Impulsivity is an understudied area of post-traumatic stress disorder, a debilitating disorder specifically associated with stress. We examined reward-related impulsive behavior, anxiety-like behavior, locomotor activity and social behavior in the absence and presence of protracted pharmacological positive modulation of α5- and α6-GABAA receptors (GL-II-73 and DK-I-56-1, respectively) in male Sprague-Dawley rats exposed to a combination of maternal deprivation (MD) and single prolonged stress (SPS). While locomotor and anxiety-like behavior were not affected in the SPS and MD+SPS groups, the double-hit group treated with DK-I-56-1 exhibited a higher locomotor distance compared with MD+SPS and a higher percentage of open-arm time in the elevated plus maze compared with the control group. In the variable delay-to-signal task of impulsivity, the total number of successful trials and premature responses (PR) in the first stage of the test day were reduced in all groups exposed to stress compared with the controls. Based on PR rates in the first and second set of trials, motor impulsivity was apparently suppressed in all stressed groups, while delay intolerance was suppressed only in the MD+SPS+GL-II-73 group, respectively. In the three-chamber test, social interaction was completely normal, while social recognition was preserved in the MD+SPS+GL-II-73 group. In the resident-intruder test, social play was reduced only in the SPS group. The evaluation of impulsive behavior in the used complex task was hindered by the lack of motivation of stressed rats, which in the case of omission percentage was ameliorated by positive modulation of α5 and α6 GABAA receptors.

Juvenile social play and the development of socio-cognitive skills in male rats: Does everyone benefit?

Recent climate change is increasing thermal stress, highlighting the importance of understanding how wild animals behaviorally buffer these conditions. Although microhabitat use is known to vary with temperature and to function as behavioral thermoregulation, the effect of humidity on this process (i.e., the effect of humidity on temperature-dependent microhabitat use) remains poorly understood. Here, I aimed to examine microhabitat use in wild Japanese macaques (Macaca fuscata yakui) on Yakushima, Japan, across sunlight categories (sun, semi-shade, shade), explicitly accounting for both temperature and humidity. The study spanned from October 2020 to October 2021, excluding March 2021; temperatures ranged from 6.0°C to 35.1°C and humidity from 35.7% to 91.2%. I conducted 512h of focal follows on 24 adult females (≥ 4 years), averaging 21.3 ± SD 4.2h per subject, and extracted 722 observations of microhabitat use under sunny conditions when macaques were resting or engaged in affiliative behavior, except for social play. At high temperatures, macaques selected shade at high humidity and semi-shade at low humidity, indicating that humidity modulates microhabitat use under heat stress. These results suggest that semi-shade use can serve as a behavioral thermoregulatory strategy for wild Japanese macaques under hot, dry conditions and may inform our understanding of how primates and other endotherms use microhabitats to cope with heat stress that varies with humidity.

ABSTRACT Across millennia and geographies, humans and dogs have lived, worked, and played together. While play between dogs and humans may be a hallmark of the dog–human bond, empirical research on dog–human play is relatively limited. This scoping review examined academic research on dog–human play, mapping (1) theoretical and methodological approaches to the study of dog–human play; (2) how play is defined by researchers; and (3) the primary aims of research studies focused on play. Four databases were searched: Web of Science (via OVID), Psych Info, Agricultural Sciences, and Family and Society Studies. One hundred and nine articles describing dog–human play were identified, with 28 articles primarily focusing on the dog–human play encounter. Most research was localized within European and American contexts to focus on companion or “pet” dogs, and most studies were rooted in scientific disciplines, such as ethology and comparative psychology. Less than half of the identified articles provided a definition of dog–human play, and the most common definitions focused on relational components of play and/or on specific motor activity involved within the play encounter. Almost all articles provided an example of play, which primarily focused on social object play (e.g., fetch, tug). Researchers highlighted specific functions of dog–human play behaviors or focused more generally on implications of the play relationship. This scoping review identifies a need for more diverse cultural, theoretical, and methodological contributions to the landscape of dog–human play and reiterates concerns that definitional ambiguity may devalue the important work of play research. Ultimately, dog–human play tends to center the “human” within the dyad and would benefit from more diverse considerations around what it means to play with our canine companions.

ABSTRACT This study investigates the relation between parenting styles and children's play behaviour in Taiwan and the United States. Using purposive sampling, 107 parent–child dyads were recruited from university-affiliated preschools (64 in Taiwan, 43 in the U.S.). Children's play behaviour was assessed via the Play Observation Scale (POS) over a three-month period, while parental discipline styles were measured using the Parenting Style Dimensions Questionnaire (PSD). Results revealed that American parents were more likely to adopt an authoritative style, while Taiwanese parents showed a stronger tendency towards authoritarian parenting. Additionally, American children engaged in more group play than their Taiwanese counterparts. While authoritative parenting showed no significant association with children's play, authoritarian parenting was moderately and negatively correlated with group play. Further, parental warmth/acceptance and punitive/irrational strategies emerged as significant predictors of children's group play behaviour. These findings highlight the culturally contingent associations between parenting styles and children's social play, underscoring the importance of parental warmth and disciplinary strategies in shaping early peer interactions.

