1
00:00:03,040 --> 00:00:06,800
Speaker 1: Welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind, a production of iHeartRadio.

2
00:00:13,200 --> 00:00:15,520
Speaker 2: Hey, welcome to Stuff to Blow Your Mind. My name

3
00:00:15,560 --> 00:00:16,640
Speaker 2: is Robert Lamb.

4
00:00:16,600 --> 00:00:19,960
Speaker 3: And I am Joe McCormick. And today we returned the

5
00:00:20,000 --> 00:00:24,919
Speaker 3: fourth installment in our discussion of pretend play, play that

6
00:00:25,000 --> 00:00:29,680
Speaker 3: involves non literal action and understanding. So when I pretend

7
00:00:29,760 --> 00:00:32,440
Speaker 3: my fingers are worms crawling up the side of the

8
00:00:32,479 --> 00:00:34,519
Speaker 3: couch that's going on in our house this week, by

9
00:00:34,560 --> 00:00:38,360
Speaker 3: the way, fingers are worms, Or when I pretend a

10
00:00:38,479 --> 00:00:42,239
Speaker 3: cardboard box becomes the castle gray Skull, or when I

11
00:00:42,400 --> 00:00:45,559
Speaker 3: change the diaper on a stuffed velociraptor, or if I

12
00:00:45,600 --> 00:00:48,560
Speaker 3: go on adventures in the backyard with an imaginary friend.

13
00:00:48,800 --> 00:00:51,920
Speaker 3: These are all forms of pretend play, play that takes

14
00:00:51,920 --> 00:00:55,240
Speaker 3: place within a pretend frame and treats anything in the

15
00:00:55,240 --> 00:00:57,760
Speaker 3: world or in the situation as other than what it

16
00:00:57,840 --> 00:01:01,200
Speaker 3: literally is. Now, if we haven't heard the previous parts

17
00:01:01,240 --> 00:01:03,240
Speaker 3: in this series, I think this is one where we

18
00:01:03,280 --> 00:01:05,720
Speaker 3: really would recommend listening in order. We're going to be

19
00:01:05,720 --> 00:01:09,440
Speaker 3: building on some conversations we had in previous episodes today,

20
00:01:10,400 --> 00:01:14,360
Speaker 3: but in those previous installments, to refresh, we talked about

21
00:01:14,440 --> 00:01:18,760
Speaker 3: ways that researchers define and subdivide pretend play into activities

22
00:01:18,800 --> 00:01:23,120
Speaker 3: like object substitution. So one of our favorite examples is

23
00:01:23,120 --> 00:01:25,480
Speaker 3: banana is a telephone. They talk about that a lot

24
00:01:25,520 --> 00:01:29,720
Speaker 3: in the research enactment play where you might be You know,

25
00:01:29,800 --> 00:01:33,560
Speaker 3: I am cooking dinner in my play kitchen replica, play

26
00:01:33,600 --> 00:01:36,760
Speaker 3: where you have my toy triceratops as cooking dinner in

27
00:01:36,800 --> 00:01:42,399
Speaker 3: the dollhouse, imaginary companions, and other things. We talked about

28
00:01:42,440 --> 00:01:46,200
Speaker 3: possible links explored in the research between pretend play and

29
00:01:46,240 --> 00:01:52,200
Speaker 3: the development of advanced cognitive skills like symbolic understanding, counterfactual reasoning,

30
00:01:52,600 --> 00:01:56,720
Speaker 3: and theory of mind, addressing the question of whether pretending

31
00:01:56,840 --> 00:02:00,720
Speaker 3: might help children develop some of those important faculties, or

32
00:02:00,760 --> 00:02:04,080
Speaker 3: at least whether pretending in those faculties might draw on

33
00:02:04,160 --> 00:02:08,720
Speaker 3: the same underlying neural structures. In Part two, we talked

34
00:02:08,760 --> 00:02:13,080
Speaker 3: in more depth about research on imaginary friends and imaginary companions,

35
00:02:13,480 --> 00:02:16,839
Speaker 3: how often they manifest within and across different cultures, what

36
00:02:16,919 --> 00:02:20,480
Speaker 3: forms they take, what children believe they know, and things

37
00:02:20,520 --> 00:02:23,399
Speaker 3: like that. In the most recent episode, we looked more

38
00:02:23,440 --> 00:02:27,640
Speaker 3: at the question of how adult culture influences pretend play

39
00:02:27,680 --> 00:02:31,240
Speaker 3: among children, noting that while pretending does appear to be

40
00:02:31,280 --> 00:02:35,799
Speaker 3: basically universal, there is pretty wide variation in how much

41
00:02:36,000 --> 00:02:40,080
Speaker 3: children play pretend, and in the themes of the pretend play,

42
00:02:40,480 --> 00:02:44,000
Speaker 3: and in some particular cases, in the framing of whether

43
00:02:44,040 --> 00:02:48,120
Speaker 3: pretend entities are understood as real in some important way

44
00:02:48,400 --> 00:02:52,000
Speaker 3: or not. And then last time we also examined the

45
00:02:52,120 --> 00:02:57,680
Speaker 3: fascinating phenomenon of paracosms, essentially extending the concept of an

46
00:02:57,720 --> 00:03:01,280
Speaker 3: imaginary friend to where it is not a single character

47
00:03:01,400 --> 00:03:05,440
Speaker 3: or playmate, but an entire imaginary world, maybe with its

48
00:03:05,480 --> 00:03:10,680
Speaker 3: own geography, culture, populations, and rules. And we discussed links

49
00:03:10,720 --> 00:03:15,120
Speaker 3: between a childhood tendency to generate paracosms and things like

50
00:03:15,240 --> 00:03:16,799
Speaker 3: creativity in later life.

51
00:03:17,080 --> 00:03:20,440
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, and I have a paracosm update here. Oh

52
00:03:20,520 --> 00:03:23,359
Speaker 2: really yeah, Because after we'd record this, I realized, well,

53
00:03:23,360 --> 00:03:26,840
Speaker 2: my child is twelve and almost thirteen, which places them

54
00:03:27,080 --> 00:03:30,160
Speaker 2: toward the end of what is broadly considered the paracosm

55
00:03:30,200 --> 00:03:34,079
Speaker 2: period for kids. So I asked them the next morning

56
00:03:34,080 --> 00:03:36,640
Speaker 2: over breakfast. I was like, I know you had some

57
00:03:36,720 --> 00:03:40,600
Speaker 2: pretend worlds and or have pretend worlds that you sometimes

58
00:03:40,640 --> 00:03:45,720
Speaker 2: engage with other friends. Tell me about them. And so

59
00:03:46,320 --> 00:03:48,080
Speaker 2: they laid it all out for me. They said, there

60
00:03:48,120 --> 00:03:52,320
Speaker 2: are two pretend worlds, both of them social in nature,

61
00:03:52,600 --> 00:03:56,040
Speaker 2: that they shared with one particular other friend. So one

62
00:03:56,080 --> 00:04:00,320
Speaker 2: of these with one friend is essentially an extrapol of

63
00:04:00,360 --> 00:04:04,560
Speaker 2: Star Wars. They said. It's different planets set in the

64
00:04:04,600 --> 00:04:09,360
Speaker 2: Old Republic era on which Jedis have adventures. Okay, which

65
00:04:09,560 --> 00:04:11,200
Speaker 2: I think that's a pretty good example because it's like,

66
00:04:11,280 --> 00:04:14,240
Speaker 2: clearly it's built upon the Star Wars universe, but a

67
00:04:14,320 --> 00:04:16,599
Speaker 2: universe like the Star Wars universe is kind of limitless,

68
00:04:16,920 --> 00:04:20,279
Speaker 2: so yeah, you can build out other things that draw

69
00:04:20,560 --> 00:04:23,680
Speaker 2: on the existing Star Wars lore, but but generate new

70
00:04:23,720 --> 00:04:26,960
Speaker 2: ideas as well. And then the other one. I think

71
00:04:26,960 --> 00:04:30,080
Speaker 2: this was earlier. It was a really wild take on

72
00:04:30,160 --> 00:04:33,679
Speaker 2: Pokemon that they had with another friend that was super

73
00:04:33,720 --> 00:04:36,720
Speaker 2: into Pokemon at the time, and they would describe these

74
00:04:36,760 --> 00:04:41,479
Speaker 2: epic wars between Pokemon factions and like an evil Pikachu.

75
00:04:41,720 --> 00:04:43,560
Speaker 2: It was really wild, and at the time it was

76
00:04:43,640 --> 00:04:45,800
Speaker 2: like it was at times it was a little much.

77
00:04:45,839 --> 00:04:49,280
Speaker 2: I was like, this Pikachu is an ally, guys, what

78
00:04:49,520 --> 00:04:50,000
Speaker 2: are you doing.

79
00:04:50,839 --> 00:04:53,320
Speaker 3: Is evil Pikachu already a thing? Or is that that's

80
00:04:53,720 --> 00:04:54,560
Speaker 3: purely original?

81
00:04:54,800 --> 00:04:57,279
Speaker 2: I mean, Pikachu's been around long enough. I imagine all

82
00:04:57,360 --> 00:05:01,200
Speaker 2: variations possible have been dreamt off. Pikachu, I'm sure has

83
00:05:01,600 --> 00:05:03,520
Speaker 2: played a role in various paracosms.

84
00:05:03,920 --> 00:05:06,080
Speaker 3: I am Pikachu, I contain multitudes.

85
00:05:06,440 --> 00:05:08,880
Speaker 2: Yeah, for some reason, these kids didn't like Pikachu. I

86
00:05:08,880 --> 00:05:11,880
Speaker 2: think they didn't like Pikachu's fame, like Pikachu being the

87
00:05:11,880 --> 00:05:17,320
Speaker 2: most famous of the Pokemon. But they love Piachu, the

88
00:05:17,440 --> 00:05:20,120
Speaker 2: Pokemon that evolves into Pikachu. So there you go.

89
00:05:20,120 --> 00:05:24,000
Speaker 3: Gotta take Pikachu down a pig. I guess so well. Obviously,

90
00:05:24,000 --> 00:05:26,159
Speaker 3: Pretend to Play is a really rich subject where we

91
00:05:26,279 --> 00:05:29,120
Speaker 3: just keep finding new angles to examine and things to

92
00:05:29,160 --> 00:05:31,360
Speaker 3: talk about. I don't know exactly how many parts we're

93
00:05:31,360 --> 00:05:33,360
Speaker 3: going to go to here. This will be part four.

94
00:05:33,400 --> 00:05:36,000
Speaker 3: We may actually make it to part five in this series,

95
00:05:36,600 --> 00:05:39,920
Speaker 3: but there was something I wanted to address in today's episode.

96
00:05:41,000 --> 00:05:45,440
Speaker 3: One reason is that one of the big overviews of

97
00:05:45,520 --> 00:05:48,440
Speaker 3: pretend to Play research addressing like the links with other

98
00:05:48,520 --> 00:05:50,760
Speaker 3: cognitive capacities and stuff like that, one of the big

99
00:05:50,760 --> 00:05:53,320
Speaker 3: overviews we talked about. It's about ten years old at

100
00:05:53,320 --> 00:05:55,120
Speaker 3: this point, so I was looking around for some more

101
00:05:55,160 --> 00:05:57,880
Speaker 3: recent research on Pretend to Play to see if there

102
00:05:57,880 --> 00:06:00,000
Speaker 3: are kind of updates to any of the stuff we've

103
00:06:00,080 --> 00:06:03,040
Speaker 3: already talked about. Obviously there's new stuff coming out all

104
00:06:03,080 --> 00:06:05,919
Speaker 3: the time. But one thing that caught my attention was

105
00:06:05,960 --> 00:06:09,200
Speaker 3: when I came across an interesting write up in Nautilus

106
00:06:09,320 --> 00:06:13,960
Speaker 3: by Elena Rankin from September twenty twenty four, which was

107
00:06:14,040 --> 00:06:17,320
Speaker 3: reporting on a paper published in the journal Cognitive Development

108
00:06:17,440 --> 00:06:19,920
Speaker 3: the same year. And that paper was by a pair

109
00:06:19,960 --> 00:06:23,760
Speaker 3: of researchers named Elena Hoyka who is affiliated with the

110
00:06:23,839 --> 00:06:27,920
Speaker 3: University of Bristol, and Eloise Prutin, who at the time

111
00:06:27,960 --> 00:06:32,200
Speaker 3: I believe was a trainee clinical psychologist at Oxford. And

112
00:06:32,279 --> 00:06:36,520
Speaker 3: this paper is called the Early Pretending Survey or EPs,

113
00:06:36,960 --> 00:06:41,080
Speaker 3: A Reliable Parent Report Measure of Pretense Type Development for

114
00:06:41,240 --> 00:06:46,000
Speaker 3: four to forty seven month olds. Now we've already talked

115
00:06:46,120 --> 00:06:50,039
Speaker 3: about a few different kinds of pretend play and how

116
00:06:50,120 --> 00:06:53,640
Speaker 3: they don't all emerge at once, but rather come online

117
00:06:53,720 --> 00:06:57,120
Speaker 3: at different times as a child grows up, as the

118
00:06:57,200 --> 00:07:02,040
Speaker 3: children developed different mental and physical capabilit Something interesting that

119
00:07:02,080 --> 00:07:06,000
Speaker 3: this twenty twenty four paper did was get really granular

120
00:07:06,240 --> 00:07:09,960
Speaker 3: in that specific regard breaking pretend to play down into

121
00:07:10,120 --> 00:07:14,240
Speaker 3: lots of different categories, in fact, into nineteen different categories

122
00:07:14,280 --> 00:07:17,360
Speaker 3: of activity, and then they did a large survey of

123
00:07:17,400 --> 00:07:20,320
Speaker 3: the parents of about nine hundred kids between the ages

124
00:07:20,360 --> 00:07:23,120
Speaker 3: of four months old to forty seven months, which is

125
00:07:23,200 --> 00:07:25,960
Speaker 3: just shy four years old, to try to get fine

126
00:07:26,080 --> 00:07:30,360
Speaker 3: detail on when parents observed all these different types of

127
00:07:30,400 --> 00:07:35,320
Speaker 3: pretend play first manifesting. Now you might think nineteen different

128
00:07:35,360 --> 00:07:37,560
Speaker 3: types of pretending, like, how do you get to that?

