creatively in a wide range of situations.
But animals must be well fed, comfortable, and healthy for play to occur and all stressors reduce play. So some children get ample opportunity for play, while others who need it most shrink into the background.
Primates have highly developed GRIEF systems and after prolonged isolation young monkeys become despondent; then, following reunion, they huddle together and do not play. Basic needs for social warmth, support, and affiliation must be fulfilled before they feel playful again.
Brain-imaging studies indicate widespread release of opioids in the nervous system during play. The higher levels of brain opioids generate feelings of social confidence and facilitate winning in playful competitions. Animals deprived of play are at an emotional, social, and competitive disadvantage and this seems to be true for humans as well.
In comprehensive research studies of play in rats, Jeffrey S. Burgdorf at Northwestern University found that rough and tumble play (with rats) stimulates neurotrophic factor (BDNF) encouraging the growth and differentiation of new neurons and synapses in the brain. Play significantly modified (epigenetically) about a third of 1,200 brain genes evaluated in the cortex of the brain within an hour after a 30-minute play session. The gene that showed the largest effect was BDNF. Conversely, depression and stress down-regulated the BDNF gene. The BDNF protein made by the BDNF gene is found in regions of the brain that control eating, drinking, and body weight.
Although the brain circuitry of PLAY is still in its infancy, the system has been mapped in rats by stimulating areas of the brain that generate laughter. (Yes, rats laugh, especially when tickled.) The PLAY system maps about the same as the SEEKING system.
Play System
Verbal Exchange
As individuals mature, play becomes focused on verbal exchange. Friendly teasing comes under this category and had I understood this as a teenager, I would have gotten into significantly fewer fights. I did not consider the playful aspect of teasing, although looking back I see that much of it was. I could have benefited by understanding this was normal play that could even cement friendships, especially when the back and forth repartee results in laughter.
That is why especially with young people, play must be a topic thoroughly understood in all its ramifications. Even understanding this now so late in life changes my perspective. Imagine the effect it could have had sixty or seventy years ago. Yet none of my therapists broached this topic of play.
Mind/Body
Harvard cardiologist Herbert Benson, author of “Relaxation Response” and “Relaxation Revolution,” wanted to determine whether mind-body techniques might alter gene expression. He wanted to know which, if any, of the body’s 54,000 genes were “turned on” or “turned off” by mind-body techniques. Epigenetics is the turning on or off of genes by life situations.
His team discovered 2,209 genes that are affected by mind-body techniques. These genes are associated with stress-related medical problems involving immune response, inflammation, aging, thinning of the brain’s cortex, and oxidative stress causing damage to physical tissues by the release of destructive oxygen molecules known as free radicals.
Mind-body practices take a bad gene and make it better. The benefits of mind-body practices include healthful regulation of the immune system, lowered psychosocial stress levels, less destructive oxidative stress, and a reduced tendency toward premature aging. These benefits are associated with healthful gene activity, the opposite of that found in cardiovascular diseases and other medical conditions.
As we get older and older, perhaps play occupies less and less of our lives. It took a lot for me to start up life from ground zero. Starting with Aikido and Ki Breathing Meditation, along the way, I added Vipassana Insight Meditation, Open Focus Training, and Attention Training Therapy. I went from hopelessly damaged goods – psychotic violent monster –to loving husband and father, gradually over a period of several years.
I’m at play on the computer. This offers a bit of flow. When I’m not researching and writing, I’m listening to books on mp3s and podcasts, where I escape into the lives and worlds of others.
Self-help books that help:
Total Self-Renewal through Attention Therapies and Open Focus
The Open-Focus Brain: Harnessing the Power of Attention to Heal Mind and Body
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