Understanding Trauma Through Play

Children communicate their inner world through play.

A child may repeatedly crash toy cars, stage rescue missions with superheroes, hide characters from danger, or act out scenes where someone is injured and needs help.

To adults, these stories can sometimes feel confusing, concerning, or even alarming.

But for children, play is often the primary language through which they process experiences that feel overwhelming, frightening, or difficult to understand.

When children experience stress or trauma, play can become a powerful way for the brain and body to gradually make sense of what happened.

What Do We Mean by Trauma?

When adults hear the word trauma, they often think of extreme events.

In childhood development, however, trauma is better understood as any experience that overwhelms a child’s ability to cope and regulate their emotions.

This might include:

• medical procedures or hospitalisation

• accidents or injuries

• separation from caregivers

• exposure to conflict or violence

• frightening events

• sudden changes in family or living environments

• chronic stress or instability

What matters is not only the event itself, but how the child’s nervous system experienced it.

Trauma researcher Bruce Perry explains that when children experience overwhelming stress, the brain prioritises survival systems rather than reflective thinking. In these moments, the parts of the brain responsible for language and reasoning are less active, while the systems responsible for safety and threat detection become dominant.

This is one reason why children often cannot simply talk about what happened.

Instead, their experiences may be expressed through behaviour, body reactions, and play.

How Trauma Affects a Child’s Developing Brain

Children’s brains are still developing, and their nervous systems are built through everyday experiences with parents, caregivers and the world around them.

When children grow up in environments that feel safe, predictable, and supportive, the brain can focus on learning, exploring, and connecting with others. Neural pathways that support emotion regulation, problem-solving, and trust in relationships become stronger over time.

However, when children experience chronic stress, fear, or traumatic events, the brain adapts in a different way. Instead of prioritising learning and connection, the brain shifts into survival mode.

Research in interpersonal neurobiology and trauma science shows that repeated stress can activate the brain’s threat detection system, particularly the amygdala, making it more sensitive to perceived danger. At the same time, areas involved in regulation and reasoning, such as the prefrontal cortex, may have less opportunity to fully develop their regulatory role.

This means a child who has experienced trauma may:

• become easily overwhelmed by emotions

• react strongly to situations that seem small to adults

• struggle with impulse control

• have difficulty trusting others or feeling safe

Importantly, these responses are not “bad behaviour.” They are adaptive survival responses from a nervous system that has learned to stay on high alert.

The Good News: The Brain Can Heal

One of the most hopeful findings in neuroscience is that children’s brains remain highly plastic, meaning they can continue to change and grow through new experiences.

Consistent, safe, and attuned relationships help regulate the nervous system and gradually build new neural pathways. When children experience adults who are predictable, calm, and emotionally available, their brains begin to learn that the world can feel safe again.

Play is one of the most powerful ways this healing happens.

Through play, children can revisit experiences, express emotions, regain a sense of control, and integrate difficult memories in a way that feels manageable for their developing minds.

This is why in play therapy, children often show rather than tell what they have experienced.

The “Upstairs Brain” and the “Downstairs Brain”

Psychiatrist Dan Siegel often describes the brain in a simple way that helps parents understand children’s behaviour.

He refers to the “downstairs brain” and the “upstairs brain.”

The Downstairs Brain (Survival Brain)

The downstairs brain is responsible for survival and safety. It includes systems that manage:

• strong emotions

• fight, flight, or freeze responses

• body reactions to danger

When children experience fear or overwhelming stress, this part of the brain becomes highly active. Their nervous system is trying to protect them.

In these moments, children may:

• yell or lash out

• run away or hide

• freeze or shut down

• seem unable to listen or think clearly

From the outside, it may look like “bad behaviour,” but from the inside the child’s brain is simply trying to stay safe.

The Upstairs Brain (Thinking Brain)

The upstairs brain is responsible for:

• thinking and reasoning

• impulse control

• empathy

• problem-solving

• emotional regulation

This part of the brain develops gradually throughout childhood and even into early adulthood.

When a child is calm and regulated, the upstairs brain can help them make thoughtful choices and manage their feelings.

But when the downstairs brain is activated by fear or stress, the upstairs brain temporarily goes offline.

This is why children who have experienced trauma may struggle to use words, follow instructions, or calm themselves in difficult moments.

Where Play Fits In

Play creates a bridge between these two parts of the brain.

