ThesisPDF Available

How Play Moves Us: Toys, Technologies, and Mobility in a Digital World

April 2024

Thesis for: Doctor of Philosophy
Advisor: Jaakko Suominen

Authors:

University of Turku

The 21st century has been described as the Century of Play. The change in current play is particularly noticeable when looking at technological developments. This thesis deals with the technologization, digitalization, and connectedness of play between 2010–2020. The research explores forms of contemporary play, playthings, and players in a time when digitalization and connectedness have extended to various tools and realms of play— devices, toys, games, apps, and mediated playful environments. At the heart of the research are playthings and technologies conceptualized here as play machines, players using these tools within their communities and contexts, and, due to technological evolution, play research that increasingly, expands our knowledge about How Play Moves Us physically, cognitively, and emotionally.

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TURUN YLIOPISTON JULKAISUJA – ANNALES UNIVERSITATIS TURKUENSIS

SARJA - SER. B OSA - TOM. 658 | HUMANIORA | TURKU 2024

HOW PLAY MOVES US

Toys, Technologies, and Mobility in a Digital World

Katriina Heljakka

HOW PLAY MOVES US

Toys, Technologies, and Mobility in a Digital World

TURUN YLIOPISTON JULKAISUJA – ANNALES UNIVERSITATIS TURKUENSIS

SARJA - SER. B OSA - TOM. 658 | HUMANIORA | TURKU 2024

Supervisor

Professor Jaakko Suominen

University of Turku

Faculty of Humanities

School of History, Culture and Arts Studies

Digital Culture

Doctoral Programme in History, Culture and Arts Studies (Juno)

Reviewers

Associate Professor Hanna Wirman

IT University of Copenhagen

Senior Lecturer Nicolle Lamerichs

HU University of Applied Sciences,

Utrecht

Opponent

Associate Professor Hanna Wirman

IT University of Copenhagen

The originality of this thesis has been checked in accordance with the University of

Turku quality assurance system using the Turnitin OriginalityCheck service.

Cover photo: Markku Heljakka

Cover illustrations: Sanna Soininen

ISBN 978-951-29-9610-0 (Print)

ISBN 978-951-29-9611-7 (Pdf)

ISSN 0082-6987 (Print)

ISSN 2343-3191 (Online)

Painosalama, Turku 2024

To the optimists

and those with a playful heart

It is my view that we are so completely surrounded by, even immersed in play

that we cannot at present know its full involvement in our lives.

Brian Sutton-Smith, 1980

UNIVERSITY OF TURKU

Faculty of Humanities

School of History, Culture and Arts

Digital Culture

HELJAKKA, KATRIINA: How Play Moves Us: Toys, Technologies, and

Mobility in a Digital World

Doctoral Dissertation, 240 pp.

Doctoral Programme in History, Culture and Arts Studies (Juno)

March 2024

ABSTRACT

The 21st century has been described as the Century of Play. The change in

current play is particularly noticeable when looking at technological developments.

This thesis deals with the technologization, digitalization, and connectedness of play

between 2010–2020. The research explores forms of contemporary play, playthings,

and players in a time when digitalization and connectedness have extended to

various tools and realms of play — devices, toys, games, apps, and mediated playful

environments.

At the heart of the research are playthings and technologies conceptualized here

as play machines, players using these tools within their communities and contexts,

and, due to technological change, play research that increasingly expands into digital

and networked cultures. Interactive digital devices have made play ubiquitous,

including play activities related to play machines–toys, mobile technologies, digital

cameras, smartphones, digital toys, social media, and social robotics.

The purpose of the thesis is to increase the understanding of what the rapid

technologization of play, or what is conceptualized in the thesis as the digital leap of

play, means in terms of mobilizing the players physically, cognitively, and emotionally.

The thesis opens up prospects for technology-enriched play by presenting a range of

empirical studies interested in the mobilization tendencies of current digital devices,

toys, and connected media cultures that inform and inspire contemporary play and

players of different ages as a form of digital culture that unites players and generations.

The assumption is that digital technology connected to modern play experiences

can move players in physical, cognitive, and emotional terms. Through six qualitative

case studies conducted in 2018–2022, the thesis proposes to answer the central

question: “How has play moved human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 in

terms of physical, cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?” The sub-question

inquires what kinds of digital play are encountered in interactions of people of

different ages as part of technologically enhanced leisure, learning, and environments

where play is increasingly happening with and through machines and social media

platforms by asking: “How are the acts of play realized in each instance of digital play

through technology use, and what are the functions of the play for the players in each

study?”

The thesis seeks to understand the nature and various aspects of the digital

transformation of play and balance the prevailing negative assumptions with more

optimistic views on the effect of technology-oriented play on the lives of players of

different ages.

The scholarly contribution of the thesis is to generate new play knowledge: The

publications included in the thesis highlight various play patterns and practices

among children of preschool age, adults, and seniors who engage in digital play

through the use of digital devices or digital toys, either solitarily or socially, as part of

intergenerational play.

The case studies demonstrate how the mobilizing tendency always lives in play.

Even screen-based technologies may move the players imaginatively, cognitively, and

physically. Play moves us closer to each other, even when we are not physically close.

As playthings and technology develop in parallel by feeding each other, play expands

into new areas through evolving playthings, devices, and environments.

The findings of the thesis illustrate how changes in the ecosystem of play (primarily

made possible by developing mobile technology and social media) are linked to the

opportunities for players to engage in creative play activities, their documentation,

and their social sharing. The connections of evolving digital technology (for example,

digital toys, social media networking, and social robotics) to play are diverse; mobile

devices with and without screens are used as an extension of play to enrich the

experiences and outcomes of play and to empower the players by allowing them to

showcase their imagination, creativity, and ability to connect with peers and other

player communities.

In sum, the thesis illustrates the central consequences of the digital leap of play:

The mobility of technologically enhanced playthings tends to mobilize the bodies

and imaginations of the players. The play of the 2020s moves the bodies and minds

of the players cognitively, imaginatively, and emotionally.

The thesis concludes that contemporary technology embodied in digital devices

and Internet-connected playthings as the play machines of 2010–2020 allows for the

expansion of play into human and toy interactions that non-technological playthings

would not support. Technological development thus expands the historical, digital-

material, and narrative dimensions of play. Social, technology-supported play triggers

cultural processes that support intergenerational interaction in play. Consequently,

this thesis suggests that 1) digital technology is a driver for societal changes that

affect play, 2) digital technology is a mobilizer of players in a physical, cognitive,

emotional, and social sense, and 3) digital technology is an enabling, empowering,

and enriching resource for contemporary digital play.

KEYWORDS: digital devices, digital play, digital technology, intergenerational play,

IoToys, leisure studies, life-long play, life-wide play, mobility, movement, playbor,

play knowledge, playful learning, post-digital play, social robotics, technology, toys,

toy literacy

TURUN YLIOPISTO

Humanistinen tiedekunta

Historian, kulttuurin ja taiteiden tutkimuksen laitos

Digitaalinen kulttuuri

HELJAKKA, KATRIINA: Liikuttava leikki: Lelut, teknologia ja liikkuvuus

digitaalisessa maailmassa

Väitöskirja, 240 s.

Historian, kulttuurin ja taiteiden tutkimuksen tohtoriohjelma (Juno)

Maaliskuu 2024

TIIVISTELMÄ

2000-lukua on kuvailtu leikin vuosisadaksi. Viime vuosikymmeninä teknologian

käyttö on laajentanut leikin ja leikillisyyden ilmiökenttää kohti kaikenikäisten

ihmisten vuorovaikutusta oppimisessa, työssä ja vapaa-ajalla. Nykyleikkiä määrittävät

teknologisessa murroksessa erilaiset leikin jatkeet. Teknologia yhdistyy monien

ajattelussa usein erilaisiin laitteisiin ja digitaalinen leikki tarkoittaa vuorovaikutusta

näiden leikkikoneiden kanssa. Leikkivälineet ja teknologia kehittyvät jatkuvasti

rinnakkain toistensa kehitystä innoittamalla ja ruokkimalla, laajentaen leikkiä

uusille alueille kehittyvien leikkivälineiden, laitteiden ja ympäristöjen kautta.