Affiliative behaviours in pigs can enhance group cohesion and lower stress levels, ultimately improving individual welfare. Individual factors such as dominance rank, sex or kinship may play a key role in shaping the expression of social behaviours, but there is a lack of knowledge on the contribution of these variables. The aim of this study was to identify social behavioural profiles in pigs, based on putative affiliative behaviours, and evaluate the extent to which dominance rank, sex, and kinship influence their expression. Agonistic interactions were recorded on 212 male and female domestic pigs (Sus scrofa domesticus) to calculate dominance ranks within 16 groups. Based on this, 96 pigs (six pigs per group) were selected for observations on detailed social nosing behaviours, allogrooming, spatial proximity and social play. Principal components analysis was used to assess the presence of behavioural profiles, followed by mixed model analysis to evaluate the influence of individual factors on each principal component (PC). Snout contact constituted the majority of interactions and was exhibited by all pigs. Lying in body contact and snout-snout proximity were also frequent and were expressed by more than 95% of individuals. Allogrooming and social play were observed in 29.2 and 33.3% of pigs, respectively, and represented less than 1% of the total interaction frequency. Three PCs had eigenvalues > 1 and together explained 60.9% of the variance. The PCs related to social contact (PC1), proximity (PC2) and social engagement (PC3). Sex, dominance status and kinship had no effect on PC1 or PC3, but sex and kinship had a limited effect on PC2, with entire males showing more snout proximity than females (P <0.001) and pigs showing less snout proximity behaviours towards their kin (P=0.044). This study shows that the expression of putatively affiliative social behaviours can be clustered into profiles and is under commercial settings only marginally influenced by individual factors such as dominance and kinship, suggesting their general relevance to pigs' social life.

Chronic stress can induce lasting physiological changes that may affect subsequent generations. Parental factors-such as affect, interparental relationship quality, and parenting styles-are potential mediators of these intergenerational effects. Utilizing the socially monogamous and biparental prairie vole, we previously reported that parents with a history of chronic stress exposure prior to conception (vs. stress-naïve parents), exhibited poorer pair-bonding quality and preferred maintaining physical contact while parenting. However, the impact of these subtle parental differences on offspring development remained unclear. Therefore, the current study examined the developmental and sociobehavioral outcomes in offspring indirectly exposed to preconception stress or in stress-naïve offspring. Indirectly stress-exposed offspring showed reduced allogrooming in juvenile males, inhibited social play in both sexes, and decreased self-grooming in adult females relative to their stress-naïve counterparts. These behavioral changes were partially mediated by parental allogrooming and aggression during early pair-bonding and parental proximity during the parental care task. These findings indicate that preconception stress is associated with impaired offspring sociobehavioral development, primarily through modifications in interparental relationships and parenting styles. These results underscore the importance of the preconception period in shaping offspring development and may inform both preclinical studies of stress transmission and clinical interventions targeting family dynamics.

Early-age social play influences rat cognition.

Adult-adult social play is unevenly expressed across human populations and primate species, raising the question of why some societies sustain such play while others do not. We tested whether adult-adult play is shaped by morphology, phylogeny, social structure or social style in 37 primate species, using Bayesian logistic regression with a phylogenetic random effect. Adult play was not predicted by female body mass or sexual dimorphism, which are phylogenetically conserved. Social style was the key factor: tolerant species were more likely to exhibit the behaviour than despotic ones, with intermediate probabilities in moderately despotic species. Phylogenetic analyses further showed that closely related species tend to resemble one another in their likelihood of adult-adult play, and that this phylogenetic signal persists even after accounting for the other predictors. Model comparisons consistently favoured social style over social structure, indicating that it better captures the conditions that enable adult-adult play. Adult-adult play and tolerance may form a positive feedback loop, while despotic systems seem to inhibit both play and its potential social benefits. This pattern mirrors human cultural variation, in which authoritarian regimes suppress playful and creative expression.