129
00:07:37,720 --> 00:07:39,880
Speaker 3: Like beyond the banana phone, I don't know what else

130
00:07:39,960 --> 00:07:43,160
Speaker 3: is there? You got imaginary friends, banana phone, I'm a lion,

131
00:07:43,720 --> 00:07:47,640
Speaker 3: what's left? And it's true that some of these categories

132
00:07:47,680 --> 00:07:50,280
Speaker 3: they explore are kind of overlapping or are kind of

133
00:07:50,360 --> 00:07:54,800
Speaker 3: subdivisions of activities we've already talked about into two different subtypes,

134
00:07:54,800 --> 00:07:57,320
Speaker 3: but I still thought it was really interesting, and this

135
00:07:57,440 --> 00:08:01,000
Speaker 3: brought up stuff that I had actually observed with my

136
00:08:01,040 --> 00:08:03,640
Speaker 3: own daughter but had sort of forgotten about in our

137
00:08:03,680 --> 00:08:07,600
Speaker 3: earlier discussions of pretend play from this series. So I

138
00:08:07,640 --> 00:08:11,000
Speaker 3: want to look through this list of play activities from

139
00:08:11,040 --> 00:08:11,480
Speaker 3: the paper.

140
00:08:11,520 --> 00:08:13,640
Speaker 2: Okay, all right, this will be fun, because, yeah, I

141
00:08:13,680 --> 00:08:16,120
Speaker 2: think we can compare notes in multiple ways here.

142
00:08:16,360 --> 00:08:18,000
Speaker 3: So we're going to start with some we haven't really

143
00:08:18,000 --> 00:08:22,160
Speaker 3: talked about before. One category is pretending to be in

144
00:08:22,320 --> 00:08:26,600
Speaker 3: another state. Now that's not a state, like a geographic region,

145
00:08:26,920 --> 00:08:30,160
Speaker 3: a state, another state of being, like pretending to be

146
00:08:30,240 --> 00:08:34,080
Speaker 3: asleep or pretending to sneeze when you don't actually have

147
00:08:34,160 --> 00:08:37,760
Speaker 3: to sneeze. Somewhat similar but a little bit different is

148
00:08:37,920 --> 00:08:39,280
Speaker 3: pretending to cry.

149
00:08:40,200 --> 00:08:43,920
Speaker 2: Hmm, okay, there are different dynamics to all of these,

150
00:08:44,000 --> 00:08:47,040
Speaker 2: because you know, you can pretend to cry and work

151
00:08:47,080 --> 00:08:49,520
Speaker 2: yourself up to a real cry. Oh sure, I don't

152
00:08:49,640 --> 00:08:51,880
Speaker 2: know if you can do that with a sneeze. Maybe

153
00:08:51,920 --> 00:08:55,000
Speaker 2: there's been research into this. Likewise, you can pretend to

154
00:08:55,040 --> 00:08:56,600
Speaker 2: be asleep and fall asleep.

155
00:08:57,160 --> 00:09:01,119
Speaker 3: But yeah, okay, here's another one. Pretending to do everyday

156
00:09:01,200 --> 00:09:04,800
Speaker 3: adult activities like cooking or driving. We could think of

157
00:09:04,840 --> 00:09:07,240
Speaker 3: this as a kind of enactment play. So we've already

158
00:09:07,240 --> 00:09:11,680
Speaker 3: talked about versions of this. Pretending that this is apparently

159
00:09:11,760 --> 00:09:14,640
Speaker 3: really big. It sounds very specific, but it's a very

160
00:09:14,800 --> 00:09:19,880
Speaker 3: very commonly observed thing. Pretending empty vessels are full, so

161
00:09:20,240 --> 00:09:24,720
Speaker 3: drinking from an actually empty cup or pouring One example

162
00:09:24,760 --> 00:09:28,000
Speaker 3: I thought of is pouring invisible cereal out of an

163
00:09:28,000 --> 00:09:31,760
Speaker 3: empty cereal box into a bowl. And this one can

164
00:09:31,800 --> 00:09:35,040
Speaker 3: actually split up into three subtypes. So there is pretending

165
00:09:35,120 --> 00:09:38,800
Speaker 3: empty vessels are full in relation to serving the self,

166
00:09:39,000 --> 00:09:42,280
Speaker 3: like I drink from a literally empty cup. Then there

167
00:09:42,360 --> 00:09:45,960
Speaker 3: is pretending empty vessels are full on another, I feed

168
00:09:46,040 --> 00:09:48,320
Speaker 3: my doll from this empty cup, or I try to

169
00:09:48,360 --> 00:09:51,680
Speaker 3: make Dad drink from this empty cup, and then finally

170
00:09:51,800 --> 00:09:55,319
Speaker 3: pretending empty vessels are full on many others. So I'm

171
00:09:55,360 --> 00:09:58,160
Speaker 3: feeding many different toys or people in this manner.

172
00:09:58,679 --> 00:10:01,280
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, looking back that I remember doing a lot

173
00:10:01,320 --> 00:10:06,199
Speaker 2: of sampling of various food, imaginary food, or drinks that

174
00:10:06,240 --> 00:10:07,520
Speaker 2: my kid had prepared you.

175
00:10:08,440 --> 00:10:12,280
Speaker 3: Another one is what the authors call gesturing an object.

176
00:10:12,320 --> 00:10:16,840
Speaker 3: This would not be external object substitution, but instead things

177
00:10:16,960 --> 00:10:21,320
Speaker 3: like my finger is a toothbrush, essentially mentally extending or

178
00:10:21,360 --> 00:10:25,719
Speaker 3: substituting parts of the body as a pretend external object.

179
00:10:26,120 --> 00:10:28,560
Speaker 2: Okay, finger guns wouldnt imagine Okay.

180
00:10:28,640 --> 00:10:31,520
Speaker 3: Yeah. Then after that you got one that will be

181
00:10:31,520 --> 00:10:34,240
Speaker 3: more familiar to us. Pretending to be an object like

182
00:10:34,400 --> 00:10:35,079
Speaker 3: I am a tree.

183
00:10:35,840 --> 00:10:40,040
Speaker 2: There is pretend what I'm sorry, I'm just imagining that

184
00:10:40,080 --> 00:10:41,000
Speaker 2: pretend gang, gotcha.

185
00:10:41,160 --> 00:10:43,680
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's very Yeah, I don't know, it's more complex

186
00:10:43,720 --> 00:10:44,360
Speaker 3: than you might think.

187
00:10:44,559 --> 00:10:46,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, for the quiet kids.

188
00:10:47,040 --> 00:10:49,440
Speaker 3: There's pretending to be an animal like I am a

189
00:10:49,480 --> 00:10:50,120
Speaker 3: bunny rabbit.

190
00:10:50,559 --> 00:10:56,120
Speaker 2: This was huge with my child until really very recently.

191
00:10:56,640 --> 00:11:00,000
Speaker 2: There would often be request to play zookeeper at playground

192
00:11:00,160 --> 00:11:03,120
Speaker 2: where I would have to be a zookeeper doing a

193
00:11:03,120 --> 00:11:06,720
Speaker 2: British accent, like a like an Attenborough type accent, describing

194
00:11:06,800 --> 00:11:09,760
Speaker 2: nature documentary style what the animal is doing while they

195
00:11:09,760 --> 00:11:11,040
Speaker 2: did animal pretend play.

196
00:11:11,160 --> 00:11:16,240
Speaker 3: That's beautiful. There is classical object substitution, which we've already

197
00:11:16,240 --> 00:11:19,400
Speaker 3: talked about, but they actually break this down into multiple categories.

198
00:11:19,760 --> 00:11:24,080
Speaker 3: There is object substitution with non descript props, so this

199
00:11:24,240 --> 00:11:28,119
Speaker 3: might be when the literal prop is somewhat generic and versatile,

200
00:11:28,240 --> 00:11:32,160
Speaker 3: like toy block is a phone. And then there is

201
00:11:32,240 --> 00:11:37,160
Speaker 3: object substitution with more specific props that are very different

202
00:11:37,240 --> 00:11:40,080
Speaker 3: from the thing they're mimicking, So like toy car is

203
00:11:40,120 --> 00:11:40,920
Speaker 3: a telephone?

204
00:11:42,200 --> 00:11:44,960
Speaker 2: Interesting, all right, And so this is casual object substitution,

205
00:11:45,000 --> 00:11:48,120
Speaker 2: So imagine this is different. This differs from something that

206
00:11:48,200 --> 00:11:51,959
Speaker 2: I saw later on with my child where they would

207
00:11:53,120 --> 00:11:57,080
Speaker 2: craft a pretend telephone or a pretend computer or a

208
00:11:57,120 --> 00:12:00,760
Speaker 2: pretend Nintendo switch out of like cardboard and stuff like that.

209
00:12:00,800 --> 00:12:02,960
Speaker 2: That seems more specific than what we're talking about here.

210
00:12:03,080 --> 00:12:04,840
Speaker 3: Yeah, that does seem like a different thing if you're

211
00:12:04,920 --> 00:12:07,320
Speaker 3: building it. That's like a like the play if the

212
00:12:07,320 --> 00:12:10,079
Speaker 3: play is centered around the fabrication process.

213
00:12:10,440 --> 00:12:13,000
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, And I guess you get into the example

214
00:12:13,160 --> 00:12:15,240
Speaker 2: that I already brought up about the lightsabers building a

215
00:12:15,320 --> 00:12:16,080
Speaker 2: lightsaber help.

216
00:12:16,559 --> 00:12:20,520
Speaker 3: Yeah, okay. After this, there is pretending to be another person.

217
00:12:20,600 --> 00:12:22,839
Speaker 3: This would be a really existing person like I am

218
00:12:22,920 --> 00:12:25,719
Speaker 3: Grandpa or I am Mom. Okay, I don't think we

219
00:12:25,800 --> 00:12:30,360
Speaker 3: did that one. And then there are further distinctions about

220
00:12:30,480 --> 00:12:36,320
Speaker 3: the social context. There's pretending alone versus pretending with somebody else.

221
00:12:36,360 --> 00:12:38,439
Speaker 3: And I guess those two categories could apply to any

222
00:12:38,520 --> 00:12:43,520
Speaker 3: of the above categories we mentioned. Beyond this, there is

223
00:12:43,640 --> 00:12:48,439
Speaker 3: what the authors call socio dramatic pretending. This means creating

224
00:12:48,640 --> 00:12:52,960
Speaker 3: not just a single action in pretense, but creating a

225
00:12:53,000 --> 00:12:57,000
Speaker 3: more elaborate pretend story. So maybe not just like I

226
00:12:57,040 --> 00:13:01,200
Speaker 3: am Grandpa, I pour tea like Grandpa. Instead it's like

227
00:13:01,360 --> 00:13:03,760
Speaker 3: I am Grandpa and I want to go to the

228
00:13:03,800 --> 00:13:06,760
Speaker 3: store to buy candy for my doggie. But on the

229
00:13:06,760 --> 00:13:09,240
Speaker 3: way to the store, I get attacked by pirates and

230
00:13:09,280 --> 00:13:11,000
Speaker 3: my doggie gets hurt and I have to put a

231
00:13:11,000 --> 00:13:13,120
Speaker 3: band aid on my doggie. So he can feel better,

232
00:13:13,120 --> 00:13:14,840
Speaker 3: and then we all go swimming in the lake, and

233
00:13:15,080 --> 00:13:18,199
Speaker 3: you know, and so forth after that. There is pretending

234
00:13:18,280 --> 00:13:22,079
Speaker 3: to be fantasy characters already existing in culture, like you know,

235
00:13:22,280 --> 00:13:25,680
Speaker 3: I am Princess Leiah, I am Batman, I am Santa Claus,

236
00:13:25,760 --> 00:13:26,520
Speaker 3: that sort of thing.

237
00:13:26,840 --> 00:13:31,400
Speaker 2: And obviously we encourage that across the board, yes, you know,

238
00:13:31,480 --> 00:13:34,920
Speaker 2: and for children and adults, you know, certainly get into

239
00:13:34,920 --> 00:13:38,800
Speaker 2: that dressing up as these various characters. So yeah, I

240
00:13:38,800 --> 00:13:41,600
Speaker 2: think I think a lot of us very much encouraged

241
00:13:41,679 --> 00:13:42,240
Speaker 2: this sort of thing.

242
00:13:42,960 --> 00:13:45,080
Speaker 3: There is, of course, pretending to have an imaginary friend

243
00:13:45,160 --> 00:13:47,720
Speaker 3: or companion. We've already talked about that a lot. There

244
00:13:47,800 --> 00:13:50,520
Speaker 3: is I thought this was an interesting distinction. There is

245
00:13:50,760 --> 00:13:55,440
Speaker 3: pretending to do real activities that are not available to

246
00:13:55,559 --> 00:13:59,120
Speaker 3: most people most of the time, So real activities but

247
00:13:59,200 --> 00:14:03,080
Speaker 3: not every day activities. And examples of this might be

248
00:14:03,320 --> 00:14:06,040
Speaker 3: I am a rocket ship commander. That's a real thing,

249
00:14:06,120 --> 00:14:08,760
Speaker 3: but most people don't do that. I am a pop

250
00:14:08,800 --> 00:14:11,400
Speaker 3: singer and I'm on TV in front of millions. That's

251
00:14:11,400 --> 00:14:13,680
Speaker 3: a real thing. Most people don't do it. So that's

252
00:14:13,840 --> 00:14:19,720
Speaker 3: distinct from both fantasy activities and from everyday activities like

253
00:14:19,840 --> 00:14:20,840
Speaker 3: driving or cooking.

