With the school summer holidays upon us, parents face the annual challenge of filling six weeks with affordable, memory-making fun while juggling work and sanity. Baking, picnics, and den building may seem wholesome, but by day four, the den can feel less like an adventure and more like a hiding place until September. The solution, often, is the playdate: a socially sanctioned break for parents to finish a cup of tea while it's still warm. It turns out humans aren't alone in this strategy. A recent study suggests orangutan mothers also arrange playdates for their offspring.
Orangutan mothers go out of their way for playdates
Orangutans are typically solitary, with individual territories and a strong preference for personal space. Mothers give birth to a single infant and raise it for six to seven years without a partner or modern distractions. Given this solitary lifestyle, one might expect them to avoid encounters with other youngsters. However, researchers studying 30,000 hours of observations from 31 wild Bornean mother-offspring pairs found otherwise. Mothers made trips into the territories of other mothers with similarly aged offspring, allowing the youngsters to play together before returning home.
The cost and benefit of arranging play
For the juveniles, the immediate reward is play, but for mothers, arranging these encounters comes at a cost. Travelling to a playdate takes time and energy, reducing time available for feeding. This raises the question: why bother with playtime at all? The answer may lie in how widespread play is across the animal kingdom. Baby Barbary macaques goof around, bear cubs rough and tumble, and even caimans play chase, sharks mess with beach toys, and octopuses manipulate Lego bricks.
Play is common among socially complex species
Play is particularly common among socially complex species, where it often emerges naturally when adults come together. For example, brown bear cubs run riot when their mothers gather at salmon streams, and baby spider monkeys fool around while their mothers groom each other. This is akin to human parents meeting for coffee while children play under the table. Orangutans are unique because their youngsters' play is not merely a side-effect of adults socialising; it is something mothers actively make happen.
Play is essential for development and survival
The fact that so many animals invest time in play suggests it is far from frivolous. For young animals, play serves as a rehearsal for life, teaching communication, cooperation, competition, and conflict resolution. It helps them test their bodies, explore social rules, and push boundaries. This has tangible repercussions: brown bear cubs that play more are more likely to survive, and male bottlenose dolphins that are more playful father more offspring.
Play is not just for the young
One of the biggest mistakes humans make is assuming play belongs to childhood. Adult corvids snowboard down frozen roofs, and bumble bees roll wooden balls. In the animal kingdom, many adults continue to play long after mastering survival skills. Far from being a waste of time, play may help adults navigate life's challenges. Scientists are now finding this applies to humans too. Xiangyou "Sharon" Shen from Oregon State University and Zoe Crawley from Vanderbilt University study playfulness in people. During the Covid-19 pandemic, they found that adults who were more playful coped better with lockdown upheaval. Playful people did not perceive the world as less stressful or risky, but they were better at finding creative solutions and remained more optimistic. As the pair put it, playful people don't wear rose-tinted glasses; playfulness is more like a colour spotlight that changes how you experience stress, not remove it.
Embrace playfulness in daily life
This does not mean everyone should break into spontaneous games of tag. Instead, playfulness is about cultivating a flexible, curious approach to life. Play is less about what you do and more about how you do it. So to all parents facing six weeks of childcare: don't just arrange playdates for your children. Make room for a little playfulness yourself. Messing around is not a sign of taking life less seriously; it may be one of the things that keeps you sane.