Introduction: Although many individuals are aware of the health benefits of regular exercise, few engage in it consistently. Stress, fatigue, and time pressures can deplete self-control resources, making it more difficult to prioritize exercise. When these resources are low, individuals may be more likely to choose activities based on automatic associations with pleasure and reflective evaluations of enjoyment rather than considering the long-term benefits. This tendency may lead individuals, particularly those who have negative perceptions of exercise, to remain sedentary. To address this challenge, we developed PlayFit (PF), a social physical play program designed to maximize exercise enjoyment. PF consists of modified sport-based games that are: (1) easier to play, (2) structured to encourage positive peer interactions, and (3) designed to support self-regulation of physical effort. Methods: Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, several significant modifications were made to the original registered trial design (see Methods section for details). Following these adjustments, the present study compared changes in exercise enjoyment and adherence over a 12-week period between two exercise programs matched for intensity, frequency, and duration: PF and a traditional group exercise program (Small Team Training; STT). Results: A total of 82 participants (38.3 ± 7.9 years of age; 76.8% female; BMI = 31.2 ± 8.1; VO2peak = 24.9 ± 7.9 ml/kg/min) were included in the final analysis. The PF group demonstrated a statistically significant increase in exercise enjoyment from baseline to week 12. There was no difference in the mean number of exercise sessions attended between the two groups, PF (14.0 ± 9.7 days) and STT (10.5 ± 9.6 days, p = 0.10). Conclusions: The observed increase in exercise enjoyment among PF participants suggests that enjoyment may be modifiable over time among adults with overweight or obesity and low cardiorespiratory fitness. These findings support the potential of programs like PlayFit to enhance exercise enjoyment. Future research, with adequate sample sizes and without pandemic-related constraints, is warranted to further explore the impact of intentionally designed enjoyment-focused interventions on long-term exercise adherence.

The literature reports evidence of language-based inequity in peer play: some studies have found that multilingual children experience less complex play, such as pretend play, and play alone more in early childhood education and care (ECEC), which might hamper their development. However, findings are mixed: there are indications that multilingual children do engage in pretend play and social interactions during play, through nonverbal communication or their home language. The aim of this study was to shed more light on multilingual children’s play in ten toddler groups in the Netherlands using video observation. We investigated the relationships between children’s play complexity and social interactions during free play and their linguistic resources, language use, and nonverbal communication. Our results showed that language use, especially in the home language, was related to more pretend play and more social interactions during play. There were no effects of multilingual status on children’s pretend and social play. We discuss the implications these results have for ECEC practice and policy.

The nucleus accumbens to ventral pallidum pathway regulates social play behavior via sex-specific mechanisms in juvenile rats.

ABSTRACT Play is considered a promising indicator of positive animal welfare. However, especially in older animals, significant knowledge gaps exist regarding its prevalence and influencing factors. Thus, we analyzed play in fattening pigs at the beginning (n = 229) and at the end (n = 146) of fattening. The evaluation considered social (SOC), locomotor (LOC) and object play (occupation with a metal chain (CHAIN) or nibbling toy), the aggregation of SOC+LOC and play in total (Pt). The statistical analysis focused on play event duration, number of play events/(hour*animal) and play duration/(hour*animal), considering effects such as fattening stage, sex and group size. There was 34.7% more (p = 0.0076) and 121.1% longer (p < 0.0001) Pt in the older pigs with further effects of sex and group size. These results were strongly impacted by the predominance of CHAIN, which partly exhibited characteristics of stereotypic behavior. Additional difficulties in object play arose from possible confusion with exploratory behavior. Given further challenges in reliably identifying SOC, we propose focusing on LOC as promising indicator of pig welfare in the future, which also has greatest potential for automatic detection.

This case study explores the implementation and outcomes of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) therapy in the management of challenging behaviors in a five-year-old boy attending preschool. Although the child possesses very good verbal skills that are beyond his age, he exhibits challenging behaviors with high frequency and intensity, including disobedience, aggression, destruction of materials, victimization, attention seeking, rejection, and difficulty engaging in social play. These behaviors significantly affected his involvement in learning and peer relationships. Classroom educators expressed difficulty and uncertainty in how to manage these behaviors, often using ineffective strategies due to a lack of training in behavior-based interventions. The child was treated with individual ABA therapy by the psychologist who is also the child’s therapist, for one hour per day, four times a week, at the KODDI Center. He also participated in group ABA therapy once a week for 90 minutes to improve social skills. Continuous collaboration with educators was carried out through data collection and information exchange. Functional Behavior Assessment (FBA) showed that the problematic behaviors had a function to get attention, avoid demands and have access to preferred objects. Based on the FBA, a Behavior Intervention Plan (BIP) was developed and then implemented in the clinic and at school. A companion was recommended for the child at preschool. The results showed a significant reduction in problematic behaviors, improved acceptance and increased social interactions. The study emphasizes the essential role of ABA in understanding the function of behavior, the importance of interprofessional collaboration and the need for training of educators in inclusive preschool education.