254
00:14:21,640 --> 00:14:24,720
Speaker 2: One of my kids friends would pretend to open their

255
00:14:24,720 --> 00:14:25,200
Speaker 2: own bank.

256
00:14:27,040 --> 00:14:28,200
Speaker 3: That's sort of in the category.

257
00:14:28,280 --> 00:14:30,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, they'd make their own money. I think I still

258
00:14:30,560 --> 00:14:33,480
Speaker 2: have some of their pretend bills around here somewhere in

259
00:14:33,520 --> 00:14:39,800
Speaker 2: one of my books. It's a bookmark called them Darryl Bucks.

260
00:14:39,520 --> 00:14:42,760
Speaker 3: That is curious. And then finally you've got acting out

261
00:14:43,080 --> 00:14:46,120
Speaker 3: completely made up fantasy scenarios. You know, I ride a

262
00:14:46,200 --> 00:14:49,000
Speaker 3: dragon through the sky and I use magic to transform

263
00:14:49,040 --> 00:15:01,480
Speaker 3: people into cats and that sort of thing. Yeah, so

264
00:15:01,560 --> 00:15:04,360
Speaker 3: I really liked this granular attention to detail in the

265
00:15:04,440 --> 00:15:07,960
Speaker 3: different ways that pretend to play can manifest. And this

266
00:15:08,080 --> 00:15:13,120
Speaker 3: paper actually developed a new tool for asking participant parents

267
00:15:13,360 --> 00:15:17,720
Speaker 3: questions to track the emergence of these different pretend activities.

268
00:15:18,120 --> 00:15:20,520
Speaker 3: So the tool the authors developed was called the Early

269
00:15:20,600 --> 00:15:24,920
Speaker 3: Pretending Survey or EPs, and the authors tested the EPs

270
00:15:25,680 --> 00:15:30,920
Speaker 3: for internal reliability, stability over time, inter observer agreement, and

271
00:15:30,960 --> 00:15:34,120
Speaker 3: they found it performed pretty well, which they leveraged to

272
00:15:34,360 --> 00:15:37,680
Speaker 3: argue that the EPs could be quote useful for researchers

273
00:15:37,720 --> 00:15:41,800
Speaker 3: to better understand how pretending relates to other areas of development, eg.

274
00:15:42,040 --> 00:15:46,440
Speaker 3: Cognition and language. Now I can imagine we've already talked

275
00:15:46,560 --> 00:15:51,640
Speaker 3: in some ways about difficulties with relying on parental reports

276
00:15:51,640 --> 00:15:56,440
Speaker 3: for understanding childhood play, and those things are here as well.

277
00:15:56,760 --> 00:15:59,680
Speaker 3: But I can imagine that one advantage of using parental

278
00:15:59,680 --> 00:16:03,160
Speaker 3: report in a survey as opposed to directly observing children

279
00:16:03,240 --> 00:16:06,360
Speaker 3: play in a lab is that the lab setting for

280
00:16:06,400 --> 00:16:09,840
Speaker 3: one thing might change what the children do, and so

281
00:16:10,080 --> 00:16:13,920
Speaker 3: relying on parental observations gives you access to how children

282
00:16:14,000 --> 00:16:17,120
Speaker 3: behave in settings that are normal for them, you know,

283
00:16:18,040 --> 00:16:21,600
Speaker 3: like what they do at home or at school, and

284
00:16:21,640 --> 00:16:24,400
Speaker 3: in places where they normally are. I think we can

285
00:16:24,440 --> 00:16:26,360
Speaker 3: all relate to the fact that when we go to

286
00:16:26,400 --> 00:16:31,200
Speaker 3: an unfamiliar and maybe even uncomfortable place, we act different. Yeah.

287
00:16:31,320 --> 00:16:34,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, And on top of that, this reminds me of

288
00:16:34,360 --> 00:16:37,960
Speaker 2: an example from some studies we're talking about with imaginary friends,

289
00:16:38,440 --> 00:16:42,080
Speaker 2: where it was pointed out that, ay, you want to

290
00:16:42,080 --> 00:16:44,520
Speaker 2: talk to the kid and the adult, but when you

291
00:16:44,560 --> 00:16:46,760
Speaker 2: ask the kid about their imaginary friends, they might just

292
00:16:46,800 --> 00:16:48,760
Speaker 2: create one right there on the spot.

293
00:16:49,120 --> 00:16:50,200
Speaker 3: Yeah.

294
00:16:49,600 --> 00:16:52,760
Speaker 2: So that's a great example of where it's also good

295
00:16:52,920 --> 00:16:55,440
Speaker 2: to chat with the parent and they'll be like, I've

296
00:16:55,480 --> 00:16:58,440
Speaker 2: never heard of mister Bongos. I think they made mister

297
00:16:58,480 --> 00:17:01,120
Speaker 2: bongoes up like literally just now for fun.

298
00:17:01,200 --> 00:17:02,720
Speaker 3: Yeah, because you brought up the idea.

299
00:17:02,800 --> 00:17:05,800
Speaker 2: Yeah yeah, you let mister Bond goes.

300
00:17:05,680 --> 00:17:10,720
Speaker 3: In, right, So the laboratory observation setting might be a

301
00:17:10,880 --> 00:17:13,520
Speaker 3: conjuring Captain Howdy kind of thing with the Ouiji aboard.

302
00:17:15,040 --> 00:17:19,000
Speaker 3: Another big thing is that obviously having to have researchers

303
00:17:19,119 --> 00:17:23,480
Speaker 3: directly observe children playing over time in a laboratory setting

304
00:17:23,560 --> 00:17:27,719
Speaker 3: or any kind of whatever the controlled setting is is

305
00:17:27,880 --> 00:17:30,719
Speaker 3: just cumbersome, you know, it's like time consuming, and so

306
00:17:30,760 --> 00:17:33,399
Speaker 3: a survey format allows you to gather much larger sample

307
00:17:33,480 --> 00:17:37,960
Speaker 3: sizes than direct observation in a controlled setting. It's because

308
00:17:38,040 --> 00:17:41,480
Speaker 3: that the latter is costly and time consuming. So the

309
00:17:41,480 --> 00:17:45,880
Speaker 3: author has administered this survey to parents primarily in the US, UK, Canada,

310
00:17:45,920 --> 00:17:49,560
Speaker 3: and Australia in across the years twenty fifteen and twenty sixteen,

311
00:17:50,200 --> 00:17:52,879
Speaker 3: and I was interested what do they find. I can't

312
00:17:52,880 --> 00:17:55,359
Speaker 3: discuss everything mentioned in the paper, but some of the

313
00:17:55,440 --> 00:17:58,720
Speaker 3: highlights we've been talking. Here's one thing that's kind of

314
00:17:58,760 --> 00:18:02,280
Speaker 3: surprising based on our previous discussion. We've been talking about

315
00:18:02,320 --> 00:18:06,840
Speaker 3: a prevailing belief that object substitution, like you know, banana

316
00:18:06,920 --> 00:18:09,720
Speaker 3: is a phone is usually one of the first types

317
00:18:09,760 --> 00:18:13,399
Speaker 3: of pretend play observed, most often emerging at one and

318
00:18:13,400 --> 00:18:17,040
Speaker 3: a half years of age or so. But this survey found,

319
00:18:17,280 --> 00:18:20,320
Speaker 3: and this agrees with some previous research, that actually there

320
00:18:20,359 --> 00:18:24,160
Speaker 3: are some other types of pretend play that come even earlier,

321
00:18:24,240 --> 00:18:28,080
Speaker 3: come before object substitution, and these would be some of

322
00:18:28,080 --> 00:18:31,159
Speaker 3: the more specific ones that we were talking about at

323
00:18:31,160 --> 00:18:33,359
Speaker 3: the beginning of the list. The list I read earlier

324
00:18:33,680 --> 00:18:39,040
Speaker 3: was roughly roughly in the chronological order of observance, so

325
00:18:39,640 --> 00:18:45,199
Speaker 3: remember the empty cups pretend play. The EPs found that

326
00:18:45,280 --> 00:18:48,159
Speaker 3: this happens early, with like half of kids doing it

327
00:18:48,200 --> 00:18:52,040
Speaker 3: by around thirteen months of age, and then the other

328
00:18:52,119 --> 00:18:56,600
Speaker 3: thing before object substitution is by around fifteen months, half

329
00:18:56,640 --> 00:18:59,400
Speaker 3: of kids have shown some signs of pretending with their

330
00:18:59,400 --> 00:19:02,199
Speaker 3: own body, such as pretending to be in a different

331
00:19:02,280 --> 00:19:06,760
Speaker 3: state like pretending to sleep or pretending to sneeze, or

332
00:19:06,840 --> 00:19:09,600
Speaker 3: pretending to be something else with their body like I

333
00:19:09,640 --> 00:19:13,640
Speaker 3: am a tiger, I'm growling, roar, And then it's by

334
00:19:13,720 --> 00:19:16,560
Speaker 3: seventeen months of age or so that half had shown

335
00:19:16,600 --> 00:19:20,440
Speaker 3: signs of object substitution. So this does agree in part

336
00:19:20,480 --> 00:19:22,919
Speaker 3: with the schedule we've been talking about before, where object

337
00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:25,320
Speaker 3: substitution shows up on average about one and a half

338
00:19:25,440 --> 00:19:28,840
Speaker 3: years old, but finds that some types of pretend play

339
00:19:28,960 --> 00:19:33,240
Speaker 3: tend to happen even earlier than object substitution. And though

340
00:19:33,320 --> 00:19:37,520
Speaker 3: I didn't really think much about either of these earlier examples,

341
00:19:38,040 --> 00:19:40,920
Speaker 3: now that I reflect on it, I have to question

342
00:19:41,080 --> 00:19:43,239
Speaker 3: myself because you know, my memory is involved, and who

343
00:19:43,320 --> 00:19:45,879
Speaker 3: knows what I'm being primed to misremember here? But I

344
00:19:46,040 --> 00:19:49,560
Speaker 3: think this squares exactly with my own experience as the

345
00:19:49,640 --> 00:19:51,520
Speaker 3: parent of a toddler, Like I have a two year

346
00:19:51,520 --> 00:19:54,919
Speaker 3: old right now, and my memory may begin correct, But

347
00:19:55,000 --> 00:19:58,840
Speaker 3: I think before my daughter ever pretended one object was another,

348
00:19:59,480 --> 00:20:03,280
Speaker 3: she would pretend to sneeze and pretend to be asleep,

349
00:20:03,600 --> 00:20:06,360
Speaker 3: and also pretend to eat or drink things that were

350
00:20:06,359 --> 00:20:08,959
Speaker 3: not really there, and she thought it was hilarious with

351
00:20:09,000 --> 00:20:09,600
Speaker 3: most of these.

352
00:20:10,960 --> 00:20:13,879
Speaker 2: Yeah, I don't remember how this shook out with my

353
00:20:13,920 --> 00:20:18,000
Speaker 2: own kit, but in general this does seem accurate.

354
00:20:18,080 --> 00:20:22,760
Speaker 3: Yeah, now, from here, the story based socio dramatic play

355
00:20:22,840 --> 00:20:24,960
Speaker 3: that we were talking about that starts to happen more

356
00:20:25,000 --> 00:20:27,840
Speaker 3: when kids are around two years old usually, and then

357
00:20:28,040 --> 00:20:31,680
Speaker 3: complex make believe fantasy concepts tend to take hold when

358
00:20:31,760 --> 00:20:35,119
Speaker 3: children are around three, And of course it may be

359
00:20:35,280 --> 00:20:38,399
Speaker 3: that these later play types are dependent on the development

360
00:20:38,560 --> 00:20:42,520
Speaker 3: of language skills, so as children get better at using

361
00:20:42,680 --> 00:20:46,800
Speaker 3: manipulating language, that also sort of helps them construct these

362
00:20:47,600 --> 00:20:52,320
Speaker 3: abstract or counterfactual scenarios. Now, what about other general findings

363
00:20:52,320 --> 00:20:54,439
Speaker 3: in this paper. Well, one thing is that within the

364
00:20:54,480 --> 00:20:58,080
Speaker 3: survey range like four months to four years, kids pretending

365
00:20:58,119 --> 00:21:02,800
Speaker 3: scores steadily increased with age, which actually made me wonder, okay,

366
00:21:02,840 --> 00:21:05,480
Speaker 3: in this early period is just basically going straight up,

367
00:21:06,280 --> 00:21:10,920
Speaker 3: when do we actually see reductions in pretend play? That

368
00:21:10,960 --> 00:21:14,240
Speaker 3: actually came up in the Nautilus article that I shouted

369
00:21:14,280 --> 00:21:17,320
Speaker 3: out for pointing me to this research, because the author

370
00:21:17,359 --> 00:21:21,440
Speaker 3: of that Nautilus article cited some commentary by a researcher

371
00:21:21,480 --> 00:21:25,800
Speaker 3: named Sandra Russ at Case Western and Russ says that

372
00:21:25,880 --> 00:21:28,320
Speaker 3: it is most often around the age of nine or

373
00:21:28,480 --> 00:21:32,440
Speaker 3: ten that children start to kind of relinquish their pretend play.