Mobiililaitteet, sosiaalinen media, verkottuneet esineet ja -ympäristöt luovat uusia

ilmenemismuotoja ja ulottuvuuksia leikille: Nykyleikki ilmenee multimediaalisina

tuotannon, jakelun, kulutuksen ja käytön kulttuureina. Leikkijät, joita voidaan pitää

sekä luovina että tuottavina, eivät ainoastaan kuluta leluja, pelejä ja näiden yhdessä

muodostamia hybridejä, vaan he myös esittävät leikkiään sosiaalisen median alustoilla

ja osallistuvat näin aktiivisesti digitaaliseen leikkiin. He käyttävät mediateknologioita

digitaalisen leikin luomiseen, tuottamiseen, dokumentointiin, jakamiseen ja

katsomiseen, ja ilmaisevat samalla itseään ja mielikuvitustaan moninaisin tavoin.

Valokuvausta ja videokuvausta voidaan pitää omina digitaalisen leikin muotoinaan,

jotka yhdistävät leikkivälineet digitaalisiin ympäristöihin mobiililaitteiden avulla.

Nykyleikki muuntuu ja muovautuu vuorovaikutuksessa erilaisten leikkikoneiden ja

mediasisältöjen kanssa.

Tämä tutkimus kysyy, miten nykyajan teknologisoituva, digitaalinen ja verkottuva

leikki liikuttaa leikkijöitä?

Nykypäivän teknologisesti rikastettu leikki, jota tässä tutkimuksessa käsitellään

digitaalisena leikkinä, tapahtuu yhdessä lelujen, pelien, sovellusten ja internetin, sekä

siihen yhdistettyjen lelujen, kuten Lelujen Internetin ja sosiaalisten robottien kanssa.

Kuudessa, vuosina 2018–2022 tehdyssä tapaustutkimuksessa keskityttiin perinteisiin

(ei-teknologisiin) leluihin, joilla leikkiminen tapahtuu yhteydessä leikkikoneisiin,

verkottuneisiin leluihin tai älyleluihin, kuten Lelujen Internetiin, pandemian

aikaiseen leikkiin sosiaalisessa mediassa ja sosiaaliseen robotiikkaan, eli leikittäviin

robottikumppaneihin, sekä spekulatiiviseen lelufiktioon. Tapaustutkimukset

valottavat näkymiä eri ikäisten leikin tapoihin esikouluikäisistä aikuisiin ja seniori-

ikäisiin leikkijöihin, jotka osallistuvat digitaaliseen leikkiin käyttämällä erilaisia

laitteita tai digitaalisia leluja osana yksin, yhdessä ja ylisukupolvisesti toteutuvia

leikkejä. Tapaustutkimukset tuovat esille digitaalisen leikin piirteitä, osoittaen, miten

teknologisesti kehittyvä leikki ilmenee nykyajassa. Digitalisaation, verkottumisen

ja sosiaalisen robotiikan yhteydet leikkiin ovat erilaisia; Yhtäältä teknologisia

kommunikaatiovälineitä, kuten mobiililaitteita käytetään leikin jatkeina. Toisaalta

nykyajan leluihin, kuten lelurobotteihin upotettu teknologia moninaisine

tarjoumineen mahdollistaa verkottuneen leikin.

Tutkimuksen tieteellinen kontribuutio on uuden leikkitiedon tuottaminen.

Tapaustutkimukset havainnollistavat miten teknologisoituva leikki alkaa erilaisten

teknologisten tarjoumien hyödyntämisestä, vuorovaikutuksena ruutujen kanssa

tai ilman ruutuja, joko vapaa-ajan leikin tai leikillisen oppimisen yhteydessä,

hyödyntäen leikkivälineitä, joiden ensisijainen rooli on toimia leikkikoneina, tai joilla

leikkiminen on mahdollista älylelujen, pelien ja sovellusten avulla, tai leikin jatkeina

käytettävän teknologian hyödyntämisenä (jolloin teknologian rooli leikkikoneina

on toissijainen—ne ovat mobiililaitteita ja välineitä, joilla (lelu-)leikkiä kuvataan,

videoidaan, äänitetään ja muokataan digitaalisesti).

Teknologia mahdollistaa leikin ja voimaannuttaa leikkijöitä: Tämä ilmenee

leikkijöiden luovissa ja tuottavissa tavoissa käyttää leikkikoneita. Teknologiaa

hyödynnetään leikin tallentamiseen ja mediasisältöjen tuottamiseen. Digitaalinen

leikki on usein dokumentoitua leikkiä—leikkijät tallentavat toimintaansa samalla

kuin leikkivät. Teknologia mahdollistaa leikkiin liittyvän sisällön jakelun verkostojen

kautta (esimerkkinä verkottuneet älylelut). Teknologia rikastuttaa leikkiä: Lelujen

verkottuminen tarkoittaa, että ne tarjoavat leikkijöille jatkuvasti päivitettyä sisältöä,

joka voi olla valojen, liikkeen, äänen ja puhutun kielen avulla kanavoitua viihteellistä

tai opetuksellista sisältöä tai niitä yhdistelevää opetusviihdettä. Digitaalinen leikki

voi olla yksinleikkiä, mutta siihen sisältyy myös sosiaalisen median alustojen käyttö,

joka mahdollistaa sisällön jakamisen ja siten verkostoitumisen, yhteisöllisyyden ja

sosiaalisen leikin. Digitaalinen leikki kehittyy verkottuneeksi leikiksi, kun internetiin

yhdistettyjä älylaitteita, esimerkiksi Lelujen Internetiä käytetään leikissä. Digitaalinen

leikki käyttää lisäksi sosiaalista robotiikkaa, ja viimeisimpiä leikkivälineitä tällä

alueella edustavat robottieläimet, esimerkiksi robottikoirat.

Teknologinen leikki liikuttaa leikkijät lähemmäksi toisiaan, vaikka tämä läheisyys

ei ilmenisi fyysisenä läheisyytenä tehden leikistä sosiaalisempaa: Teknologia

mahdollistaa leikkivien yhteisöjen vuorovaikutuksen sosiaalisen median alustojen

kautta. Digitaalinen ja verkottunut leikki on myös sosiaalista ja yhteisöllistä —

leikkijöiden mahdollisuus taltioida ja jakaa toimintaansa on vaikuttanut suuresti

nykyajan leikkiin tehden siitä näkyvämpää, katsotumpaa ja luovuuteen kannustavaa.

Leikkijät muodostavat yhteisöjä, joissa kommunikoidaan niin ihmisten, laitteiden

kuin sisältöjen vuorovaikutussuhteissa. Tapaustutkimukset esittävät, miten

mobilisoiva taipumus elää aina leikissä. Jopa ruutuihin perustuvat teknologiat voivat

edistää leikkijöiden fyysistä, mielikuvituksellista ja kognitiivista liikettä.

Yhteenvetona tutkimus osoittaa digiloikan keskeiset merkitykset leikille:

Leikkikoneiden — laitteiden ja teknologisten leikkivälineiden siirrettävyydellä

ja liikkuvuudella on taipumus saada leikkijöiden kehot, mielikuvitus ja tunteet

liikkeeseen: 2020-luvun teknologisoituva leikki liikuttaa niin leikkijöiden kehoa kuin

mieltä kognitiivisesti, mielikuvituksellisesti ja emotionaalisesti. Teknologia laajentaa

leikin historiallisia, materiaalisia, digitaalisia ja kerronnallisia ulottuvuuksia.

