The power of play: five key ingredients for play and well-being in crisis contexts

Today, more than one in five children globally are affected by conflict and crisis. In addition to the immediate dangers of conflict and climate shocks, protracted crises undermine children’s well-being and cause lifelong disruption to learning and development.

Play, often underutilised in humanitarian responses, can be a valuable and scalable tool to support children’s well-being in crisis contexts. As the leading non-governmental organisation focusing on play in crisis settings, Right To Play has developed a strong foundation of research about the power of play to support children’s well-being. For 25 years, we’ve protected, educated and empowered more than 18 million children through play, drawing on learnings from programmes across Africa, Asia and the Middle East. Our global work is supported by teams around the world, including our UK office in London, which plays a key role in advancing research, partnerships and advocacy.

A framework for play-based psychosocial support in crisis settings

In our recent literature review, spanning 36 studies across 33 countries, 94% of studies showed play-based psychosocial interventions had a positive impact on at least one well-being outcome. Research shows play’s close link with improved social and emotional learning, particularly in protracted crisis settings, where displacement and disruption may last for years.

It’s clear that this approach can be an effective way to support both learning and well-being over time. However, research and best practice remain limited; many interventions and studies still fail to fully define and articulate their play and psychosocial components.

Based on this recent review, Right to Play developed a framework including five key ingredients for an effective and quality play-based psychosocial support response.

1. Adapt to the context

A one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work. Interventions must be sensitive and flexible to adapt to a specific setting. The most effective play-based psychosocial support interventions will consider the type of crisis (such as conflict, displacement or climate shock), safety considerations, the stability of the situation, and cultural norms around play, gender and childhood. They must also account for how available (or not) education and community services are.

2. Support children’s social ecosystems

Effective play-based interventions recognise the critical importance of relationships with peers and trusted adults in supporting a child’s well-being. Taking a “whole family” or “whole school” approach means we can address the psychosocial well-being of parents and teachers to strengthen the social ecosystem surrounding the child.

In practice, this means considering the following:

• relationships between children and trusted adults
• peer-to-peer interactions and social cohesion
• trust, consistency and emotional attunement
• opportunities for cooperation, belonging and mutual support.

3. Follow children’s lead – and build on it

Play is the natural language of children. But in programming, it must be used intentionally to effectively deliver psychosocial support. A strong approach must understand how play naturally occurs in a specific context then build on this understanding.

This means carefully considering how to make activities:

• a voluntary and enjoyable experience
• child‑led or child‑influenced
• developmentally appropriate and flexible
• a vehicle for children’s expression, imagination and exploration.

4. Define the psychosocial support components

Although play naturally supports children’s well-being, integrating the psychosocial component – such as group-based activities or psychological first aid – contributes towards a more effective intervention. Too often, programmes fail to explicitly define the psychosocial support elements of the intervention which reduces the ability to draw conclusions of “what works” in play-based psychosocial support. It’s not enough to assume that the psychosocially protective elements will emerge naturally; they need to be defined and purposefully integrated.

5. Focus on how play-based psychosocial support contributes to outcomes

Our review found that studies often fail to explicitly map causality between play-based psychosocial support interventions and specific, relevant outcomes. Programmes should identify a clear theory of change, and explore how an intervention contributes to the intended well-being outcomes.

Ready To Learn: the five key ingredients in action

In Uganda’s West Nile region, our Ready To Learn project uses these five key ingredients. Here, families are affected by protracted crises, including displacement by conflict, an acute lack of access to services and resources, and poverty. Delivered in partnership with The LEGO Foundation, the project provides critical psychosocial support and foundational skill-building for 20,000 pre-primary and primary school-aged children.

The project began with a comprehensive context study in the region to understand the displacement dynamics and existing humanitarian response and respond to the setting’s unique needs. In crisis contexts, education spaces often provide one of the most consistent and protective environments for children, making schools a critical place to deliver play-based psychosocial support. That’s why Ready To Lean integrated it into pre-primary and primary education and into parenting skills interventions, engaging key trusted adults like parents, caregivers, teachers and facilitators.

Moving beyond simply encouraging children’s play, the project uses play as a vehicle for psychosocial support. The activities are designed to foster essential social-emotional skills (self-awareness, empathy and managing emotions) contributing to improvements in children’s well-being. We measure results by mapping each activity to a robust theory of change, focusing on links between play, psychosocial support and the key role of trusted adults (parents, caregivers and teachers).

Through a structured focus on coaching, support and engagement with educators in pre-primary and primary education, Ready To Learn demonstrates how play can be a standard, scalable tool for children’s protection, well-being and long-term academic success.

A sustainable approach for a challenging aid landscape

As international aid budgets shrink, focusing on sustainability and localisation has never been more important for NGOs. The five key ingredients for play-based psychosocial support provide a pragmatic framework to encourage quality programmes which respond to local context, putting children, families and community at the centre of protection and response while also drawing on global best practice.

As crises endure, Right To Play will continue to expand our evidence-informed play-based interventions like Ready To Learn, supporting children to rise above adversity, to heal and to learn through the power of play.

The research cited in this article was conducted by the Fjell Collective for Right To Play. The report was prepared and authored by Jennifer Flemming, PhD; Ashley Nemiro, PhD; Tarek Tamer and Cole White.