374
00:21:33,080 --> 00:21:36,200
Speaker 3: But of course that can vary, and you could argue

375
00:21:36,200 --> 00:21:39,560
Speaker 3: with most people it never completely goes away. Some people

376
00:21:39,600 --> 00:21:44,240
Speaker 3: continue to show similar imaginative, imaginative behavior into adulthood, even

377
00:21:44,280 --> 00:21:47,560
Speaker 3: if it's not exactly play like when they were a child.

378
00:21:47,800 --> 00:21:51,080
Speaker 3: They might have creative hobbies like writing or art or acting,

379
00:21:51,119 --> 00:21:53,880
Speaker 3: which could be in some ways analogous. And of course

380
00:21:53,920 --> 00:21:56,960
Speaker 3: some kids continue pretending into older ages. I think we

381
00:21:57,000 --> 00:22:01,800
Speaker 3: talked about how, you know, with kids start building paracosms

382
00:22:01,880 --> 00:22:05,720
Speaker 3: those it's I think fairly common for those to continue

383
00:22:05,880 --> 00:22:08,000
Speaker 3: from ages like eight to twelve or so.

384
00:22:08,440 --> 00:22:12,119
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, like twelve or thirteen, Yeah, somewhere in that range. So,

385
00:22:13,160 --> 00:22:14,719
Speaker 2: and I guess that makes sense if you're looking at

386
00:22:14,760 --> 00:22:19,600
Speaker 2: this as like a general progression of one's use of imagination,

387
00:22:20,520 --> 00:22:22,679
Speaker 2: that that would continue a little bit, a little bit

388
00:22:22,720 --> 00:22:23,840
Speaker 2: further into your development.

389
00:22:24,560 --> 00:22:27,840
Speaker 3: Any other broad differences within the children in the survey,

390
00:22:28,320 --> 00:22:32,359
Speaker 3: One was that girls, on average had a somewhat higher

391
00:22:32,400 --> 00:22:35,119
Speaker 3: EPs score than boys, though it was a small difference.

392
00:22:35,200 --> 00:22:38,760
Speaker 3: The gender difference was not huge, but it was statistically significant.

393
00:22:39,160 --> 00:22:43,480
Speaker 3: And also I thought this was interesting. Children of younger

394
00:22:43,800 --> 00:22:50,640
Speaker 3: parents had higher EPs scores than children of older parents. Now, again,

395
00:22:50,840 --> 00:22:54,040
Speaker 3: these differences are not huge, but that's interesting. Why would

396
00:22:54,080 --> 00:22:56,720
Speaker 3: pretending be happening a little bit more, a little bit

397
00:22:56,760 --> 00:23:00,719
Speaker 3: earlier in girls and in children of younger parents. In

398
00:23:00,760 --> 00:23:03,800
Speaker 3: both cases, it's not known with high confidence what explains it,

399
00:23:03,840 --> 00:23:06,600
Speaker 3: but the authors offer a couple of informed guesses. In

400
00:23:06,640 --> 00:23:11,040
Speaker 3: their discussion section as to the gender distinction, they relate

401
00:23:11,119 --> 00:23:14,560
Speaker 3: this possibly to the fact that at both Well, first

402
00:23:14,560 --> 00:23:17,119
Speaker 3: of all, they say that this sort of correlates to

403
00:23:17,280 --> 00:23:20,760
Speaker 3: previous findings in other studies that both in the toddler

404
00:23:20,800 --> 00:23:24,400
Speaker 3: age and in the primary school age, girls have been

405
00:23:24,440 --> 00:23:27,639
Speaker 3: found to engage in a little bit more fantasy play

406
00:23:27,680 --> 00:23:30,879
Speaker 3: on average than boys do, and that they're also a

407
00:23:30,880 --> 00:23:34,480
Speaker 3: little bit more likely to create imaginary companions. They cite

408
00:23:34,480 --> 00:23:37,760
Speaker 3: several papers to that regard, and so like, what would

409
00:23:37,760 --> 00:23:41,680
Speaker 3: be the explanation, Well, it's possible, again not known for sure,

410
00:23:42,000 --> 00:23:45,280
Speaker 3: that this could be related to language skills. In some cases,

411
00:23:45,680 --> 00:23:50,200
Speaker 3: girls acquire language skills on a slightly accelerated timeline, and

412
00:23:50,280 --> 00:23:54,080
Speaker 3: it could be that language development is related to pretending.

413
00:23:54,160 --> 00:23:56,840
Speaker 3: But again the differences are not huge, and it's not

414
00:23:56,880 --> 00:23:59,359
Speaker 3: known for sure why this would be. Similar question with

415
00:23:59,400 --> 00:24:02,480
Speaker 3: the thing about us younger parents having slightly more pretending

416
00:24:02,600 --> 00:24:06,560
Speaker 3: happening earlier the author's right quote. Perhaps younger parents spend

417
00:24:06,720 --> 00:24:10,359
Speaker 3: more time pretending with their children, allowing more opportunities for

418
00:24:10,440 --> 00:24:15,080
Speaker 3: parents to observe or even scaffold pretending, So that could

419
00:24:15,160 --> 00:24:19,639
Speaker 3: make sense, like if there's more co pretending between the

420
00:24:19,680 --> 00:24:23,040
Speaker 3: parent and child happening. That could affect the survey results

421
00:24:23,080 --> 00:24:25,199
Speaker 3: in multiple ways. It could mean that the child is

422
00:24:25,200 --> 00:24:27,919
Speaker 3: actually doing more pretending because they're getting more practice with

423
00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:30,600
Speaker 3: an adult present. Or it could mean that the children

424
00:24:30,600 --> 00:24:33,600
Speaker 3: are pretending the same amount, but the parents are observing

425
00:24:33,640 --> 00:24:36,119
Speaker 3: it happen more and thus they're reporting it more on

426
00:24:36,160 --> 00:24:36,800
Speaker 3: the surveys.

427
00:24:37,920 --> 00:24:39,720
Speaker 2: But I guess I'm still kind of foggy as to

428
00:24:40,160 --> 00:24:42,520
Speaker 2: how this would shake out between younger and older parents,

429
00:24:43,560 --> 00:24:47,479
Speaker 2: not just because I was am was and was an

430
00:24:47,480 --> 00:24:50,960
Speaker 2: older parent, but I'm just wondering, like, what's what would

431
00:24:50,960 --> 00:24:52,960
Speaker 2: be the broad difference there.

432
00:24:53,480 --> 00:24:56,040
Speaker 3: That's a good question. I don't actually know. They didn't

433
00:24:56,080 --> 00:24:58,960
Speaker 3: mention it this part, but maybe there was somewhere in

434
00:24:59,000 --> 00:25:01,359
Speaker 3: there that got lost from but they could have some

435
00:25:01,440 --> 00:25:04,400
Speaker 3: data indicating that, on average, younger parents spend more time

436
00:25:04,400 --> 00:25:06,040
Speaker 3: pretending with kids. But I don't know.

437
00:25:06,440 --> 00:25:08,600
Speaker 2: Yeah, I mean, I mean, I guess the most obvious

438
00:25:09,560 --> 00:25:12,800
Speaker 2: possible explanation for that, one might think, I would be

439
00:25:12,960 --> 00:25:17,359
Speaker 2: like work responsibilities, But I can just you know, just

440
00:25:18,520 --> 00:25:20,720
Speaker 2: shooting from the hip here, I can think of various

441
00:25:20,760 --> 00:25:26,280
Speaker 2: scenarios in which younger parents would be working more. But

442
00:25:26,320 --> 00:25:29,400
Speaker 2: then also examples where maybe younger parents have more free

443
00:25:29,400 --> 00:25:30,720
Speaker 2: time to spend with the kid, Like, I don't know

444
00:25:30,720 --> 00:25:34,359
Speaker 2: it just I guess I'm not sure how the generalities

445
00:25:34,359 --> 00:25:37,199
Speaker 2: that they're dealing with here would really pan out. But

446
00:25:37,359 --> 00:25:40,879
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm sure it's based on some findings and

447
00:25:40,920 --> 00:25:42,640
Speaker 2: some statistical information.

448
00:25:43,240 --> 00:25:47,000
Speaker 3: But yeah, so it's the slight correlation having to do

449
00:25:47,080 --> 00:25:49,159
Speaker 3: with the age of the parents is just what they

450
00:25:49,240 --> 00:25:51,679
Speaker 3: observed in the sample. I guess the part about that

451
00:25:52,160 --> 00:25:56,679
Speaker 3: having anything to do with parents spending time pretending with

452
00:25:56,800 --> 00:25:59,760
Speaker 3: the kids is just an informed guess, So who knows

453
00:25:59,760 --> 00:26:00,919
Speaker 3: what the real reason was.

454
00:26:01,160 --> 00:26:04,119
Speaker 2: I guess the other possibility would be older parents have

455
00:26:04,359 --> 00:26:07,800
Speaker 2: already had additional children and then therefore there's less attention

456
00:26:08,600 --> 00:26:09,440
Speaker 2: to go around.

457
00:26:09,840 --> 00:26:12,960
Speaker 3: Possibly. Yeah. So, as I said, none of these differences

458
00:26:12,960 --> 00:26:15,439
Speaker 3: were huge, and I guess we don't really know for

459
00:26:15,480 --> 00:26:19,280
Speaker 3: sure why they manifest in this fairly large sample. But

460
00:26:19,400 --> 00:26:21,720
Speaker 3: one thing I thought was interesting about the study was

461
00:26:21,760 --> 00:26:26,080
Speaker 3: just coming back to the kind of granular detail tracking

462
00:26:26,119 --> 00:26:31,040
Speaker 3: these different types of play emergence with a finer attention

463
00:26:31,200 --> 00:26:35,120
Speaker 3: to the variations in the style of play, Like, I

464
00:26:35,200 --> 00:26:37,760
Speaker 3: don't think otherwise I would have noticed that it's so

465
00:26:38,040 --> 00:26:41,479
Speaker 3: common to pretend to cup has something in it. Like

466
00:26:41,560 --> 00:26:45,040
Speaker 3: that feels like such a specific thing. But it's interesting

467
00:26:45,119 --> 00:26:48,000
Speaker 3: that it's observed so often they had to give it

468
00:26:48,000 --> 00:26:50,560
Speaker 3: its own category. I mean, you could just think of

469
00:26:50,640 --> 00:26:54,000
Speaker 3: that as a kind of like invisible object play. But

470
00:26:54,560 --> 00:26:57,000
Speaker 3: I guess it's so common that it is different than

471
00:26:57,040 --> 00:27:00,159
Speaker 3: like I'm using an invisible toothbrush. It seems like, like

472
00:27:00,320 --> 00:27:03,440
Speaker 3: you know, tons of kids. Maybe maybe most kids are

473
00:27:03,520 --> 00:27:06,440
Speaker 3: pretending there's something in a cup when there actually isn't.

474
00:27:06,880 --> 00:27:09,360
Speaker 2: I'll occasionally do that as a grown up, pretended there's

475
00:27:09,359 --> 00:27:13,240
Speaker 2: something in a cup and pretend to drink it, mainly

476
00:27:13,280 --> 00:27:15,040
Speaker 2: if I'm at some sort of like a social function,

477
00:27:15,200 --> 00:27:18,040
Speaker 2: you know. Yeah, And and the cup is not clear

478
00:27:18,080 --> 00:27:22,119
Speaker 2: to be to be clear, the cup has to cannot

479
00:27:22,160 --> 00:27:25,080
Speaker 2: be made of trans translucent plastic. But you know, I've

480
00:27:25,080 --> 00:27:28,920
Speaker 2: consumed everything in the cup, and I want to continue

481
00:27:28,960 --> 00:27:31,399
Speaker 2: to have like the gesture of drinking it. Yeah, to

482
00:27:31,480 --> 00:27:34,440
Speaker 2: do something with my hand. I may engage in that

483
00:27:34,520 --> 00:27:36,600
Speaker 2: level of play slash deception.

484
00:27:36,960 --> 00:27:39,800
Speaker 3: Sipping from a cup is part of the rhythm of

485
00:27:39,880 --> 00:27:41,280
Speaker 3: conversation at a party.

486
00:27:42,520 --> 00:27:45,040
Speaker 2: And if you're out of out of a beverage, I mean,

487
00:27:45,080 --> 00:27:48,280
Speaker 2: you're out of options, right, Yeah, so sometimes you've got

488
00:27:48,320 --> 00:27:48,760
Speaker 2: to pretend.

489
00:27:58,600 --> 00:28:00,879
Speaker 3: Well, So anyway, I thought that was an interesting study,

490
00:28:00,920 --> 00:28:03,880
Speaker 3: but I was thinking more about the fact that they say,

491
00:28:03,920 --> 00:28:07,359
Speaker 3: you know, most often the real height of childhood style

492
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:11,280
Speaker 3: pretend to play. It starts to fade around the age

493
00:28:11,280 --> 00:28:14,600
Speaker 3: of nine or ten. However, of course, as we know,

494
00:28:15,119 --> 00:28:17,960
Speaker 3: different types of pretending can go on for a lifetime.

495
00:28:18,000 --> 00:28:19,639
Speaker 3: And I think that's something that's related to what you

496
00:28:19,680 --> 00:28:21,919
Speaker 3: wanted to talk about today, isn't it, Rob, Yeah.