Through play, children can safely explore feelings, repeat experiences, and regain a sense of control. The playful interaction with a safe adult helps the nervous system move from survival mode back toward regulation and connection.

Over time, these repeated experiences help reconnect the brain’s emotional and thinking systems.

This is one of the reasons play therapy can be so powerful for children who have experienced difficult or overwhelming events.

Why Play Becomes So Important

Play offers children something that traumatic experiences often take away: a sense of control.

Through play, children can return to difficult situations in a symbolic way, explore them safely, and gradually change the story.

Psychoanalyst Donald Winnicott described play as the space where children explore emotional experiences and develop a sense of self within relationships.

Similarly, play therapy research has long recognised that children use symbolic play to process experiences that they do not yet have the cognitive or language capacity to understand directly.

In play, children can:

• replay events

• shift roles

• experiment with different outcomes

• move between fear and mastery

This process allows the brain to slowly integrate experiences that once felt overwhelming.

Trauma and Repetition in Play

One of the most common patterns parents notice is repetition.

A child may replay the same story again and again:

• toys crashing repeatedly

• characters being rescued

• doctor or hospital scenes

• hiding from danger

• battles between “good” and “bad” characters

This repetition is not meaningless.

Developmental psychologist Jean Piaget described repetition as an essential part of learning and mastery in childhood. When the experience being repeated involves emotional intensity, the repetition may also serve a regulatory function.

In trauma research, repetition is sometimes understood as the nervous system’s attempt to gain control over an experience that originally felt uncontrollable.

Over time, changes in the story may begin to appear:

• the frightened character becomes brave

• someone arrives to help

• the ending becomes safer

These shifts can signal that the child is slowly reorganising the emotional meaning of the experience.

The Role of Relationships in Healing

While play is powerful, children rarely process trauma alone.

Healing occurs most effectively within safe and supportive relationships.

Attachment theory, first developed by John Bowlby, emphasises that children rely on parents and caregivers as a secure base from which they explore the world and return to when they feel overwhelmed.

When a child plays out difficult themes while a trusted adult remains calm, present, and accepting, the child’s nervous system receives an important message:

You are not alone with this experience.

These moments of co-regulation help children gradually move from states of distress toward greater emotional stability and understanding.

What Parents Can Do

When children engage in intense or repetitive play themes, it is not necessary for parents to interpret every detail.

What matters most is presence and emotional availability.

Parents can support their child by:

• allowing the play to unfold without interrupting

• staying nearby and observing

• following the child’s lead

• describing what you see in a calm and neutral way

For example:

• “That was a very big crash.”

• “The doctor is helping the teddy.”

• “That character looks scared.”

• “Now the superhero is protecting them.”

These simple reflections help children feel seen and understood, which strengthens the sense of safety needed for emotional processing.

When Additional Support May Be Helpful

In many cases, children’s play naturally evolves as experiences are processed and integrated.

However, if play becomes extremely distressing, rigid, or accompanied by persistent anxiety, sleep difficulties, or strong fears, additional support may be beneficial.

Play therapy offers a specialised environment where children can explore their experiences symbolically with the guidance of a trained therapist.

A Final Thought

Play can be a window into a child’s inner world.

What may look like simple stories with toys can sometimes represent a child’s attempt to understand experiences that felt confusing, frightening, or overwhelming.

When adults respond with curiosity, patience, and emotional presence, play becomes more than just a game.

It becomes a pathway toward understanding, regulation, and healing.

How Can I Help?

References

Axline, V. M. (1947). Play therapy: The inner dynamics of childhood. Houghton Mifflin.

Bowlby, J. (1988). A secure base: Parent-child attachment and healthy human development. Basic Books.

Bratton, S. C., Ray, D., Rhine, T., & Jones, L. (2005). The efficacy of play therapy with children: A meta-analytic review of treatment outcomes. Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 36(4), 376–390. https://doi.org/10.1037/0735-7028.36.4.376

Landreth, G. L. (2012). Play therapy: The art of the relationship (3rd ed.). Routledge.

Perry, B. D., & Szalavitz, M. (2017). The boy who was raised as a dog (3rd ed.). Basic Books.

Siegel, D. J., & Bryson, T. P. (2012). The whole-brain child. Bantam Books.

Van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score. Viking.

Winnicott, D. W. (1971). Playing and reality. Routledge.