Children with disabilities: How this relates

Although I haven’t found much research on the effects of structured and unstructured play has on children with disabilities, the amount of play (both structured and unstructured) experienced certainly has an effect on possibly contributing to mental health illnesses. With a decline in play, this has also shown a decline in children’s/adolescents mental health.

"Many sources document this decline in mental health, but the most compelling evidence-because it is not confounded by changes in methods of assessment-comes from analyses of standardized assessment questionnaires that have been administered to normative or quasi-normative populations of young people in schools and colleges over the decades" (Gray, 2011, p. 447). Assessments conducted on young people collectively showed levels of anxiety and depression, as well as indications of other psychological disorders. This having increased and still increasing from the 1950’s. An increase in suicide rates in young people only reinforce the decline of mental health. These studies also noted that most young people felt they had a lack of control or a sense of lack of control over their life, which coincides with depression and anxiety.

Another steady increase that has occurred is that of narcissism. Being narcissistic are people who "tend to exploit others for personal gain, tend to value self-aggrandizement over cooperation, are more likely than others to commit white collar crimes, rank themselves unduly high in leadership abilities, and tend to lash out angrily in response to criticism" (Gray, 2011, p.451).

It hard to believe that there has been such an increase in narcissism considering the increase in anxiety and depression. Gray (2011, p. 451) comments that as "narcissism is sometimes charsterised as equivalent to high self esteem, but it is understood by clinicians to be a fragile and defensive variety of self-esteem...Narcissists commonly experience anxiety and depression when their experiences with reality run counter to their high values".

Overall it is important to have a balance of both structured and unstructured play to gain the benefits of both. It is evident that there still needs to be a lot more research done on how structured and unstructured play has an influence on child and adolescents health.