Sosiaalinen, teknologian tukema leikki vauhdittaa kulttuurisia prosesseja, jotka

vaikuttavat myös ylisukupolviseen vuorovaikutukseen leikissä. Väitös ehdottaakin

digitaalisen teknologian toimivan ajurina leikin muutoksille yhteiskunnassa.

Digitaalinen teknologia liikuttaa leikkijöitä fyysisessä, kognitiivisessa,

emotionaalisessa ja sosiaalisessa merkityksessä ja digitaalinen teknologia on leikin

digiloikan mahdollistava, voimaannuttava ja rikastuttava voimavara.

AVAINSANAT: digitaaliset laitteet, digitaalinen leikki, digitaaliteknologia, elinikäinen

leikki, elämänlaajuinen leikki, jälkidigitaalinen leikki, leikillinen oppiminen, leikin

ympäristöt, leikkitieto, lelulukutaito, liike, lelut, liikkuvuus, sosiaaliset robotit,

teknologia, vapaa-ajan tutkimus, verkottuneet älylelut, ylisukupolvinen leikki

Acknowledgments

First, thank you, Brian Sutton-Smith. I wished you would have lived to see, which

forms of play the world is engaging at the culmination point of the 2010s, and at

the dusk of the “new normal.” You have pointed out the Western dismissal of play as

superfluous and frivolous and therefore understood to have little consequence for

the serious business of life (Sutton-Smith, 1997). Yet, amidst the crises of the world,

play has kept trust and ourselves alive. Many of your visionary ideas on toys and play

have concretized in the current era. For your incredible ability and openness to grasp

play in its many forms I am forever indebted. I’m sure you would be the right person

among all scholars of play to answer the question: “Are there toys in heaven?”

Second, a kind and heartfelt Thank You to everyone, who have contributed to my

research as interviewees, test-players, workshop participants, and who have invited

me in to their homes, preschools, schools, senior day activity centers, museums,

galleries, escape rooms, and play rooms.

Third, to Kuvataidepäiväkoti Viikari — Minna, Ninni, Heli and preschoolers,

Björneborgs Svenska samskola — Nina and students, Museo Leikki, Johanna, Hanna,

and colleagues, and Viikarin Valkama for playful intergenerational encounters.

To my supervisor, Dean and Professor of Digital culture Jaakko Suominen, and

my reviewers Associate Professor Hanna Wirman and University lecturer Nicolle

Lamerichs. Those who supported me at the Degree Program of Digital Culture and

Landscape studies. Mannerheim League for Child Welfare, Tarja, and Eevamaija and

fellow team members, Liisa K. and Erja for playfulness during (and after) my work

period 2021-2022, when I acted as Play Expert in the Leikkipäivä program.

To University Consortium of Pori former leaders Harri Peltoniemi, Jari Multisilta,

and Tarmo Lipping, and current leader Katariina Yrjönkoski for allowing play

research to flourish in this area of Finland. To Miina, Maria, wonderful staff at the

helpdesk Anne, Markku, Juha-Pekka, who have always done their utmost to help and

assist a researcher in need of extra hands, keys, and a nice conversation. IT support,

Veli-Matti and Marko. For entrepreneurial spirits, Riikka F. and Lenita.

To colleagues researching games, technology, media and play in more ways

one can imagine — Frans, Annakaisa, Jaakko St., Mikko M., Markku R., Petri.

To Minna Ruckenstein, for inspiration and supportive words.

For funding, Academy of Finland projects Ludification and emergence of playful

culture, Hybrid Social Play with Business Finland, and most recently, Centre of

Excellence in Game Culture Studies.

JUNO Utuling for the finalizing grant received in 2021. Liikesivistysrahasto for

supporting researcher mobility during the project years. Suomen Kulttuurirahasto

Satakunnan rahasto, SKiB, and the city of Pori for funding our LBGs.

The Strong National Museum of Play, Chris Bensch, Julia Novakovic, and Jeremy

Saucier for supporting my multiple visits to the Brian Sutton-Smith Archives and

Library and granting me the research fellowship at The Strong.

Thank you, editors of the numerous books, journals, special issues, and

conference proceedings who have wholeheartedly embraced my play research to

become published in your volumes.

Former Lelumuseo Hevosenkenkä (now Museo Leikki) exhibition design crew

led by Laura and Anna, for trusting me as your play experience lead when work

elsewhere proved hard to find.

Annika, Kirsi-Mari, Riikka T., Pauliina, my fellow researchers of the Pori

Laboratory of Play Research Group. As your ‘chief of play’, and in some way or

another, I hope to play with you in the future too.

For co-authorship Juulia, Miikka, Krista, Mattia, Veli-Matti, Dongwon, Petri,

Pauliina, Jaakko St., Mikko M.

My special crowd of co-authors, who poured their creative and scholarly magic

into this thesis project: J. Tuomas, You were the first to suggest that we join our forces

in research after the completion of my Doctor of Arts degree. I won’t ever forget how

we made our way to the American Journal of Play!

Anu (and Milli the dog!) and the gentler side of pro-social life and learning.

Discussions over coffee in Pori and Rauma came in the right moments, when there

was barely any light to see, just a thousand doubts.

Pirita, You crazy human-machine, who became a co-player at an early stage of this

project, which really was largely unplanned when we sat at that table of the doctoral

after-party discussing opportunities for cooperation (in 2015!). When I intend to

call someone on my mobile, it is still your number that comes up first, after all these

years. Thank you for working it. Thank you, for playing along.

Friendship is a concept that I have come to know is a shape-shifter among

academic friends. Support comes in many forms, for which I’m truly grateful, Krista

K. Thanks for drawgasmic and soulful cooperation! And, Kati S. and Marjaana,

Thank you. The future of entrepreneurship and life-long learning is playful!

Thank you Tea, Sanna, Jussi L., and Miro at Tactic Games for your excellent

support and skills in producing what was needed to turn this thesis into a proper

publication (and book).

Last but not least. My family, the core of it, as well as all its colorful extensions.

Markku, Irja, Jemi, Anni, Elisa and all of their playful offspring. Without loving

support and togetherness, there is nothing.

Mika. You know that I don’t believe in the ‘forevers’ of this world, yet we’re still

we. Should you have known what goes on in the professional mind of your other

half, you would have had your doubts, I’m sure. But You also know so well, how

rationalism just does not do it with me. Rather, it is life’s precious randomness that

does the trick. It is the colorful, curious, and creative freedom that inspires us to

move, play and love, much like in surfing — we keep looking for the waves that come

next. Life is about replaying the best moments again, and again, while seeking new

ones. Couples who play together, laugh through the tears and stay together. Living

the search, we must, ‘til we move no more.

Lumi. The last time when I wrote a text of this kind, you were not around. Yet,

somehow, I knew you would be there someday. And here you are.

You stand as my Luminary, the light-bearer in play. You continue to represent the

Illuminati of Play and sometimes, allow me glimpses to your secretive play worlds —

the one, only children are granted access to. For that I am eternally grateful. Despite

that my work is play You have said that I know nothing about it, and that You know

everything about it. But aiming to know, I must.

Thank you for introducing a completely new playground for me, and allowing

me to step inside your magic playdom, filled with unicorns and fairy dust but at the

same time Yyteri sand aplenty (and some Lumo Stars, Paw Patrol, MLP, Pokémon and

the like, just to be fair!). Up until this time, I could only dream of such a play-verse.

Remember though that ‘momsters’ toys are her own, and if I want to borrow your

plushies, props and paraphernalia, I promise to ask first. But play together, and share

our toys—organic, DIY, traditional and tech — we shall. Keep opening the doors to

your sparkling play worlds, and I’ll follow, You bright and luminous light of my life.