497
00:28:22,000 --> 00:28:26,439
Speaker 2: Yeah. I got interested in the angle of pretend play

498
00:28:26,680 --> 00:28:31,359
Speaker 2: and play and creativity in adults and other ages in

499
00:28:31,359 --> 00:28:37,600
Speaker 2: addition to childhood and early adolescents. And part of this

500
00:28:37,720 --> 00:28:40,080
Speaker 2: was my wife's suggestion. She was like, well, that would

501
00:28:40,080 --> 00:28:41,880
Speaker 2: be an interesting angle. So it's like, yeah, yeah, that

502
00:28:42,200 --> 00:28:46,360
Speaker 2: sounds that sounds sounds fascinating, and so I'm not really

503
00:28:46,400 --> 00:28:49,000
Speaker 2: going to get into a lot of like specific studies.

504
00:28:50,360 --> 00:28:52,520
Speaker 2: Maybe that'll be something I can get into in the

505
00:28:52,560 --> 00:28:54,880
Speaker 2: next episode, But I ended up looking at material that's

506
00:28:54,920 --> 00:29:02,400
Speaker 2: really tackling the idea of pretend play and adults more oddly. So,

507
00:29:02,680 --> 00:29:05,440
Speaker 2: obviously we've been discussing the idea of pretend play as

508
00:29:05,440 --> 00:29:10,960
Speaker 2: a manifestation of developing creativity, and I think that's perfectly valid.

509
00:29:10,960 --> 00:29:15,840
Speaker 2: That's often how it is understood. Childhood psychologist lev Vygotsky,

510
00:29:15,880 --> 00:29:19,520
Speaker 2: who lived eighteen ninety six through nineteen thirty four, outlined

511
00:29:19,520 --> 00:29:24,880
Speaker 2: a three step creativity development process creative imagination in childhood,

512
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:29,640
Speaker 2: imagination and thought coming together in adolescence, and finally the

513
00:29:29,680 --> 00:29:34,480
Speaker 2: individual enters into adulthood quote where experience creativity is directed

514
00:29:34,560 --> 00:29:38,720
Speaker 2: and used with purpose. I was reading about this in

515
00:29:39,000 --> 00:29:43,120
Speaker 2: an article by Sinha at All twenty twenties, playing with

516
00:29:43,160 --> 00:29:46,080
Speaker 2: creativity across the life span. This was in tech trends

517
00:29:46,400 --> 00:29:50,000
Speaker 2: linking research and practice to improve learning. Now, as you

518
00:29:50,040 --> 00:29:52,800
Speaker 2: can always already imagine, we'll get into some of the

519
00:29:52,840 --> 00:29:55,520
Speaker 2: ideas around this. This is kind of, I think, from

520
00:29:55,560 --> 00:29:59,960
Speaker 2: our modern perspective limiting understanding of creativity, the idea of

521
00:30:00,040 --> 00:30:03,160
Speaker 2: it's like, okay, being creative just for the sake of fun.

522
00:30:03,680 --> 00:30:05,800
Speaker 2: That was all right when you were younger, But now

523
00:30:06,040 --> 00:30:08,600
Speaker 2: you're a grown up. How is it going to produce funds?

524
00:30:09,040 --> 00:30:11,160
Speaker 2: How are you going to make money off of that?

525
00:30:11,400 --> 00:30:13,560
Speaker 2: Or change the world for the better, and so forth.

526
00:30:13,760 --> 00:30:16,800
Speaker 2: Your creativity has to be put to work. That horse

527
00:30:16,840 --> 00:30:19,120
Speaker 2: isn't wild anymore. You need to strap it to the cart.

528
00:30:19,360 --> 00:30:21,920
Speaker 3: Oh so that is the meaning of used with purpose

529
00:30:22,000 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 3: here in this quote.

530
00:30:23,120 --> 00:30:26,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, okay, Yeah, he positive that childhood fantasy and imagination

531
00:30:26,560 --> 00:30:31,640
Speaker 2: were essentially catalysts for adult creativity, which would which was

532
00:30:31,680 --> 00:30:34,560
Speaker 2: seen as more purposeful, you know, like and you know,

533
00:30:34,640 --> 00:30:38,440
Speaker 2: I think there are some valid arguments for that as well.

534
00:30:38,480 --> 00:30:42,720
Speaker 2: I mean, obviously when we become adults and we engage

535
00:30:42,840 --> 00:30:46,400
Speaker 2: in cultures and a society that often puts an emphasis

536
00:30:46,440 --> 00:30:51,600
Speaker 2: again on making money, and also legitimately like taking things

537
00:30:51,680 --> 00:30:54,320
Speaker 2: you're good at and have a passion for, and finding

538
00:30:54,440 --> 00:30:57,680
Speaker 2: professions and callings in life that line up with those.

539
00:30:58,440 --> 00:31:02,880
Speaker 3: You know, it's understandable just solving practical problems that may

540
00:31:03,000 --> 00:31:05,080
Speaker 3: or may not have a strong economic component.

541
00:31:06,400 --> 00:31:10,120
Speaker 2: But yeah, this purpose aspect is interesting and something discussed

542
00:31:10,120 --> 00:31:12,880
Speaker 2: at length in that paper I just cited. Apparently, some

543
00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:18,960
Speaker 2: definitions of creativity stress, usefulness and effectiveness is criteria for creativity,

544
00:31:19,640 --> 00:31:23,320
Speaker 2: tying into Vagotsky's take on adult creativity. Other models call

545
00:31:23,440 --> 00:31:28,440
Speaker 2: for dual aspects of novelty or originality and usefulness or effectiveness.

546
00:31:28,920 --> 00:31:33,720
Speaker 2: And when you start talking about effectiveness and usefulness as well,

547
00:31:33,800 --> 00:31:37,240
Speaker 2: especially more recent understandings of it, there's more room for

548
00:31:37,360 --> 00:31:38,080
Speaker 2: nuance there.

549
00:31:38,400 --> 00:31:40,200
Speaker 3: Oh yeah, okay, So I guess this is going to

550
00:31:40,240 --> 00:31:43,800
Speaker 3: the question of how do we actually define creativity. If

551
00:31:43,800 --> 00:31:47,440
Speaker 3: we're trying to study it scientifically, you need a very

552
00:31:47,480 --> 00:31:50,160
Speaker 3: clear and strict definition. And instead, it's one of those

553
00:31:50,160 --> 00:31:52,040
Speaker 3: things that we kind of we feel it out, we

554
00:31:52,080 --> 00:31:54,959
Speaker 3: know what we see it. Some activity is just seems

555
00:31:55,000 --> 00:31:59,840
Speaker 3: creative or doesn't. Like writing a story is creative. But

556
00:32:00,200 --> 00:32:03,000
Speaker 3: is writing a memo for work creative?

557
00:32:03,200 --> 00:32:03,240
Speaker 2: Not?

558
00:32:03,960 --> 00:32:06,440
Speaker 3: Usually it could be Usually.

559
00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:09,080
Speaker 2: That's your creativity challenge for the day, make it a

560
00:32:09,080 --> 00:32:10,120
Speaker 2: creative exercise.

561
00:32:10,640 --> 00:32:13,680
Speaker 3: I mean, I guess there's something. Yeah, Like these definitions

562
00:32:13,720 --> 00:32:17,440
Speaker 3: mentioned something about novelty. So creativity is something that's kind

563
00:32:17,440 --> 00:32:21,640
Speaker 3: of different or unexpected. It's not just kind of going

564
00:32:21,640 --> 00:32:25,120
Speaker 3: through the motions or engaging in habits. It's doing something

565
00:32:25,240 --> 00:32:28,600
Speaker 3: different and novel. But the other half of this in

566
00:32:28,640 --> 00:32:31,160
Speaker 3: these definitions is kind of stressing that it's not just

567
00:32:31,320 --> 00:32:34,640
Speaker 3: novelty in a kind of random sense. It's novelty that

568
00:32:34,840 --> 00:32:38,280
Speaker 3: is useful or effective in some way. It does something right.

569
00:32:39,200 --> 00:32:42,080
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's good. It's interesting when we get into

570
00:32:42,160 --> 00:32:44,760
Speaker 2: like what does that mean for it to do something right,

571
00:32:45,160 --> 00:32:48,720
Speaker 2: to do something useful? As discussed in this paper, childhood

572
00:32:48,720 --> 00:32:53,160
Speaker 2: psychologist doctor Sandra Russ proposes a slightly different definition for

573
00:32:53,680 --> 00:32:57,840
Speaker 2: creativity and with a different emphasis on what some of

574
00:32:56,960 --> 00:33:01,680
Speaker 2: the key aspects mean. So she defines it as it

575
00:33:02,000 --> 00:33:05,800
Speaker 2: needs to be novel, it needs to be effective, and

576
00:33:06,400 --> 00:33:09,240
Speaker 2: it needs to be whole. So she argues that, especially

577
00:33:09,240 --> 00:33:12,000
Speaker 2: with children, we can't put much weight on the importance

578
00:33:12,080 --> 00:33:15,160
Speaker 2: or usefulness of any of this, right, like how useful

579
00:33:15,280 --> 00:33:18,400
Speaker 2: is a child's paracosm, How useful is a child's imaginary friend.

580
00:33:19,240 --> 00:33:23,280
Speaker 2: But the big thing that she stresses is play is

581
00:33:23,320 --> 00:33:26,360
Speaker 2: the product. It is. It is an output of how

582
00:33:26,400 --> 00:33:30,040
Speaker 2: they think and feel. Multiple aspects of a child's being

583
00:33:30,160 --> 00:33:33,560
Speaker 2: are involved in the act of play. And uh, and

584
00:33:33,600 --> 00:33:36,440
Speaker 2: I believe that is what's meant by wholeness here. Uh

585
00:33:36,480 --> 00:33:40,160
Speaker 2: the idea that like that, yes, with an act of

586
00:33:40,200 --> 00:33:44,840
Speaker 2: creativity is not just this like leakage of energy from

587
00:33:45,400 --> 00:33:47,920
Speaker 2: your psyche, you know. And I think this whole this

588
00:33:47,960 --> 00:33:51,400
Speaker 2: holds true for children and adults as well. Discussed like

589
00:33:51,440 --> 00:33:54,479
Speaker 2: when when you're engaging and create a creative output like

590
00:33:54,520 --> 00:33:56,640
Speaker 2: that is it's like the output of your being, you know,

591
00:33:56,720 --> 00:34:00,640
Speaker 2: it is like not to get to you know, wax

592
00:34:00,680 --> 00:34:03,280
Speaker 2: too poetic about it. But I mean, it's like a

593
00:34:03,360 --> 00:34:06,480
Speaker 2: light shining out of your soul and your your mind.

594
00:34:07,400 --> 00:34:10,680
Speaker 2: It's it's not just this shadow that happens to be

595
00:34:10,800 --> 00:34:11,839
Speaker 2: cast by who you are.

596
00:34:12,400 --> 00:34:15,480
Speaker 3: Well, that is beautifully put. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I

597
00:34:15,480 --> 00:34:17,640
Speaker 3: think you're right. Sorry, but sorry, my mind was just

598
00:34:17,640 --> 00:34:21,319
Speaker 3: divided into different places because I just realized while you're

599
00:34:21,320 --> 00:34:23,600
Speaker 3: saying that also that you were citing that the work

600
00:34:23,640 --> 00:34:25,840
Speaker 3: of Sandra Russ, who was the same person that I

601
00:34:25,880 --> 00:34:29,840
Speaker 3: just cited in my section about about most pretend to

602
00:34:29,840 --> 00:34:31,840
Speaker 3: play tending to fade around the age of nine or

603
00:34:31,840 --> 00:34:32,520
Speaker 3: ten years old.

604
00:34:32,600 --> 00:34:34,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, I believe. I believe she's a pretty big name

605
00:34:34,160 --> 00:34:34,720
Speaker 2: in this field.

606
00:34:34,880 --> 00:34:38,000
Speaker 3: Yeah, but of course with a lot of variation. But

607
00:34:38,040 --> 00:34:40,399
Speaker 3: that's an interesting criterion that I don't think I would

608
00:34:40,400 --> 00:34:42,440
Speaker 3: have gotten to this concept of wholeness.

609
00:34:43,360 --> 00:34:46,759
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, And you know, and looking around, I'm not

610
00:34:46,840 --> 00:34:51,359
Speaker 2: sure how often she uses the term wholeness, but they

611
00:34:51,480 --> 00:34:54,239
Speaker 2: reference whole. They had kind of some wholeness up as

612
00:34:54,280 --> 00:34:58,480
Speaker 2: being an aspect of her definition. Oh okay, And I

613
00:34:58,480 --> 00:35:01,160
Speaker 2: do think that that plays out with what she's stressing here.

614
00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:04,480
Speaker 2: But you know, even in adults, though, the way we

615
00:35:04,520 --> 00:35:07,760
Speaker 2: think of usefulness or to you know, to use Russ's

616
00:35:07,800 --> 00:35:11,680
Speaker 2: model usefulness or effectiveness. It varies from field to field.

617
00:35:12,280 --> 00:35:15,719
Speaker 2: In this paper, they broadly address different forms of creativity,

618
00:35:15,760 --> 00:35:19,600
Speaker 2: invoking the four C creative creativity model by James C.

619
00:35:19,760 --> 00:35:24,080
Speaker 2: Kaufman and doctor Ronald Baghetto. Have we talked about this before?

620
00:35:24,480 --> 00:35:26,680
Speaker 3: I don't know. We've been doing the show a long time,

621
00:35:26,760 --> 00:35:28,040
Speaker 3: so I can't always recall.

622
00:35:28,080 --> 00:35:30,160
Speaker 2: But yeah, I forget whole episodes sometimes.

623
00:35:30,280 --> 00:35:33,280
Speaker 3: But I don't think so, but I could be wrong.

