One of the most renowned advocates of risky play, Peter Gray, research professor of psychology at Boston College, says that not only is risky play beneficial to children’s health and development but that depriving them of it can cause harm. According to Gray, risky play is nature’s way for children to teach themselves emotional resilience and learn how to manage and overcome their fears. Gray draws a straight line from the decline in children’s freedom to play and embrace risk to the dramatic rise in childhood mental disorders like anxiety and depression that has occurred since the 1950s.