Katriina, Kati, toy and play researcher, toy and play expert, playful learning

advocate, entrepreneur/future playpreneur?

Toyer, dreamer, explorer and player extraordinaire, from here to ∞

On Irja’s day

the 30th of January, 2024

Katriina (Kati) Heljakka

Katriina Heljakka

Doctor of Arts (visual culture), Master of Arts (art

history), M.Sc. (economics) Katriina Heljakka

(b. 1975) is a researcher of toys, play, and playful

learning at the University of Turku. She received

her doctorate of arts at the Aalto University in 2013

and has since worked in the Academy of Finland-

funded projects Ludication and the Emergence

of Playful Culture, Hybrid Social Play (together

with Business Finland), and most recently, the

Centre of Excellence in Game Culture Studies.

In 2021-2022 she acted as the Play Expert for the

Mannerheim League for Child Welfare. Her current

research interests include playable technologies

and playful learning in work and higher education.

Photo: Petra Laurila

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments ............................................................................ 9

List of Figures and Tables ............................................................. 15

Preface: Play travels where it wants to go ................................... 16

1. Introduction ............................................................................ 19

1.1. Background: The transforming nature of play ..........................49

1.1.1. Digital culture .................................................................. 54

1.1.2. Digital play ...................................................................... 55

1.1.3. Digital (and hybrid) play environments ...........................57

1.1.4. Digital players ................................................................. 59

1.1.5. Digital toys ...................................................................... 60

1.1.6. Affordances ....................................................................68

2. Positioning Play in Theory and Society .............................. 71

2.1. The Meaning of Play.................................................................72

2.2. Play and Its State in Society .................................................... 78

2.3. Play of Children and Adults .....................................................80

2.4. Play in Leisure, Learning, and Productive Endeavors ............. 82

2.5. Toward Post-Digital Play .......................................................... 91

3. Methods ................................................................................. 94

3.1. Playful Approaches to Qualitative Research Methodology .......96

3.1.1. Triangulation ..................................................................98

3.2. Research Participants, Materials, and Research Questions .... 98

3.3. Research Ethics .......................................................................99

3.3.1. Recruiting subjects and requesting their permission .... 101

3.4. Responsible Data Management ............................................ 102

3.5. Data Analysis .......................................................................... 103

4. Case Studies......................................................................... 104

4.1. Author’s Role in the Design, Execution,

and Reporting of Studies ........................................................ 104

4.2. Description of Articles ............................................................. 105

4.3. Limitations of Studies .............................................................107

5. Findings ................................................................................ 110

5.1. Article I: Playing with the Camera........................................... 111

5.2. Article II: Playing with Connected Toys ..................................122

5.2.1. Screen-based or screenless toys? ..............................124

5.2.2. Guided digital play and hybrid playful learning ............. 125

5.2.3. Studying the affordances of IoToys ............................... 126

5.3. Article III: Playing with the Smartphone ................................. 134

5.4. Article IV: Playing with Screens with/through Social Media .... 142

5.5. Article V: Playing with Social Robots ...................................... 151

5.6. Article VI: Playing with Speculative Toy Fiction ...................... 163

6. Discussion ............................................................................ 170

7. Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the

Post-Digital Era .................................................................... 184

7.1. Future Paths for Research ....................................................198

7.1.1. Players .......................................................................... 198

7.1.2. Playthings ..................................................................... 199

7.1.3. Play(ful) environments and assemblages .....................201

7.2. Finally… ..................................................................................202

List of Original Publications ........................................................ 206

Appendix I ..................................................................................... 209

Appendix II .................................................................................... 230

List of Figures and Tables

Figures

Figure 1. The focus of Articles I-VI: Various approaches to

technologies as play machines ........................................ 72

Figure 2. Facets of digital and Internet-connected play:

Play as part of leisure, learning and productive

endeavors as investigated in the thesis

(and detected opportunities for future research) .............. 91

Figure 3. A word cloud was created to give an overview of the most

common words identifying the main focus of the research

publications—play ............................................................ 95

Figure 4. Findings of the case studies summarized ...................... 110

Figures A-G (AI generated images on pages 49, 111, 122, 134, 142,

151, 163)

Figure 5. Portrait of the researcher by

Studio 1851 / Tuomas Sinkkonen .................................. 205

Tables

Table 1. Research data, analysis methods, and critical

questions summarized ................................................... 100

Table 2.  Asummaryofthemainndings,scholarlycontributions,

and future research ideas per publication ..................... 168

Preface: Play travels where it wants to go

Sail away from the safe harbor. Explore. Dream. Discover. (Mark Twain)

This thesis is the result of many playful interventions involving many forms of

collaborations, collegial work, research themes, and subjects. The overarching theme

is to frame the topic of play with digital technology and technological development

significant to play over a particular period of time: the second decade of the 21st

century. Undoubtedly, the project has been both multidisciplinary and international.

Researching play involves risk-taking, but experimentalism is essential to play.

Play is exploration as much as it is self-expressive—people play to discover expanded

versions of self (Henricks 2015a, 11). Researchers play to discover something

previously unknown. Play is a pathway to new knowledge. The player always

reveals aspects of his or her identity in play; players share ideas about their aesthetic

preferences, skills, and proneness to competition or lack thereof while participating

in play.

Mainly, this thesis was conducted because I wanted to know more about the

subject. Movement has always inspired me—the movement onward, not backward

or upward. During the research, I have come to see that going forward seems more

rewarding to me than moving up (on the career ladder). A fascination with newness

and the unexplored is one of the greatest motivators for me to conduct research, as well

as being able to stretch the flexibility of the mind by trying to see outside of the box.

Being considered highly creative is a competitive advantage in any field of design

work, or in that certain entrepreneurship required in advanced scholarship. This

capability has proved to be a useful skill throughout the years of research, especially

when considering the area of expertise in play research. Understanding play is a

powerful capacity to encompass, and being able to detect how exactly play moves

us physically, cognitively, and emotionally is surely a 21st-century skill for anyone

interested in growing and flourishing in today’s world.

Words are powerful, just like gratifying play, as they set our minds in motion.

Think about the following: “Research that advances the frontiers of academic

knowledge differs from research that is focused on delivering solutions to societal

problems” (Hicks et al, 2015; Leiden manifesto 2015, 430).

The aim of this work has not been to solve problems but rather to increase

understanding of the phenomenon of digital play and its multiple relations to mobility

when associated with digital technology and the uses of devices as play machines.

I have worked toward seeking answers to how play moves us while remembering

that “there can never be the answer to a question” (Firat & Venkatesh 1995, 261).

As the thesis demonstrates, there are many ways to investigate technologically

enhanced play in the lives of players of different ages. The studies presented in the

thesis at hand represent merely a handful of examples of how play moves us. Yet, they

are children of their times, each describing their specific mobilization techniques and

affective persuasion through the means of digital technology.

Claude Shannon, the man who “invented the Information Age, has said that he

lacked that strange and wonderful creative spark that makes a good researcher” (Soni

& Goodman 2017, 84). Shannon was also interested in the mechanics of toys, which

makes his work highly aspirational to me. Just like Shannon, I have worked with toys

both in a literal and metaphoric sense:

Mathematicians worry about spending time on problems of insufficient difficulty, what

they derisively call “toy problems”; Claude Shannon worked with actual toys in public!

Time and again, he pursued projects that might have caused others embarrassment,

engaged in questions that seemed trivial or minor, then managed to wring the

breakthroughs out of them. (Soni & Goodman 2017, 278)

The research done for this thesis represents my “toy problems” (more about toys

than actual problems for me), but based on my work with play inside and outside

academia, I reckon there are others who would also like to know How Play Moves Us

through Toys, Technologies, and Mobility.