624
00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:38,480
Speaker 2: Yeah, it feels fresh to my mind. So basically, the

625
00:35:38,480 --> 00:35:42,520
Speaker 2: way the four C creativity model plays out is that

626
00:35:42,600 --> 00:35:44,920
Speaker 2: you have four different modes of creativity. First of all,

627
00:35:44,920 --> 00:35:49,839
Speaker 2: you have big C creativity. This is landmark work that

628
00:35:50,040 --> 00:35:53,959
Speaker 2: changes a field or changes the world. So like big

629
00:35:54,040 --> 00:35:57,600
Speaker 2: C creativity would be like I have invented the steam engine,

630
00:35:58,000 --> 00:36:02,120
Speaker 2: or I have I present you with a new religious

631
00:36:02,160 --> 00:36:05,120
Speaker 2: model and spiritual model for your way of life, something

632
00:36:05,200 --> 00:36:08,120
Speaker 2: like that, huge impact.

633
00:36:07,640 --> 00:36:09,759
Speaker 3: General theory of relativity or something. Yeah.

634
00:36:09,880 --> 00:36:13,520
Speaker 2: Yeah, Then you have little C creativity and this is

635
00:36:13,520 --> 00:36:17,880
Speaker 2: still this is work that has strong interpersonal value. It's additive,

636
00:36:18,040 --> 00:36:22,080
Speaker 2: it's cumulative, and we can think of various examples of

637
00:36:22,120 --> 00:36:24,600
Speaker 2: this as well. I mean I think, like a great book,

638
00:36:25,400 --> 00:36:27,200
Speaker 2: but not a book so great that it changes the

639
00:36:27,239 --> 00:36:31,560
Speaker 2: world might fit under little C creativity if I'm understanding

640
00:36:31,600 --> 00:36:34,759
Speaker 2: the concept correctly, or I would say not even they

641
00:36:34,800 --> 00:36:37,000
Speaker 2: don't even think about greatness. But a book you like

642
00:36:37,480 --> 00:36:40,880
Speaker 2: has you know, strong personal value and you know you

643
00:36:41,120 --> 00:36:43,960
Speaker 2: share that with others and so forth. Then you have

644
00:36:44,080 --> 00:36:47,680
Speaker 2: pro c creativity. This is not game changing, but it's

645
00:36:47,680 --> 00:36:51,480
Speaker 2: effective and beneficial within a given field. So you know,

646
00:36:51,560 --> 00:36:56,719
Speaker 2: a new means of doing something, some new innovation within

647
00:36:56,760 --> 00:36:57,399
Speaker 2: a given field.

648
00:36:57,760 --> 00:36:59,960
Speaker 3: Okay, and then you have many.

649
00:36:59,800 --> 00:37:04,120
Speaker 2: Creativity, And this is an interpersonal creativity that is a

650
00:37:04,160 --> 00:37:07,640
Speaker 2: part of the learning process. So my understanding on this,

651
00:37:07,920 --> 00:37:13,000
Speaker 2: like to draw an example from like our daily work

652
00:37:13,000 --> 00:37:15,400
Speaker 2: pretty much is like sometimes when we run across a

653
00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:17,520
Speaker 2: new concept, we kind of have to make sense of

654
00:37:17,520 --> 00:37:19,839
Speaker 2: it ourselves, and we'll sort of turn to some sort

655
00:37:19,880 --> 00:37:23,480
Speaker 2: of a personal novel metaphor for how it works, you know,

656
00:37:23,960 --> 00:37:26,759
Speaker 2: like compare it to a Santo movie or what have you.

657
00:37:26,760 --> 00:37:30,200
Speaker 2: You know, So we're engaging and many see creativity according

658
00:37:30,239 --> 00:37:32,520
Speaker 2: to this model here. You know, it's it's not going

659
00:37:32,600 --> 00:37:34,560
Speaker 2: to change the world, it's not trying to change the world.

660
00:37:34,600 --> 00:37:37,759
Speaker 2: It's not really innovating anything, but it's helping us in

661
00:37:37,800 --> 00:37:40,360
Speaker 2: a learning process, Like it does have value within the

662
00:37:40,360 --> 00:37:43,279
Speaker 2: way that our mind is working. It's helping us roll

663
00:37:43,320 --> 00:37:45,160
Speaker 2: around various concepts and so forth.

664
00:37:45,560 --> 00:37:48,080
Speaker 3: The kind of creativity we engage in, we all engage

665
00:37:48,080 --> 00:37:51,480
Speaker 3: in basically every day, coming up with analogies or ways

666
00:37:51,520 --> 00:37:53,560
Speaker 3: of thinking about or explaining things.

667
00:37:54,040 --> 00:37:59,000
Speaker 2: Yeah, but an important thing they stress is that any

668
00:37:59,080 --> 00:38:02,240
Speaker 2: kind of creativity is going to start out novel and personal.

669
00:38:03,840 --> 00:38:07,240
Speaker 2: So you know, a many create many C creativity project

670
00:38:07,440 --> 00:38:10,000
Speaker 2: could become a pro C, could become a little C,

671
00:38:10,200 --> 00:38:13,840
Speaker 2: could become a big C, and so forth. So I

672
00:38:13,880 --> 00:38:18,560
Speaker 2: think it's a pretty useful idea for and certainly gives

673
00:38:18,560 --> 00:38:20,319
Speaker 2: it a little more nuanced to the idea of like

674
00:38:20,400 --> 00:38:23,960
Speaker 2: what is the enterprise of creativity and what role does

675
00:38:24,000 --> 00:38:27,319
Speaker 2: it play? So applying all of this to adults, the

676
00:38:27,360 --> 00:38:30,879
Speaker 2: idea that Russ and the paper proposes here is that, yes,

677
00:38:30,960 --> 00:38:34,279
Speaker 2: childhood creativity has an influence on adult creativity. But we

678
00:38:34,400 --> 00:38:38,319
Speaker 2: can't just think about creativity in adults as you know,

679
00:38:38,400 --> 00:38:42,719
Speaker 2: just in terms of its usefulness like in the workplace

680
00:38:42,840 --> 00:38:45,440
Speaker 2: or for a career. Again, we can't just think of

681
00:38:45,480 --> 00:38:48,920
Speaker 2: it as strapping that horse to a cart play in particular,

682
00:38:48,960 --> 00:38:52,280
Speaker 2: they stress for children and adults, allows us to process

683
00:38:52,360 --> 00:38:57,080
Speaker 2: challenges and emotions while also supporting other forms of creativity.

684
00:38:57,400 --> 00:38:59,880
Speaker 2: So again, a mini C exercise could transition into a

685
00:39:00,080 --> 00:39:03,080
Speaker 2: pro s or any of the other forms of creativity.

686
00:39:03,280 --> 00:39:06,000
Speaker 2: You know, to quote Lawrence of Arabia, big things have

687
00:39:06,080 --> 00:39:06,920
Speaker 2: small beginnings.

688
00:39:08,120 --> 00:39:10,800
Speaker 3: And I think often this is sort of a cliche

689
00:39:10,880 --> 00:39:14,320
Speaker 3: at this point, but how often in history you see

690
00:39:14,680 --> 00:39:18,680
Speaker 3: people who do, I don't know, make big creative leaps

691
00:39:18,719 --> 00:39:21,880
Speaker 3: that are often categorized as the useful sort. You know,

692
00:39:21,880 --> 00:39:25,040
Speaker 3: people who make big scientific breakthroughs, or people who you know,

693
00:39:25,280 --> 00:39:28,120
Speaker 3: do great works of art or something, are often also

694
00:39:28,520 --> 00:39:32,080
Speaker 3: engaged in what we might think of as a lot

695
00:39:32,239 --> 00:39:38,320
Speaker 3: of trivial collaborative outside of work play of a creative sort.

696
00:39:38,680 --> 00:39:41,400
Speaker 3: You know, they're just sort of in whatever off hours

697
00:39:41,440 --> 00:39:45,040
Speaker 3: they have, kind of talking to other people who are

698
00:39:45,080 --> 00:39:49,320
Speaker 3: involved in similar pursuits and engaging and engaging in little

699
00:39:49,400 --> 00:39:52,799
Speaker 3: kind of lower stakes games with the ideas that they're

700
00:39:52,800 --> 00:39:54,400
Speaker 3: manipulating in their major work.

701
00:39:54,840 --> 00:39:57,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, yeah. And one of the big ideas

702
00:39:57,680 --> 00:40:00,320
Speaker 2: here is that most of us are not getting gauge

703
00:40:00,320 --> 00:40:03,280
Speaker 2: and big C creativity. Most of us are not going

704
00:40:03,320 --> 00:40:07,799
Speaker 2: to create a new religion, create some sort of new technology.

705
00:40:07,840 --> 00:40:10,759
Speaker 2: It changes the world. We're not going to, you know,

706
00:40:11,080 --> 00:40:14,680
Speaker 2: write the great American novel or what have you. But

707
00:40:14,960 --> 00:40:19,000
Speaker 2: those little C and many C exercises they're still novel,

708
00:40:19,080 --> 00:40:22,640
Speaker 2: they're still useful, and they're still whole. So in this

709
00:40:23,160 --> 00:40:27,040
Speaker 2: paper they make several observations about adult play during COVID

710
00:40:27,120 --> 00:40:30,680
Speaker 2: nineteen lockdowns, you know, taking us back to that time

711
00:40:30,680 --> 00:40:32,960
Speaker 2: in which you know, we can I think everyone listening

712
00:40:32,960 --> 00:40:35,400
Speaker 2: can probably remember that. You know, you had many adults

713
00:40:35,400 --> 00:40:40,280
Speaker 2: suddenly dealing with more free time, but also expressing themselves

714
00:40:40,320 --> 00:40:44,839
Speaker 2: through play and even process emotions and even trauma through

715
00:40:44,920 --> 00:40:48,160
Speaker 2: that play in addition to nurturing joy. You know, So

716
00:40:48,320 --> 00:40:53,880
Speaker 2: suddenly people who had the ability to do so, you know,

717
00:40:53,920 --> 00:40:56,480
Speaker 2: they might suddenly they're playing more Dudges and Dragons than usual,

718
00:40:56,560 --> 00:40:59,959
Speaker 2: or they're they're turning back to an old hobby. And yeah,

719
00:41:00,080 --> 00:41:03,000
Speaker 2: part of that is like maybe they had some extra

720
00:41:03,040 --> 00:41:04,960
Speaker 2: time they were trapped in their home and so forth.

721
00:41:05,719 --> 00:41:11,879
Speaker 2: But additionally, like the creative process gave them a way

722
00:41:11,920 --> 00:41:15,440
Speaker 2: to work through what they were feeling. So in this

723
00:41:15,520 --> 00:41:19,800
Speaker 2: paper from Sinha at All, they write the following quote

724
00:41:19,840 --> 00:41:22,040
Speaker 2: as human beings. We are programmed to use play in

725
00:41:22,080 --> 00:41:25,440
Speaker 2: creative expression to connect and work through the difficulties. Creativity

726
00:41:25,480 --> 00:41:28,120
Speaker 2: is not just about finding solutions to problems. It is

727
00:41:28,160 --> 00:41:32,040
Speaker 2: about expressing emotion and processing change. Now does it involve

728
00:41:32,080 --> 00:41:38,040
Speaker 2: pretend play? Coming back to the overarching theme of these episodes? Subjectively,

729
00:41:38,840 --> 00:41:41,160
Speaker 2: my argument was, yes, you know, I was thinking about

730
00:41:41,239 --> 00:41:45,080
Speaker 2: various games, you know, Dungeons and Dragons, or otherwise various

731
00:41:45,080 --> 00:41:48,800
Speaker 2: creative endeavors one might engage in. But I also found

732
00:41:48,800 --> 00:41:52,960
Speaker 2: literature that lines up with this too. Oh okay, I

733
00:41:53,000 --> 00:41:56,000
Speaker 2: was looking at a paper this is by Gungku at

734
00:41:56,000 --> 00:42:00,319
Speaker 2: All published in Topoi, an international review of philosophy from

735
00:42:00,320 --> 00:42:05,600
Speaker 2: two thousand and five, titled Pretend Play as a lifespan Activity,

736
00:42:05,640 --> 00:42:08,200
Speaker 2: and the authors here argue that pretend play is an

737
00:42:08,200 --> 00:42:12,040
Speaker 2: adaptive human activity of adulthood as well as childhood. They

738
00:42:12,080 --> 00:42:14,400
Speaker 2: point out that a lot of the early work in

739
00:42:14,480 --> 00:42:18,239
Speaker 2: childhood psychology creative view in which childhood is playful and fanciful,

740
00:42:18,320 --> 00:42:21,959
Speaker 2: while adult adulthood is all logical and productive. We touched

741
00:42:22,000 --> 00:42:24,040
Speaker 2: on that already, the idea that okay, you're grown up

742
00:42:24,040 --> 00:42:27,520
Speaker 2: and now put your creativity to work again. Creativity and

743
00:42:27,560 --> 00:42:32,040
Speaker 2: adults was seen as is useful almost always in a

744
00:42:32,080 --> 00:42:34,839
Speaker 2: big sea or at least little sea aspiring manner. The

745
00:42:34,880 --> 00:42:37,640
Speaker 2: authors here, though, argue the opposite, that pretend play can

746
00:42:37,680 --> 00:42:40,880
Speaker 2: be found throughout adult life as well, and they point

747
00:42:40,920 --> 00:42:45,080
Speaker 2: to adult improv theater as a key example of this. Now, granted,

748
00:42:45,120 --> 00:42:48,000
Speaker 2: not everyone engages in improv theater, but it has been

749
00:42:48,000 --> 00:42:50,239
Speaker 2: interesting in recent years to see improv theater and it's

750
00:42:50,280 --> 00:42:53,760
Speaker 2: often brought in to say, business spaces and so forth,

751
00:42:54,080 --> 00:42:59,279
Speaker 2: realizing that it is a fun and helpful skill set

752
00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:02,560
Speaker 2: to bring into some sort of a work environment.

