Stress And Play Outline

Stress and Play on the Young Child's Brain

Natasha Vanderwall

Portland State University The Effects of Stress and Play on the Young Child's Brain

1. Introduction

a. Introductory sentence: - The term ‘’stress’’ is common among people, especially adults.

b. Definition of stress: - People define stress differently, but Cohen et al. (2013) terms it as a state of mind during tense moments characterized by demands, constraints, or opportunities.

c. Types of stress: - stress may be positive or negative depending on its effects on a child or an adult.

d. Relationship between play and stress: - like stress, play can also be positive or negative.

e. Thesis: - Despite the fact that stress and play are seen as counterproductive, research indicates

Counterargument: - too much play may impair mental development of a child.

d. Refutation: - Play is important among children because it helps relax brain muscles and aid development.

3. Types

a. Topic Sentence: - play takes different phones; it could be object, locomotor, or social among others.

b. Object play: - Normally found in active species that like hunting. It denotes skill building play.

c. Social play: - helps build behavioral plasticity or flexibility among children and other species.

d. Locomotor play: - Helps in building brain-body coordination to aid movement of body parts such as hands and legs. It is important among young children, as they learn to walk, move around, and coordinate their brains and movement of specific body parts such as the hands to the mouth.

4. Stress

a. Topic sentence: - Stress might have a positive or negative impact on a child’s brain development.

b. Supporting sentence: - negative stress has destructive impact on the child’s brain development.

c. Supporting sentence: - positive stress has positive impact of a child’s brain development.

d. Counter argument: - Stress has positive impact on children depending on its magnitude.

e. Refutation: - stress no matter how little can have a negative impact of brain development of a

A., Davies, E., & Kiel, E. (2011). Allostatic and environmental load in toddlers predicts anxiety in preschool and kindergarten. Development and Psychopathology, 23(4), 1069-87.

Camping Magazine. (2015). Childhood Stress, 1-7

Cohen, L., Pooley, J. A., Clarke-Stewart, A., Penner, L. A., Roy, E. J., Bernstein, D. A., Provost, S., Cranney, J. (2013). Psychology: An International Discipline in Context. Melbourne: Cengage Learning Australia.

Ginsburg, K. (2006). The importance of play in promoting healthy child development and maintaining strong parent-child bond. American Academy of Pediatrics, 119(1), 182-191.

Lupien, S., McEwen, B., Gunnar, M., & Heim, C. (2009). Effects of stress throughout the lifespan on the brain, behavior and cognition. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 10(6), 434-445.

Sam. W., & Aamodt, S. (2012). Play, Stress, and the Learning Brain. Cerebrum, 1-12. Retrieved from http://dana.org/news/cerebrum/detail.aspx?id=39402

Thompson, R., A. (2014). Stress and Child Development. The Future of Children, 24(1), 41-59.

Watamura, S., E., et al. (2003). Morning-to-afternoon increases in cortisol concentrations for infants and toddlers at child care: Age differences and behavioral correlates. Child Development, 74(4),