Pesce (2000, 267) philosophically asserts that “each age has a truth, an explanation

appropriate to itself and its relation to the world.” So is the cas e with a doctoral thesis as well.

Researcher and Finnish artist Astrid Joutseno has said: “I think that in all research,

there is also an autobiographical thread. Even researchers, who study the smallest of

viruses, write a bit of themselves into their research” (Parmala 2020). Similar to Astrid

Joutseno, I have surely weaved an autobiographical thread in the thesis at hand.

Soni and Goodman (2017, 187) write of Claude Shannon’s qualities as “a kind of

playfulness of spirit, a curious combination of creative skill and the ability to stand

apart from the prestige-soaked, ladder-climbing world of elite academia.” This kind

of spirit has inspired the time spent on this project and has urged me to move forward

and advance. I hope that both my creative spark and playful personality come across

in the research I conducted. In any case, I played it my way.

Katriina Heljakka

Introduction

1. Introduction

Movement is miraculous. Finnish artist Jorma Uotinen

Western societies are quickly moving into a post-digital era, where digitality and

connectedness have become ubiquitous and unquestionable facets of everyday

life — work, education, leisure — and play. Relations with technology have significant

consequences for the human experience, including play. Play is undergoing a radical

expansion in association with the use of technologies. In addition to the increasing

role of visuality and entertaining content, contemporary play is intensely colored by

using various extensions for play, such as technological tools, i.e., devices and media.1

One of the strongest motivators to research the relationships between

technology — digital technology in particular — and play was to overcome some of the

concerns and false assumptions linked with a belief in the erosion of play in the digital

era.This thesis section positions the research within digital culture by addressing key

dimensions of play involving toys, technologies, and mobility in a digital world. In

this introduction, I will explain the connections between digital technology, media,

devices, and toys. Moreover, I will highlight some concerns regarding screen time

and adult governance of play in relation to current, technologically oriented play,

which has motivated me to investigate digital play’s positive dimensions.

***

In the beginning, there are toys and a digital camera. I, a fortysomething adult toy

player, use the digital camera to capture my toys in the domestic interiors I have created

myself. To my thinking, they are displays and dioramas — spatial arrangements in

which the toys are at home. For me, the act of toy photography represents photoplay. In

photoplay, character toys — dolls, action figures, figurines, and plush toys — are made

to appear alive. When represented in serial form, they become doll dramas, continuous

toy stories. In association with traveling toys, or toy tourism (even toyrism!), photoplay

is conducted with smartphones, mobile devices with a camera function in outdoor

environments, on staycations or in lands far away. In these instances, the snapshots are

taken in touristic locations to document play, which is then often shared on social media

to narrate the toys’ adventures. When the pandemic takes over the world, it suddenly

halts the mobility of characters with wanderlust — both human and toy. At this time

of physical social distancing, our toys are displayed behind window screens, and we

humans are glued to our digital screens. In both cases, to stay safe, sustain hope, and

experience togetherness despite health concerns. To imagine a better future for ourselves,

and the toys.

1 Media works as environments and media technologies are important extensions of

humans (McLuhan 1964).

Katriina Heljakka

My daughter, a preschooler at the time of research, has discovered the IoToys

and robotic dog at my studio, with which I have conducted case studies with my

colleagues with other preschoolers. These Internet-connected toys are used with and

without screens, but the robotic dog has a natural interface and no screen at all. The

technology is fully integrated into the toy as the dog is an embodied social robot.

Notably, in all the examples above, our playing is enabled by digital devices, defined

here as play machines. In all instances, play in a technological and digital sense moves

us. Play moves us physically, emotionally, and cognitively, and we play for the sake of

leisure, learning, and playbor. In play, we advance, make progress, and become more

social. In play, we move closer to each other, befriending the play machines. This is

what speculative toy fiction also tells us: While watching a movie on a future version

of a connected toy robot, we are offered a glimpse into what may come — a perspective

on what post-digital play with new toy friends might look like one day, perhaps in the

not-too-distant future.2

***

As described above, the evolution of technological innovations parallels evolving

patterns of play, meaning new forms of play innovated in association with digital play.

For example, connected technologies enable new ways of human communication

through social play, creative play, and object play — or play with things. Children,

like adults, are leading digital, connected lives (Hall et al. 2022, 2). Still, the fear of

erosion, even the disappearance of (childhood) play, lingers around conversations

regarding contemporary digitalizing play.

Play means “mobilizations that work across domestic, virtual, and publicly

networked spaces” (Jayemanne & Nansen 2016), and “play, as a mode of experience, is

mobilized across dimensions of hardware and software” (Moore 2011, 373). In other

words, play moves between players, play machines, and various play environments,

and in turn, the technological devices act as play machines (also perceived as ‘toys’),

moving us in many ways.

In their article on the classification of digital play, Marsh and colleagues (2016)

accentuate that the nature of play in the digital age is changing and that this change

is foregrounded by how the resources available for play are deployed in various

forms of play (also see Bird & Edwards 2015; Herr-Stephenson et al. 2013; Marsh &

Bishop 2014; Plowman & Stephen 2014). Through these resources, the thesis seeks to

investigate, and therefore bring to the fore, positive ideas about the impact of devices

used in play, which will later be referred to as play machines.

To add another layer of inquiry to the studies conducted, the concept of (human)

movement is a thematic thread that runs through the case studies and is a common

2 This passage, as a reflective piece, summarizes my own experiences of digital play with

play machines.

Introduction

denominator for the research examples explained in this thesis. Philosophically, play

is movement that manifests between order and chaos (Sicart 2014, 3 citing Nietzsche

1872/1993). The Oxford Learner’s Dictionary (2023) gives multiple definitions

to the term movement, including “changing position: an act of moving from one

place to another or of moving something from one place to another.” Here, the term

encapsulates mobility from a variety of perspectives, including physical (bodily),

spatial (geographical), cognitive (educational), and mental (imaginative and creative)

movement that happens in play as it manifests through the use of technology.3 By

acknowledging the manifold dimensions of human movement, my goal is to approach

digital and connected play from perspectives that are wide rather than narrow. As

illustrated in the following discussion, theoretical ideas address movement from

many directions.

“Play is the free space of movement within a more rigid structure” (Zimmerman

2004). In fact, “play moves in space” (Frappier 1976, 164). In the context of the studies

undertaken for this thesis, in play, movement/motion and emotion arise between and

within physical space and the players’ physical and mental stances in that space. This

movement results from a combination of actions between players, toys, and digitally

enhanced play machines, which all exist primarily as entities in the physical world.

This means that the explorations of digital play that happen exclusively within the

virtual space have been left out of the investigations.4

Movement also encapsulates another meaning — that of “a slow steady change in

what people in society do or think” (Oxford Learning Dictionary 2023). An additional

agenda for the thesis at hand would then be to advance the reader’s thinking about

how play moves us in association with play machines and the ongoing changes in

today’s world of digitalizing play.

Sutton-Smith (1986) has, on the one hand, written of the toy as both a bauble

and an intellectual machine. On the other hand, the play machines discussed in this

thesis represent a dimension of playful technologies, which have a purpose, goal, or

function (Sicart 2014, 31–32) outside of play, “but the behavior and attitudes toward

them […] invoke the characteristics of play.” Therefore, they are first and foremost,

‘intellectual machines,’ whose quality manifests in acts of play.

3 In order to not be trapped in Cartesian Dualism, originating from the work of

René Descartes (1596–1650), separating body and mind (see, e.g., Watson 2023), I

acknowledge that these perspectives intertwine in play experiences. However, some

aspects of mobility are accentuated more than others in the case studies presented in

the publications of this thesis, depending on the context the research was conducted in

and on the players, whose activities the research sought to explore.