753
00:43:03,160 --> 00:43:07,600
Speaker 3: Hmm yeah, okay, So I was thinking of ways that

754
00:43:08,080 --> 00:43:12,560
Speaker 3: pretend play can continue into adulthood, and it made me wonder,

755
00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:16,600
Speaker 3: does something count as pretend play if you were sort

756
00:43:16,640 --> 00:43:19,839
Speaker 3: of trying to hide the fact that you're doing it,

757
00:43:19,920 --> 00:43:22,640
Speaker 3: if it's just sort of a private game with yourself,

758
00:43:23,160 --> 00:43:25,880
Speaker 3: and maybe you're not really thinking of it as pretend

759
00:43:25,920 --> 00:43:28,520
Speaker 3: play and you don't necessarily tell other people about it.

760
00:43:29,080 --> 00:43:31,279
Speaker 3: But I don't know. What's coming to mind is that

761
00:43:31,480 --> 00:43:35,759
Speaker 3: I think probably a lot of adults go about their

762
00:43:35,840 --> 00:43:39,320
Speaker 3: business with this model we've talked about before, where they're

763
00:43:39,360 --> 00:43:42,600
Speaker 3: kind of seeing themselves as a character in a narrative.

764
00:43:42,880 --> 00:43:46,239
Speaker 3: You know, they're not like I am Luke Skywalker, but

765
00:43:46,400 --> 00:43:50,719
Speaker 3: they are framing the events of their life in a

766
00:43:50,840 --> 00:43:55,880
Speaker 3: kind of in a modified, not very realistic way that

767
00:43:56,400 --> 00:43:59,520
Speaker 3: paints them as like the hero of an important story.

768
00:44:00,080 --> 00:44:02,400
Speaker 3: Does that count as pretend play? I mean it's I

769
00:44:02,400 --> 00:44:05,040
Speaker 3: don't I don't know if it's like altering the literal

770
00:44:05,200 --> 00:44:09,760
Speaker 3: facts of reality, but it's it's putting their life within

771
00:44:09,800 --> 00:44:14,000
Speaker 3: a frame, a frame that is probably not the way

772
00:44:14,040 --> 00:44:17,160
Speaker 3: an objective observer would describe what they're doing. Does that

773
00:44:17,200 --> 00:44:17,680
Speaker 3: make sense?

774
00:44:18,080 --> 00:44:22,239
Speaker 2: Now, there's at least a patina of pretend play involved here. Yeah, yeah,

775
00:44:23,560 --> 00:44:27,600
Speaker 2: Whereas in an improv class you might literally be pretending

776
00:44:27,600 --> 00:44:29,440
Speaker 2: to be a dump truck in a way if that

777
00:44:29,640 --> 00:44:35,200
Speaker 2: most most non improv adults are not doing, but very

778
00:44:35,280 --> 00:44:37,200
Speaker 2: much in line with the kind of pretend play a

779
00:44:37,280 --> 00:44:38,319
Speaker 2: child might engage in.

780
00:44:38,600 --> 00:44:42,399
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah. And there is something kind of freeing about that,

781
00:44:42,480 --> 00:44:44,680
Speaker 3: you know, when you when you watch improv, there's like

782
00:44:44,760 --> 00:44:48,120
Speaker 3: a there's a feeling of cutting loose that's very exciting

783
00:44:48,160 --> 00:44:50,800
Speaker 3: that you don't see even in a lot of otherwise

784
00:44:50,840 --> 00:44:51,719
Speaker 3: creative adults.

785
00:44:52,280 --> 00:44:53,920
Speaker 2: Now that this paper does not get into it, but

786
00:44:53,960 --> 00:44:57,879
Speaker 2: of course I'm also reminded of various observations about other

787
00:44:57,960 --> 00:45:00,520
Speaker 2: forms of acting in which there can be kind of

788
00:45:00,560 --> 00:45:06,480
Speaker 2: a contagious aspect to the part one is playing and

789
00:45:06,840 --> 00:45:11,680
Speaker 2: one's own thoughts and actions. So, I mean, I guess

790
00:45:11,719 --> 00:45:14,319
Speaker 2: you especially when adults, I mean to a certain extent,

791
00:45:14,360 --> 00:45:17,840
Speaker 2: when kids pretend play. You know, sometimes animal simulations can

792
00:45:17,880 --> 00:45:20,120
Speaker 2: get a little out of hand and mom and dad

793
00:45:20,200 --> 00:45:24,600
Speaker 2: might get scratched or bit But but but on a

794
00:45:24,800 --> 00:45:28,960
Speaker 2: on another level, there's always that possibility with adult actors

795
00:45:29,000 --> 00:45:34,480
Speaker 2: as well. Now, I think it's an interesting comparison between

796
00:45:34,760 --> 00:45:40,359
Speaker 2: improv theater and childhood pretend play. I think kids are

797
00:45:40,360 --> 00:45:44,080
Speaker 2: sometimes not as good at the yes and aspect of improv.

798
00:45:44,080 --> 00:45:47,040
Speaker 2: That's you know, central to the philosophy of improv. But

799
00:45:47,960 --> 00:45:50,280
Speaker 2: you know, I think that's on another level, that's often

800
00:45:50,320 --> 00:45:52,439
Speaker 2: one of the big lessons that they learn when they

801
00:45:52,640 --> 00:45:55,920
Speaker 2: play with others. I mean, there's a lot of research

802
00:45:55,960 --> 00:45:57,600
Speaker 2: on this as well. We didn't know I haven't really

803
00:45:57,600 --> 00:46:00,680
Speaker 2: got into this, but you have like parallel play kids

804
00:46:00,719 --> 00:46:04,879
Speaker 2: where it's like little Susie and little Bobby. They are

805
00:46:04,920 --> 00:46:07,200
Speaker 2: not really playing together. They are both playing with dump

806
00:46:07,239 --> 00:46:10,000
Speaker 2: trucks in the sand, but they're just kind of playing

807
00:46:10,000 --> 00:46:12,840
Speaker 2: alongside each other. And thank goodness they both have dump trucks,

808
00:46:12,840 --> 00:46:14,200
Speaker 2: because otherwise they would be a fight.

809
00:46:14,680 --> 00:46:17,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, and I can see, yes. And as a form

810
00:46:17,200 --> 00:46:19,560
Speaker 3: of sharing, I mean it as a way of give

811
00:46:19,600 --> 00:46:22,640
Speaker 3: and take and of sharing, not the physical props of play,

812
00:46:22,680 --> 00:46:24,719
Speaker 3: if you have to share your one dump truck toy,

813
00:46:24,960 --> 00:46:28,120
Speaker 3: but of sharing the direction of the play, sharing the narrative.

814
00:46:28,360 --> 00:46:30,879
Speaker 2: Yeah. If it's for example, if you're engaging in an

815
00:46:30,960 --> 00:46:33,960
Speaker 2: imagine shared world, in a paracosm, Yeah, you have to

816
00:46:34,000 --> 00:46:37,480
Speaker 2: share that, like one person can't be just be the

817
00:46:37,480 --> 00:46:40,680
Speaker 2: god of this realm. I guess there's room for maybe

818
00:46:40,680 --> 00:46:43,720
Speaker 2: a you know, forty sixty split there on creative control

819
00:46:43,719 --> 00:46:44,400
Speaker 2: of the paracosm.

820
00:46:44,800 --> 00:46:55,000
Speaker 4: Yeah.

821
00:46:55,040 --> 00:46:58,080
Speaker 2: But another way that the improv theater example I think

822
00:46:58,200 --> 00:47:02,560
Speaker 2: is interesting is that it's an example where adults often

823
00:47:02,640 --> 00:47:05,800
Speaker 2: or at least sometimes have to relearn how to engage

824
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:09,759
Speaker 2: in pure imagination play. You know a lot of you

825
00:47:09,760 --> 00:47:12,600
Speaker 2: hear plenty of accounts of adults who take an improv

826
00:47:12,680 --> 00:47:15,279
Speaker 2: class and it's like they're one over by it. You know,

827
00:47:15,520 --> 00:47:18,520
Speaker 2: it transforms them, like they're able to reconnect with this

828
00:47:18,520 --> 00:47:20,880
Speaker 2: this creative energy that they hadn't had, perhaps since they

829
00:47:20,880 --> 00:47:23,360
Speaker 2: were kids, and this all kind of ties into that

830
00:47:23,400 --> 00:47:26,839
Speaker 2: whole idea of creativity as being this expression of the whole.

831
00:47:26,960 --> 00:47:29,759
Speaker 2: You know, it's not just this thing you know, you

832
00:47:30,200 --> 00:47:33,279
Speaker 2: do you know in this one exercise like it is

833
00:47:34,239 --> 00:47:35,880
Speaker 2: you know, it is a way that you're able to

834
00:47:36,000 --> 00:47:40,279
Speaker 2: process things and let things out. Now another example that

835
00:47:40,320 --> 00:47:42,919
Speaker 2: they bring up. This one was really fascinating in part

836
00:47:42,960 --> 00:47:46,120
Speaker 2: because we already kind of stumbled over this a little

837
00:47:46,160 --> 00:47:50,319
Speaker 2: bit when we were talking about imaginary friends. We were

838
00:47:50,360 --> 00:47:54,440
Speaker 2: talking about, Okay, what do adults engage in that are

839
00:47:54,480 --> 00:47:57,120
Speaker 2: akin to imaginary friends? And we talked about things like

840
00:47:57,840 --> 00:48:02,120
Speaker 2: speaking to angels and shouting at the devil and so forth.

841
00:48:02,600 --> 00:48:06,239
Speaker 2: But the example brought up in this paper is that

842
00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:12,600
Speaker 2: you will have the situation of adults engaging in conversation

843
00:48:12,840 --> 00:48:16,760
Speaker 2: with the dead had a grave site, for example, adults

844
00:48:16,840 --> 00:48:21,320
Speaker 2: essentially engaging in a conversation with an imagined or simulated mind.

845
00:48:21,880 --> 00:48:24,080
Speaker 2: And this was an idea that was apparently discussed in

846
00:48:24,120 --> 00:48:27,280
Speaker 2: a paper by I. E. Josephson nineteen ninety eight titled

847
00:48:27,320 --> 00:48:30,160
Speaker 2: constructing Oneself in the City of the Silent.

848
00:48:30,719 --> 00:48:33,840
Speaker 3: Oh wow, this is interesting because just last night I

849
00:48:33,880 --> 00:48:37,960
Speaker 3: was reading sort of a biographical article about the life

850
00:48:37,960 --> 00:48:42,480
Speaker 3: of Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein, and she apparently

851
00:48:42,520 --> 00:48:48,480
Speaker 3: had an extremely important relationship with her with her mother's grave,

852
00:48:48,600 --> 00:48:51,759
Speaker 3: essentially with her mother was an important writer in her

853
00:48:51,760 --> 00:48:55,880
Speaker 3: own right, Mary Wollstonecraft, and she would visit her mother's

854
00:48:55,920 --> 00:49:00,360
Speaker 3: grave and like apparently had a strong, powerful emotional relationship

855
00:49:00,400 --> 00:49:02,759
Speaker 3: with her mother's tombstone, would sort of like talk to

856
00:49:02,960 --> 00:49:06,200
Speaker 3: and relate to her mother who died after giving birth

857
00:49:06,239 --> 00:49:06,560
Speaker 3: to her.

858
00:49:07,200 --> 00:49:10,640
Speaker 2: Wow. Yeah, and I feel like a lot of us, yeah,

859
00:49:10,680 --> 00:49:15,000
Speaker 2: can speak to examples of this the way that gunku

860
00:49:15,640 --> 00:49:19,200
Speaker 2: at All sum this up, They say, quote, these conversations

861
00:49:19,320 --> 00:49:22,880
Speaker 2: enable the grieving survivors to reinterpret their joint past with

862
00:49:22,960 --> 00:49:25,760
Speaker 2: the deceased, as they also help them prepare for the future,

863
00:49:26,080 --> 00:49:29,000
Speaker 2: a finding that is corroborated by other clinical studies.

864
00:49:30,120 --> 00:49:30,359
Speaker 4: Yeah.

865
00:49:30,960 --> 00:49:33,040
Speaker 2: So yeah, I feel like a lot of us can

866
00:49:33,239 --> 00:49:35,800
Speaker 2: can speak to this on some level. I've certainly engaged

867
00:49:35,840 --> 00:49:39,280
Speaker 2: in this before, speaking to the dead, reaching for the dead,

868
00:49:39,800 --> 00:49:44,640
Speaker 2: particularly at a gravesite. Yeah. And I want to stress again,

869
00:49:44,680 --> 00:49:46,919
Speaker 2: as we've touched on this many times on the show,

870
00:49:46,920 --> 00:49:49,640
Speaker 2: that we as humans are capable of juggling multiple and

871
00:49:49,719 --> 00:49:55,640
Speaker 2: even contradicting ideas about say the persistence of consciousness. Have

872
00:49:55,920 --> 00:49:59,160
Speaker 2: you contradicting ideas in your head, multiple of them at once.

873
00:50:00,120 --> 00:50:02,000
Speaker 2: You know, standing at the grave of a loved one,

874
00:50:02,040 --> 00:50:04,200
Speaker 2: you might at once feel as if you were speaking

875
00:50:04,239 --> 00:50:07,440
Speaker 2: to a person who is in the past. You know,

876
00:50:07,440 --> 00:50:09,840
Speaker 2: you're speaking you're a person who only exists in memory.

