Safety, Play and the Commercial Playground

Dr John McKendrick: Lecturer, Caledonian University

The findings in this paper have been drawn over the last three years from The Business of Children's Play research project.

Parents' perceptions of safety in commercial playgrounds

Parents are favourably disposed toward commercial playgrounds. Positive appraisals are expressed over a wide range of issues, from playground quality, its' social value, to playground safety. Of particular note, is the overwhelmingly positive evaluation of equipment safety and the ability of parents to supervise children at play: 89% parents agree that the play equipment is safe and 74% consider that it is an environment which enables them to supervise their children with ease. Even when parents are dissatisfied with aspects of the commercial playground experience, many are prepared to bear these inadequacies, on the grounds that, more importantly, their children are encountering a safe play experience. Safety, for parents, is everything.

Problems with safe play

There are three main problems with creating 'safe play environments'. These concern the role of children, the changing nature of play and the quality of play.

First, commercial playgrounds are achieving the impossible - they are marginalising the role of children in play. Children are becoming less responsible for deciding when and where they play. On the whole, in two thirds of cases, the decision to visit a commercial playground is made only by adults. Only one quarter of visits are joint adult/child decisions and children initiate less than one in ten visits.

Second, the nature of play changes when play is formalised with a visit to a designated site. Play is no longer just a spontaneous everyday and everywhere event. Play also becomes an organised event, a commodity that is purchased and for which value for money must be gained.

Third, not only is the meaning of play challenged, but also to some extent the quality of play is compromised. There are 'costs' which may be associated with the very production of a safe play environment. Children described how the interventions of staff compromised their play, and parents and older children lamented the sanitation of a once challenging play environment. Safer play does not mean desirable play.

Are commercial playgrounds all bad news?

Far from it! Here, three arguments are raised in favour of the 'safe' commercial playground.

First, and most importantly, commercial playgrounds are popular with adults and children, and are a commercial success with service providers.

Second, one of the key reasons for this success is that commercial playgrounds strike a compromise between needs for safety and needs for 'independent' play. For some parents, safety is most closely associated with whom the playground excludes, as opposed to the elements of which it is comprised. Protecting their child from the social danger of unknown 'Others' who lurk beyond this cocooned world is a key element in what leads parents' to conclude that commercial playgrounds are safe play environments.

Third, and interestingly, children are now 'playing with' the safety discourse to strengthen their case for the play environments that they want. The safety discourse is used by children when they are arguing for a play environment without adults which is more attentive and better suited to their play preferences. Counter-intuitively, these children seem to suggest that a safe play environment can be one without adults (and young children) and can be one with physically challenging equipment.

Conclusion: what is safety in play?

Safe play is a goal that is sought by adults, and to a lesser extent, by children. It is achieved directly by people in play environments through rule-setting, monitoring and regulation, and indirectly through legislation and guidelines. For many adults and some children, safe play is synonymous with a controlled environment. Parents want assurances that play environments are safe environments. Thus safe play is a decision-making factor with respect to patronage and is a marketable commodity for proprietors and other service providers. Society has become more parent/family friendly in recent years. However, it does not always concur that parent-friendly is child-friendly. Signs that society is becoming more directly attentive to children's needs may have implications for commercial playgrounds. In future years, securing the 'play pound' may be more directly concerned with what children think. This is not to suggest that children's opinions are currently ignored, or that safe play will cease to be a marketable commodity, or a social value. Rather, it is to recognise that the sands may be set to shift and the prominence of safety in playground debates and discourse may give way to more rounded concerns which take into account the problems that are being inadvertently created by today's parents.