4 However, the final study included in the thesis (Article VI), Playing with speculative toy

fiction, involves actions depicted in a physical yet still speculative and imaginative space

of the future world.

Katriina Heljakka

Already in 2004, Goldstein, Buckingham, and Brougère highlighted that beyond

the “standard toy,” the video game console and computer could be counted in the

“curriculum of the overall toy culture” as recreational objects (2004, 3). Obviously,

the computer game console is meant to be used in and for play, but the computer,

much like the digital cameras, smartphones, and tablets, is an example of a play

machine that caters to uses beyond play. At the same time, these devices are essential

for the existence of digital play.

Digital play is, first and foremost, a result of digitalization — a buzzword within

the evolving technological landscape — which, as a phenomenon, may be viewed as

a driver for effectiveness and automation. Again, the digitalization process refers to

the evolution of matters into a digital form and computerization, which means using

acomputerto do something done bypeople or othermachines before (Cambridge

Dictionary 2023). In her book, The Place of Play. Toys and Digital Cultures (2009,

8), Maaike Lauwaert stated that “technology is at stake in toys, games and playing,”

pointing to “the increasing technologization and digitalization of both toys and play.”

Digitalization predominantly originates from the field of information technology, but

it has made its way to other research traditions, such as media and cultural studies.

While Lauwaert’s work is situated in media studies, in this thesis, digitalization is

treated as a matter of interest in (digital) play culture at the intersection of toys,

technologies, and human mobility.

Play mobilizes and moves homo ludens, the playing human being, a term coined

by Johan Huizinga (1938). Moore (2011) points out how Huizinga, one of the most

acknowledged theorists in play, has declared the mobile quality of play: “Play, he

argues, ‘moves’” (Huizinga 1970 [1938], 28).

The thesis title has a dual meaning, both literal and metaphoric. Movement in play

occurs in many forms, from physical mobility to cognitive advancement and, finally,

to emotional enjoyment, reactions, and responses to play. Indeed, understanding

of play that moves us must also consider the emotional aspects of play. Emotions

are considered a subset of the broader term affect, which also encompasses moods

(Zhang & Li 2005). Emotions can be defined as “an affective state[s] induced by or

attributed to a specific stimulus” (Zhang 2013, 251). The term usually reflects an

individual’s subjective feelings toward objects, environments, people, and events

(Russell 2003). “All social play has a mixture of the affective components of hardship

and enjoyment by its very dialudic nature,” writes Sutton-Smith (2017, 129). And,

“the positive emotions associated with play seem likely to promote the ontogeny of

cognitive abilities that will facilitate the playing individual’s ability to successfully

navigate its way through its physical and social worlds” (Kuczaj & Horback 2013, 106).

***

Why is research on the physically mobilizing and emotional tendencies of play

Introduction

needed? Ruckenstein (2010, 502) highlights the importance of mobility in a physical

and computer-generated sense, as “mobility is valued over stability.” However, “play

has a mobility of its own that often goes unacknowledged” (Moore 2011, 373). In

terms of physical mobility, mobilizing play may occur as everything between the

geographical movement of the human player and her playthings5, whole-body play,

and gross-motor movements throughout various movement categories, such as

balance, locomotion, flight, manipulation, and projection (Maude 2010). Physically,

the human moves in a multitude of ways:

Fine motor skills relate to small muscle movements, which involve precise movements of

the hands, face, and feet. These skills can be facilitated through actions such as toggling

or pressing buttons. Gross motor skills relate to actions of large muscle groups and

whole-body movements or movements of large body segments. More specifically, gross

motor skills commonly include locomotor skills (e.g., running, jumping, hopping) and

object-control skills (e.g., catching, kicking, throwing). (Ulrich 2000)

The radius of action of the players investigated in the studies in this thesis ranges

from small to large (meaning the range of movements made in play), as the digital

technologies presented in the research at hand constrain and enlarge the scope of

play. Consequently, playing with the play machines is not only about “pushing the

buttons,” but more about the object-control skills used in combination with creative

thought. It includes everything from the tapping, swiping, and sliding done in screen-

based media; the notion of “high touch”; and agile movement within physical terrains

and virtual online spaces, such as social media platforms.

As play moves us, it often manifests as a holistic experience, resulting from

multisensory and mental engagement. To continue, what can move us physically

may also move us emotionally, ultimately increasing our cognitive and empathic

abilities, such as socio-emotional skills. Thus, How play moves us also points

to movement of a more intimate kind. In addition, what moves us in play may

point to a shift in internal emotional states and movement of the imagination.

Emotions and imagination are needed to consider others’ experiences. This is one

perspective on how technologically oriented play moves us emotionally. Therefore,

the consecutive idea in this thesis is that play can move us in multiple ways.

When doing so physically, play sets our body in motion. To exemplify, Bianchi-

Berthouze et al. (2007) found that body movements increase the level of player

engagement in a digital game. The movement also occurs within players’ interactions

with social settings and mediated systems:

5 For a historical overview of the meaning of playthings, see Mergen (1982).

Katriina Heljakka

Play is not only fun, not only a child’s activity but also exploring the free movement

present in a system of any kind, where the system might refer to a social situation as

much as a machine assembly. Play is the process of exploring such a system, whether it be

a toy, a game, a form of the sonnet, or the economics of a household. (Bogost 2016, 113)

Play mobilizes us physically, most notably as part of sports and related recreational

activities, simultaneously moving and transforming our minds — and mindsets.

As Brian Sutton-Smith claims, play “changes the person who does it somehow into

someone momentarily at least more confident on his or her return to the hazards,

anxieties, and boredom of everyday life” (Sutton-Smith 2017, 217). In other words,

by increasing curiosity and proactivity over passivity, playing adds flexibility to our

minds being a phenomenon with transformative powers.

Central to the idea behind this thesis is that play also moves us with the help

of objects, artifacts, and technology. Toys are a powerful media that influence play

and impact society: “Toys have always been social markers that reflect socio-cultural

practices” (Johnson & Christie 2009, 287). Modern toys, just like modern technologies,

seem to separate younger generations from the older ones (Chudacoff 2007, 158). For

example, as Lauwaert notes (2009, 40–41), toys are “generation-shapers”: They can

tie generations together through communal play or create a rift between different

generations when children and (grand)parents cannot find common ground in play.

This is another motivation for why research on technology-oriented toys and the

use of devices as play machines is needed to understand how and why digital play

happens, how digital play manifests in the playing of different age groups, and how

play moves us in association with digital technology in particular.

Besides being a matter of homines ludentes — the playing human beings —

movement is integrated into technological innovations. Mobility and movement

also have a historical trajectory and past that is meaningful to them alongside the

evolution of technology and media.

Parikka and Suominen (2006) suggest that mobile media are media on media or

media in action. In a physically mobile sense, with the naissance of railway systems

and train rides, “mobility became a central issue (and concern) of modernization,

and movement in itself (not merely as an instrumental issue) became a novel non-

place, which consumed a huge time-share of everyday life” (Parikka & Suominen

2006, 5). Similarly, technologically enriched play accentuates action prompted by

mobility of machines and media. While human mobility in association with the use

of mobile devices, such as digital cameras, smartphones, and tablets, is logical and

expected, the phenomenon of the mobilizing tendency (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2020)

of technologically enhanced toys has been researched far less than, for example,

player mobility in association with location-based games (for location-based games,

or LBGs, see e.g., Benford 2005). Parallel to presenting the possibility of perceiving

cameras and communication devices with functions outside of play as play machines,

Introduction

this thesis also attempts to address the gap that currently exists in research regarding

toys, technologies, and mobility in a time where screens and autonomous movement

are becoming an everyday standard of technology.