877
00:50:10,480 --> 00:50:12,640
Speaker 2: You may also feel in another level like you are

878
00:50:12,840 --> 00:50:15,680
Speaker 2: speaking to the ghost of a loved one that is

879
00:50:15,960 --> 00:50:19,640
Speaker 2: spiritually present, like in a movie about a ghost, or

880
00:50:19,880 --> 00:50:23,160
Speaker 2: someone who is there but invisible, like in other movies

881
00:50:23,200 --> 00:50:25,920
Speaker 2: about ghosts. I mean, you really can't discount the power

882
00:50:26,440 --> 00:50:30,040
Speaker 2: that say, ghost movies have on these sort of like

883
00:50:30,680 --> 00:50:35,600
Speaker 2: almost subconscious ideas about the deceased and the role that

884
00:50:35,600 --> 00:50:39,480
Speaker 2: they have in our lives. You might see them as

885
00:50:39,480 --> 00:50:41,400
Speaker 2: a spirit of a loved one that is now residing

886
00:50:41,400 --> 00:50:44,319
Speaker 2: in another realm of existence. You know, the idea that

887
00:50:44,360 --> 00:50:47,720
Speaker 2: well they're looking down on me and so forth. You also,

888
00:50:48,120 --> 00:50:51,040
Speaker 2: on some level, maybe even like front loaded, you might

889
00:50:51,080 --> 00:50:54,360
Speaker 2: be thinking, well, this is just an empty, corporeal vessel,

890
00:50:54,440 --> 00:50:57,480
Speaker 2: like there's there's nothing here. I am just engaging in

891
00:50:57,520 --> 00:51:00,960
Speaker 2: this idea of the person that is passed. And then yeah,

892
00:51:01,040 --> 00:51:02,920
Speaker 2: ultimately you might think of it all, I'm dealing with

893
00:51:03,160 --> 00:51:06,160
Speaker 2: a mental simulation of the deceased via theory of mind.

894
00:51:06,800 --> 00:51:07,160
Speaker 3: Hmm.

895
00:51:07,760 --> 00:51:10,960
Speaker 2: Yeah, and for something as deeply personal and emotional as

896
00:51:11,000 --> 00:51:13,359
Speaker 2: a grave side conversation with the deata, I think it's

897
00:51:13,400 --> 00:51:15,200
Speaker 2: fair to accept that any number of these can be

898
00:51:15,239 --> 00:51:17,919
Speaker 2: in play, and we shouldn't be dismissive of any of them,

899
00:51:18,000 --> 00:51:21,239
Speaker 2: at least from an emotional standpoint, you know. But I

900
00:51:21,239 --> 00:51:24,920
Speaker 2: think it's a great concept concerning the power of human

901
00:51:24,920 --> 00:51:28,959
Speaker 2: imagination and our engagement with simulated realities as a means

902
00:51:28,960 --> 00:51:33,279
Speaker 2: of processing and evaluating feelings, and as an expression of

903
00:51:33,320 --> 00:51:36,560
Speaker 2: wholeness and creativity. You know. So you know it is.

904
00:51:37,080 --> 00:51:40,840
Speaker 2: It is ultimately a kind of pretend play, but pretend

905
00:51:40,880 --> 00:51:44,279
Speaker 2: play that you know, has very high emotional stakes. But

906
00:51:44,320 --> 00:51:48,160
Speaker 2: at the same time, it's not useful in the in

907
00:51:48,239 --> 00:51:50,560
Speaker 2: the sense that it is going to change the world

908
00:51:50,640 --> 00:51:54,880
Speaker 2: or generate income. But it can be highly useful depending

909
00:51:54,960 --> 00:51:58,439
Speaker 2: on the individual obviously in the situation, like for their

910
00:51:58,680 --> 00:52:01,799
Speaker 2: their their own feeling, and for their own sense of

911
00:52:01,840 --> 00:52:02,320
Speaker 2: well being.

912
00:52:02,719 --> 00:52:05,399
Speaker 3: Well, this actually makes me reframe one of the ways

913
00:52:05,440 --> 00:52:08,560
Speaker 3: I was thinking about childhood pretend play. In the first part,

914
00:52:08,600 --> 00:52:12,239
Speaker 3: we briefly discussed a definition of play, which is that

915
00:52:12,320 --> 00:52:16,160
Speaker 3: it's non instrumental activity. It's activity that is not put

916
00:52:16,200 --> 00:52:21,200
Speaker 3: toward any kind of external purpose. It's purely it's often

917
00:52:21,239 --> 00:52:25,000
Speaker 3: described as purely for enjoyment, and that makes it sound

918
00:52:25,080 --> 00:52:28,920
Speaker 3: like anything that is play, or by extension, pretend play,

919
00:52:29,000 --> 00:52:33,600
Speaker 3: should be for fun. But actually, I mean, obviously, I

920
00:52:33,600 --> 00:52:35,920
Speaker 3: think it makes sense in a way to call this

921
00:52:36,040 --> 00:52:39,680
Speaker 3: kind of interfacing with the dead a form of pretend play,

922
00:52:39,800 --> 00:52:42,960
Speaker 3: except the word play sounds wrong because play is supposed

923
00:52:42,960 --> 00:52:46,239
Speaker 3: to be fun. But then when I think of the

924
00:52:46,320 --> 00:52:49,799
Speaker 3: pretend play games I actually like watch my daughter go through.

925
00:52:50,360 --> 00:52:53,600
Speaker 3: They're usually fun, but they're not always fun. Sometimes they

926
00:52:53,640 --> 00:52:57,200
Speaker 3: actually feel quite serious and sometimes quite sad. Like one

927
00:52:57,239 --> 00:53:00,840
Speaker 3: thing she likes to do is to pretend to treat

928
00:53:00,960 --> 00:53:05,799
Speaker 3: and heal the wounds of her toys, and she she

929
00:53:05,800 --> 00:53:08,400
Speaker 3: gets kind of sadness in her boy, you know, she's like,

930
00:53:08,480 --> 00:53:12,520
Speaker 3: oh he you know, dinosaur, her need feel better. And

931
00:53:13,840 --> 00:53:17,680
Speaker 3: that almost strikes me as somewhat similar to the Graveside conversation.

932
00:53:17,760 --> 00:53:20,120
Speaker 3: I mean, in a way that still has to be play,

933
00:53:20,200 --> 00:53:23,760
Speaker 3: that is play, but there's no laughter involved. It's not fun,

934
00:53:23,800 --> 00:53:28,040
Speaker 3: and the main emotion seems to be sympathy and sadness. Yeah,

935
00:53:28,120 --> 00:53:30,120
Speaker 3: so I don't know. There are many many ways obviously

936
00:53:30,200 --> 00:53:33,200
Speaker 3: in which those things are different, But it does seem

937
00:53:33,239 --> 00:53:36,920
Speaker 3: to drive home that there's maybe something that is missing

938
00:53:37,160 --> 00:53:39,920
Speaker 3: when we think of play as an activity that is

939
00:53:39,960 --> 00:53:44,880
Speaker 3: strictly for fun. Instead, it's something that's like usually for fun,

940
00:53:45,520 --> 00:53:48,799
Speaker 3: but it also can sometimes be something else. It's something

941
00:53:48,840 --> 00:53:52,440
Speaker 3: we're doing for kind of intrinsic motivations, but they're not

942
00:53:52,520 --> 00:53:56,680
Speaker 3: really related to like pleasure or laughter or excitement.

943
00:53:57,400 --> 00:54:01,719
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, so at any rate, Yeah, these, like I say,

944
00:54:01,920 --> 00:54:03,200
Speaker 2: I thought I was going to get more into sort

945
00:54:03,239 --> 00:54:07,840
Speaker 2: of granular discussions of you know, of adult imagination play

946
00:54:08,000 --> 00:54:11,239
Speaker 2: and like the benefits of engaging maybe in something like

947
00:54:11,280 --> 00:54:14,160
Speaker 2: improv theater. And yeah, I realized this all ended up

948
00:54:14,160 --> 00:54:16,839
Speaker 2: being a little bit broader and a little bit more philosophic,

949
00:54:17,680 --> 00:54:20,200
Speaker 2: But I thought it was really fascinating and it made

950
00:54:20,239 --> 00:54:21,799
Speaker 2: me sort of rethink a lot of what I thought

951
00:54:21,800 --> 00:54:23,080
Speaker 2: I knew about creativity.

952
00:54:23,440 --> 00:54:24,160
Speaker 3: Yeah, totally.

953
00:54:25,040 --> 00:54:26,839
Speaker 2: All right, Well, I think we're going to go ahead

954
00:54:26,880 --> 00:54:29,759
Speaker 2: and close this episode out, and we're thinking we're going

955
00:54:29,800 --> 00:54:32,399
Speaker 2: to be back with one more of these, because there's

956
00:54:32,400 --> 00:54:35,319
Speaker 2: still plenty to talk about and in the meantime, we'd

957
00:54:35,320 --> 00:54:37,200
Speaker 2: love to hear from all of you. I know we

958
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:40,360
Speaker 2: have some people out there who are improv actors or

959
00:54:40,400 --> 00:54:42,640
Speaker 2: certainly have taken an improv class or two, or done

960
00:54:42,680 --> 00:54:46,399
Speaker 2: a little improv maybe in a college acting class. Tell

961
00:54:46,480 --> 00:54:49,279
Speaker 2: us about it. How do your experiences line up with

962
00:54:49,320 --> 00:54:54,000
Speaker 2: what we've been discussing here, any other of your thoughts, experiences,

963
00:54:54,080 --> 00:54:57,120
Speaker 2: and so forth concerning this episode or the previous episodes

964
00:54:57,440 --> 00:54:59,920
Speaker 2: in the pretend play series right in, We would love

965
00:55:00,040 --> 00:55:02,640
Speaker 2: to hear from you. And oh and as always, if

966
00:55:03,000 --> 00:55:06,040
Speaker 2: you want what you share to be to not be

967
00:55:06,120 --> 00:55:08,880
Speaker 2: shared in a future listener mail episode, let us know

968
00:55:09,000 --> 00:55:12,120
Speaker 2: and we'll honor that. Likewise, if you would like to

969
00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:15,160
Speaker 2: use a pseudonym, you know, just let us know as well.

970
00:55:15,239 --> 00:55:18,360
Speaker 2: Just tell us what to do with the copy you send.

971
00:55:18,239 --> 00:55:20,920
Speaker 3: Us, with the understanding that if you don't give us

972
00:55:20,960 --> 00:55:23,600
Speaker 3: any instructions of that sort, we will use your first

973
00:55:23,680 --> 00:55:26,560
Speaker 3: name and consider it fair game to read on air.

974
00:55:26,840 --> 00:55:29,799
Speaker 2: Absolutely, absolutely all right, Just a reminder. Stuff to Blow

975
00:55:29,840 --> 00:55:32,359
Speaker 2: Your Mind is primarily a science and culture podcast. Core

976
00:55:32,360 --> 00:55:35,440
Speaker 2: episodes on Tuesdays and Thursdays, short form episodes on Wednesdays

977
00:55:35,680 --> 00:55:38,000
Speaker 2: and on Fridays. We set aside most serious concerns to

978
00:55:38,120 --> 00:55:40,600
Speaker 2: just talk about a weird film on Weird House Cinema.

979
00:55:40,760 --> 00:55:44,680
Speaker 2: If you're on Instagram, follow us at STBYM podcast. We're

980
00:55:44,719 --> 00:55:46,560
Speaker 2: been trying to build that one up again because we

981
00:55:46,640 --> 00:55:49,520
Speaker 2: used to have another Instagram account. That one went away

982
00:55:49,920 --> 00:55:52,439
Speaker 2: and now we have this newer one with a low

983
00:55:52,480 --> 00:55:56,120
Speaker 2: follower account to be clear, trying to get those numbers up.

984
00:55:56,160 --> 00:55:59,480
Speaker 2: We have higher numbers on other platforms like Twitter, but

985
00:56:00,200 --> 00:56:01,759
Speaker 2: I kind of want the Instagram want to be hired,

986
00:56:01,880 --> 00:56:04,800
Speaker 2: So help us out with that if you have the ability.

987
00:56:04,440 --> 00:56:07,160
Speaker 3: To do so. We have a Twitter account.

988
00:56:07,080 --> 00:56:10,360
Speaker 2: Yeah, we do. It's active. You can follow us on Twitter.

989
00:56:11,040 --> 00:56:12,680
Speaker 2: It does get updates about the.

990
00:56:12,640 --> 00:56:18,200
Speaker 3: Content huge thanks as always to our excellent audio producer

991
00:56:18,320 --> 00:56:20,640
Speaker 3: JJ Posway. If you would like to get in touch

992
00:56:20,680 --> 00:56:22,839
Speaker 3: with us with feedback on this episode or any other,

993
00:56:22,960 --> 00:56:25,239
Speaker 3: to suggest a topic for the future, or just to

994
00:56:25,280 --> 00:56:28,600
Speaker 3: say hello, you can email us at contact at stuff

995
00:56:28,640 --> 00:56:37,240
Speaker 3: to Blow your Mind dot com.

996
00:56:37,760 --> 00:56:40,680
Speaker 1: Stuff to Blow Your Mind is production of iHeartRadio. For

997
00:56:40,760 --> 00:56:43,560
Speaker 1: more podcasts from My Heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app,

998
00:56:43,719 --> 00:57:02,040
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you're listening to your favorite shows.

999
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:03,279
Speaker 2: The four part