Collecting Data on Play: A Critique of Available Methods

Play, a subjective and naturalistic behavior, both reflects and facilitates development. As such, it provides an important area of research for occupational therapy. Although a multitude of methods and instruments exist for studying play, they are not comparable in terms of their psychometric properties nor in terms of the approach they take to conceptualizing play. This article identifies and critiques a number of instruments that examine the behavior exhibited during play, the environment of play, and people's attitudes toward play. Available information on the reliability and validity of the reviewed instruments is presented, and the problems associated with assessing play behaviors are described It is concluded that play assessment is presently in a nascent stage of evolution and therefore represents a potentially fruitful area for additional research.