Currently, toys have encompassed movement through various player-employed

affordances — playthings, such as smart toys, are no longer manipulated and moved

by either robust mechanics or the hand of the players only but are increasingly

controlled and given mobility through devices like smartphone applications and

tablets, in other words, play machines that come with screens. In parallel, the

play that occurs with technologically enabled toys without a screen belong to the

category of embodied toy robots integrated with sensor technologies, sound, lights,

and movements: Embedded play refers to play with connected, screenless toys or

objects where a screen-based app is unnecessary to unlock the toy’s digital potential

(Mascheroni & Holloway 2019, 7).

New toy technologies are emerging fast, at least if speculative accounts are

considered. As illustrated by the products of speculative toy fiction (Heljakka 2022),

such as the future “toy friends” introduced in the Netflix series Black Mirror (IMDb

2023), toys may receive unprecedented powers in terms of mobility when combined

with cutting-edge technologies. This thesis is an attempt to move beyond the concerns

expressed in entertainment and the dystopian views of technology of the Black Mirror

kind and to examine where the digital leap6 has taken players during the past decade

in terms of creativity in play during learning, leisure, and playbor (Kücklich 2004); it

also examines how educational and imaginative aspects of play set us in motion, once

invited to play by digitalizing and Internet-connected playthings, devices, and play

environments. This being said, it is also possible to see how speculative toy fiction

gives us a glimpse of more optimistic views on how play may move us in the future

through the use of play machines.

This thesis aims at understanding the positive and multidimensional role of digital

technology in everyday play (or, the digital leap of play), including its mobilizing

tendency, and players of preschool age up to adult seniors both in the contexts of

leisure and learning, as well as adult players whose play is beginning to demonstrate

productive cultures through work-infused play, conceptualized by Julian Kücklich as

playbor.

The manifestations of play depend on the context, and technological development

offers a context to consider play experiences (Verbeek 2006). In her book on digital

6 The digital leap is a popular term that refers to a rapid advance or transition into digital

technologies. The term has been used extensively in the Finnish language context (in

Finnish, digiloikka) and has been, for example, discussed as part of education (for

reference, see Saari & Säntti 2018). In the context of this thesis, I play with this term to

explain the technological change that has both decreased and increased understanding

of play with technologies.

Katriina Heljakka

play cultures, Lauwaert (2009) observes how players “perform play activities that lie

outside the core,” meaning that they challenge what the designers had in mind when

designing the interaction between the plaything and the player. Lauwaert uses the

term “periphery of the geography of play” to describe divergent practices of play

that deviate from intentional design. Simultaneously, as a toy and play researcher, I

am particularly interested in the new appropriative manifestations (Sicart 2014) of

current play in the social and digital context, the mobilizing effect of technology on

players (and gamers), and the prevailing attitudes toward digital play. The subject of

digitalization and connectedness of play enabled by machines and media is timely

considering the uncertainties experienced in current society, “since digital play can

support children’s learning, development and well-being during times of crisis or

rapid societal change by offering innovative new ways to play, learn and interact”

(Gray & Thomsen 2021, 4). Perhaps more than ever, to advance and overcome current

societal and planetary challenges, the world needs the creativity and exuberance of

players who, to follow Lauwaert’s thinking, move across the core and the periphery

of the geography of digital play, and who constantly innovate new ways to employ

machines and media in their playing supported by devices.

***

As every research endeavor should start with considering the epistemic grounds

of a phenomenon, it becomes necessary to ask: What is meant by technology, more

generally? Better yet, let us not consult old media, but play a little digitally and ask

contemporary technology itself: “Siri, what is technology?”7

Siri: Here’s some information. [Opens a window on screen]: Technology: Making,

modification, usage, and knowledge of tools, machines, techniques, crafts, systems,

and methods of organization. Technology is the application of knowledge for achieving

practical goals in a reproducible way. The word technology can also mean the products

resulting from such efforts, including both tangible tools such as utensils or machines,

and intangible ones, such as software. Technology plays a critical role in science,

engineering, and everyday life. Technological advancements have led to significant

changes in society.

And then let’s ask ChatGPT, a popular “AI toy” at present, the same question:

“What is technology?”8

7 Siri is the digital voice assistant of Apple Inc. https://www.apple.com/siri/

8 ChatGPT is a free-to-use AI system. https://chat.openai.com/

Introduction

[Text appears letter by letter on window screen]: Technology refers to the tools,

methods, and systems that are developed through scientific knowledge and applied

for practical solutions that solve problems and improve our lives. Technology can be

seen in various forms such as computer systems, software applications, digital devices,

machinery, medical equipment, and more. Technology has played a critical role in

shaping human societies and has drastically transformed the way we communicate,

work, and live. The advancement of technology continues to impact all aspects of our

lives and is an essential aspect of modern society.

To narrow down the concept of technology to digital technology, let us concentrate

on the most relevant aspects of the phenomenon, namely technology as devices and

software. The massive upsurge and presence of various technological devices (Granata

2014) and the use of screen media provoke increasing debates around their capacity

to capture and hook players’ attention, troubling many people today, regardless of

their age.

According to Michel de Certeau, products gain meaning when used, and the

same goes for technological devices. In the book The Practice of Everyday Life (1988),

de Certeau speaks of “making do” in appropriating existing technologies through

“manipulation” and “bricolage,” or creating, inventing, and generating something

new. de Certeau’s “making do” (de Certeau et al. 1990) enables ideas of production,

work, and leisure to intertwine, which is another idea touched upon in the thesis at

hand, namely from the viewpoint of playbor, or productive play. This is why research

on human interaction — including play — with objects, environments, emergent

technologies, and players is needed to understand human ways of manipulation and

creation that ultimately increase our understanding of how we interact and engage

with the world around us.

Lauwaert (2009, 21) lists commodification, domestication, and urbanization as

“exemplary processes illustrating how societal shifts and the changing world of toys

co-evolve.” Commodification refers to the act or process of treating something as a

product that can be bought and sold, and urbanization signifies the trend of people

moving to cities to work and live. Domestication, again, requires a few more words

to explain.

How does technology become “tamed” through human play? Through a process

named domestication (Panzar 1997). “Domestication is understood as the process

which makes play an everyday practice of the domestic realm and ‘bends’ it to the

wills and norms of the family” (Enevold 2014, 1). The domestic space is a locus in

which technological devices are “tamed” (Haddon 2011), and the domestication

of technology happens as media technologies turn to tools, and these tools as toys

start to function as the instruments of play. An example of a domestication process

unfolds in the history of the telephone: Much has changed in the meanings associated

with communication technology, such as the telephone. As Pantzar (1997) points

Katriina Heljakka

out, the first telephones were not meant to be used for enjoyment. At the same time,

“playthings” of the past, toy technologies such as the car, have transformed into

practical technologies with uses that stretch far beyond play. Similarly, by looking

at the evolution of mobile technologies such as portable devices (cameras, mobile

phones, and tablets), it is possible to see how they have and continue to serve us as

play machines.

Human play often strongly reflects adult behaviors. Object play, in particular,

serves to acquaint children with the technologies that adults use in the relatively safe

home environment (Ember & Cunnar 2015; Lancy 2015; cf. in Riede et al. 2018).

Nevertheless, the ongoing “technologization” of object play understood in this thesis

through the concepts of toys, devices, and mobility has provoked many concerns

among adults, parents and educators in particular. Some of these controversies and

complexities will be unpacked next.

***

Sometimes, the communication about play could flow more fluently between

adults and children, especially concerning what is perceived as spaces, objects, or

media used for play. Adults often find themselves “lost” on children’s playgrounds

because they do not speak the language of play (Sutton-Smith 2017, 135). The same

goes for playthings: Ellen Seiter notes how children make meaning out of unanticipated

toys and are perhaps undecipherable to adults (Seiter 1995, 10). This view resonates

with the difficulties of understanding technologically oriented play. Consequently, it

is possible to perceive a generational rift in understanding technologically oriented

play due to perceptions of what play means, its ties to media, and how access to

devices and media is enabled and governed by those in charge, who are often adults.