This single-case intervention study examined the application of non-directive play therapy (NDPT) to enhance social communication skills in a child with moderate autism spectrum disorder (ASD) aged 3 years. The intervention consisted of 32 individual play sessions, each lasting 45–60 minutes, conducted over eight weeks. Data were collected through video recordings, structured observations, and the Social Communication Checklist, and were analyzed using both quantitative and qualitative methods. Results indicated significant improvements in several domains of social communication, including social participation, expressive language, receptive language, and functional play skills. The child demonstrated increased initiation of interaction, more active engagement in joint play, and expanded functional vocabulary during the intervention period. These findings suggest that NDPT may be a promising approach for supporting early social communication development in young children with ASD. The study also contributes preliminary empirical evidence on the application of NDPT within the Vietnamese early intervention context.

ABSTRACT Playing in outdoor and natural environments has many benefits for children’s development and learning. As children play in a variety of outdoor environments, examining how different types of environments impact children’s play could be valuable for best supporting children’s development. Through a quasi-experimental mixed-method design, this study used the Play Observation Scale to examine young children’s social and cognitive play behaviors on an equipment-based playground compared to those on a naturalized playground in an early childhood education and care setting. The toddlers were found to participate in significantly more social group play and cognitive constructive play on the naturalized playground compared to the equipment-based playground. No significant differences were found for the preschool children, though general increases were seen in this age group’s social parallel and cognitive functional play. In addition, a greater variety of affordances were observed in the children’s play on the naturalized playground compared to the equipment-based playground, suggesting that the naturalized playground may support a wider variety of play behaviors. Given these results, we believe that a naturalized playground design could be a beneficial design approach for supporting some children’s social and cognitive development.

ABSTRACT This study uses latent profile analysis to examine how individual patterns of play (social, solitary, reticent, and rough-and-tumble), language (vocabulary and pragmatic language), and attention are associated, and how relevant covariates predict profile membership. Participants were 485 Norwegian children aged 36–57 months (M = 46). Five profiles emerged: (1) more social play – high language – high attention; (2) moderate social play – low language – high attention; (3) more rough-and-tumble play – average language – low attention; (4) more solitary play – low language – average attention; and (5) more reticent play – low language – low attention. Profile 1 included a higher proportion of monolingual children and those from families with higher parental education. Profiles 1 and 2 included more girls, whereas Profiles 3 and 4 included more boys. These findings suggest that play behaviour interacts with aspects of child development, indicating a need for tailored strategies to foster social play, which may support more inclusive educational practices.

Peer action coordination in middle childhood is thought to benefit from socio-cognitive abilities such as emotion understanding and inhibitory control, but empirical evidence for their role is limited. This study replicates and extends a previous study by examining whether emotion understanding and inhibitory control correlate with children's peer action coordination in a cooperative sensorimotor problem-solving task. To test this hypothesis, 6- to 10-year-old children (N = 108, M = 8 years, 8 months, 46.3% girls, 53.7% boys) completed the Test of Emotion Comprehension and the Attention Network Task. To assess children's performance in coordinating their actions with a peer, they were asked to complete the Labyrinth Ball Game-a sensorimotor task that they first performed individually and then together with a peer. Contrary to expectations, there was no direct association between emotion understanding or inhibitory control and children's peer action coordination after controlling for age, gender, and individual sensorimotor skills. However, a significant interaction between age and gender revealed that older boys showed greater cooperative action coordination performance than younger boys, whereas girls' performance remained stable across age. These findings challenge the view that individual socio-cognitive abilities straightforwardly support cooperative success, suggesting that peer action coordination in middle childhood may rely on more complex mechanisms, such as gender-specific communicative strategies or social play, rather than on emotion understanding and inhibitory control.

The availability of outdoor spaces enhances social play in dairy cows.

Social play is a widespread behavior across the animal kingdom. Although its ultimate function remains debated, it likely contributes to establishing and maintaining social bonds. Hence, it is not surprising that many group-living animals engage in social play with conspecifics, with playfighting being the most common form. More puzzling, however, are cases of interspecific play behavior, as firstly, playfighting in particular requires effective communication between partners to ensure that both parties perceive the interaction as play behavior rather than aggression. Secondly, the choice of a heterospecific partner over a conspecific raises questions about the social and ecological factors that influence this behavior. Here, we describe multiple instances of playfighting between adult black-and-white ruffed lemurs ( Varecia variegata ) and juvenile ring-tailed lemurs ( Lemur catta ). We observed multiple behaviors consistent with play from both species. To the best of our knowledge, this is the first documented case of such behavior between the two species. Although interspecific play is rare and difficult to study systematically, it offers valuable insights into the evolution of social play and communicative signaling.