The Role of Games in the Recovery Process after the Earthquake

Natural disasters such as earthquakes can have a traumatic impact on children's mental health. Many different approaches can be taken to help them recover from these traumatic events.

One of these is play. Play contributes to children's physical, emotional and cognitive development and teaches them various behaviors and habits. Supporting children after the earthquake through play will accelerate the healing process.

Supporting Children After Disasters Through Play

After an earthquake, you can help children make sense of and cope with the situation through play. Play reduces the negative effects of the earthquake by increasing children's positive emotions. In addition, play will provide them with a safe space to better express their feelings and reduce their worries about the future. While playing, children will also develop their ability to communicate, cooperate, share, empathize and interact. This is a very important element for post-earthquake children. Because the intense stress and anxiety they experience can limit their social interactions and cause them to disconnect from the environment.

Children exposed to traumatic events such as earthquakes often reflect this in their play. These games are aimed at reconstructing the event. For example, they may build a house with toys, reenact the earthquake, hide their belongings and search for a solution.

This way, children can more easily express their feelings after an earthquake. As a result, the child can reflect the event he/she has experienced in his/her play and advance the course of the play through this traumatic event. At this point, what needs to be done is to be a good observer in the face of these behaviors of children and to seek solutions to eliminate these negative effects.

Recommendation:What are the activities that can be done at home with children after an earthquake?

How Games Affect the Healing Process

After a difficult time, children may be more sensitive to loud noises and sudden stimuli. Therefore, it is important to be careful with games and toys that may frighten them. Toys such as ambulances, police cars, scoops, ladders and buildings can cause traumatic effects in children. Therefore, it is not recommended that they play with such toys. Instead, toys that will distract their attention such as legos, puzzles, colored pencils will reduce the stress they experience.

Play is one of the most fundamental activities of children by nature. While children try to make sense of life through play, they also develop problem-solving skills through the roles they take on. Playing games with their peers will help them cope with the trauma after this difficult process. At this point, it will be one of the most appropriate approaches in this process for adults to follow the games they play without intervening during the game and without setting new rules.

In conclusion;

A number of changes can be observed in children following difficult events such as disasters. Aggression, depersonalization and withdrawal are some of the most common behaviors in children. In order to recover from the traumatic effects of the event, the child needs to return to their daily habits as soon as possible. At this point, first of all, a safe space should be created where the child can play by bringing him/her together with his/her peers. In this way, the child will feel safe after the disaster and his/her worries will decrease.

To learn more about games, which play an important role in reducing the traumatic effects observed in children after disasters, you can take a look at our content titled Activities that can be done at home with children after an earthquake.