These reasons will be discussed in more detail in the following.

A major reason for misunderstandings around play may be the different views

adults and children have on their perceptions of play. For example, Howard and

McInnes (2012, 738) have observed how “research has tended to focus on what play

looks like from an adult perspective, for example, in terms of what materials are being

used or whether children look like they are having fun, rather than focusing on what

characteristics children themselves associate with play activity” (cf. in Takhvar 1988;

Howard et al. 2003). Indeed, although some parents may perceive digital technologies

as more of an asset than a threat (Lauwaert 2009), children’s and adults’ views on

what constitutes play may differ (Dockett & Perry 2007). Furthermore, Kudrowitz

and Follett (2014) note how the needs and preferences of adults as purchasers of

toys, and children as their end-users (i.e., players), tend to be very different. These

complexities of play add to the perceived difficulties of understanding creative —

imaginative and self-expressive — device use in association with machines as play, as

conceptualized and investigated in this thesis.

Introduction

Weil and Rosen (1997, 359) have observed that while fast-evolving technology

presents many opportunities, the majority of us are not enamored with technology

but rather feel frustrated and uncertain about it. To continue, Ruckenstein (2013,

485) has found that for some, “the use of technologies and associated media by

children is considered a waste of time and money.” Early on, Resnick (2006) noted

the polarization of discussions about children and technology as a sign of the

aforementioned generational rift. Often, critique against technology use comes from

the parents and grandparents of young children: “critics of new technologies are

too quick to lump all technologies together and dismiss them collectively,” Resnick

(2006, 11) observes.

One further explanation for the limited views that adults have on technological

play is given by Jayemanne and Nansen (2016), who bring up the concept of prolepsis,

first discussed by McPake and Plowman (2010) and drawing from Cole’s discussion

in Cultural Psychology (1996). The notion of prolepsis means that “a critical

influence on parents’ interactions with their children derives from the projection

of their memories of their own idealized past into the children’s futures, which is

an explanatory force for parents’ participation in technological play” (McPake &

Plowman 2010, 1). Another explanation may be the limited understanding regarding

the relationship between technological devices, media, and mediated content and

the relations people have to these realms in the context of family lives, education,

leisure, work — and play. What causes additional confusion is the intermingling of

technological devices and media.

Aufderheide defines the five qualities of media as follows: “1) Media are

constructed and construct reality; 2) Media have commercial implications; 3)

Media have ideological and political implications; 4) Form and content are related

in each medium, each of which has a unique aesthetic, codes, and conventions; and

5)Receivers negotiate meaning in media” (Aufderheide 1992; cf. in Koltay 2011, 213).

Information communication technologies (ICTs) have entered the context of

everyday life as both “objects and media” (Haddon & Silverstone 2000, 251). Digital

media have a close relationship to digital play as play media. In turn, digital play media

are constructed and construct reality. Different generations operate across an evolving

media landscape. Takeuchi (2012) notes how the news media, including newspapers

and magazines, TV news, and books, have all contributed to characterizing the

digital generation (e.g., Tapscott 1998, 2009; Prensky 2001) from which parents of the

“digital natives,” the so-called digital nomads, seem to feel detached. Then again, we

need to keep in mind that “digital natives are made, not born” (Takeuchi 2012, 39).

Livingstone (2007) claims that households can be positioned along media-rich and

media-poor homes. As technology use demands access, our possibilities are framed

by agency and, sometimes, ownership. The agency is limited by control, governance,

and permission, ownership by means that guarantee access. In children’s lives, parents

and educators often afford and limit children’s use of media technologies, even in

Katriina Heljakka

terms of play. Barron and associates (2009) position parents as “resource providers”

and gatekeepers who grant children access to tools that inspire technology-based

activities. Simultaneously, parents are the child’s first educators (Stephen et al. 2013).

At the same time, they are “digital immigrants” adjusting to new play worlds their

offspring already easily and effortlessly navigate and experience.

***

How play undergoes changes and transformations due to new devices and

communication technologies is of interest to the general public — and academic

scholars — besides parents, caretakers, and educators of young children. There are

manifold concerns articulated and made visible in the news media about how digital

technologies and media impact what is often conceptualized as traditional and hence,

non-technological play. One of the most vital and commonly expressed concerns

regarding evolving play is that technology can diminish play (Marsh & Bishop 2014).

Simultaneously, for some, play with digital technologies is not conceived as “real play”

(Palmer 2016) or “real” interaction, physical interaction, and tactile play (Lauwaert

2009, 21). Which societal transitions have strengthened these beliefs, and which lines

of development have contributed to the fears, misunderstandings, and possible hopes

associated with digital play? How have the things made for play come to have a close

relationship with digital technology and media?

“There has been increasing recognition of the potential for harm in the context of

exposure to electronic media, environmental toxins, and safety hazards. In particular,

electronic media” (Healey & Mendelsohn 2019, 2). From an adult perspective, the

effects of technology are understood either as beneficial or detrimental. A study

found that parents associate health concerns, content concerns, and addiction

concerns with digital play (Erdogan et al. 2019), a form of engagement with digital

resources previously understood as electronic media.

In a commentary written about a blog post I wrote on digital play, someone

expressed the idea of interaction with devices having nothing to do with play by

saying: I don’t conceive of children being with devices as play of any kind. Playing is a

more physical and concrete action. Even social interaction is very different face-to-face

than through devices.9 Based on this narrow conception of device use, an essential

part of digital play, engagement with technologies combined with mediated content

is not perceived to carry either “physical” or “concrete” qualities. Sung (2018, 234)

9 “Devices” are a popular term for “machines” that enable digital communication. The

comment here is given for an article on digital play on the website for the Mannerheim

League for Child Welfare. Retrieved at: (https://www.mll.fi/lapsemme-lehti/mita-on-

digitaalinen-leikki/) and translated from the original language, Finnish: “En miellä

lasten laitteilla olemista leikkimiseksi millään lailla. Leikkiminen on enemmän fyysistä

toimintaa ja konkreettista tekemistä. Sosiaalinen vuorovaikutuskin on hyvin erilaista

kasvotusten kuin laitteiden välityksellä.”

Introduction

has found that exposure to digital technology during early childhood may indeed

influence the quantity and quality of children’s play. However, this development does

not necessarily correlate with the diminishing physical or concrete manifestations of

play — it may have to do with how technology use impacts the imaginative dimensions

of play as well: According to previous research, the number of hours children spend

role-playing has significantly decreased (Russ & Dillon 2011). For example, in the

ongoing debate of why this phenomenon is occurring, developmental psychologists

linked a decrease in role-play to the increasing use of technology among children

(Ito 2012; Veiga et al. 2016).

Previous play research has expressed similar concerns; for example, highlighted

anxieties tied to “the Frankenstein Paradox,” “spying” toys, and the uncanny valley

associated with robotics as phenomena affecting contemporary play by decreasing

the imagination and presenting other challenges. According to Sutton-Smith, the

Frankenstein Paradox has concerned Romanticists of childhood for over 200 years.

He writes: “Children’s imaginations, it has been said, are always being threatened by

the emergence of new machines — toys, television, video games, and so on” (Sutton-

Smith 1992, 4).

Then again, “the forms of a new culture are always seen as demonic by the

culture that precedes it,” Pesce (2000, 272) cites from cultural historian William Irwin

Thomson. This discussion is reminiscent of Ron Goulart’s (1969) idea of children’s

commercial culture — toys, fashion articles, comics, and a culture of selling — as

“an attack on childhood.” However, the agency of toys and their capacity “to attack”

depends heavily on the player: “usually the child players control the toys rather than

the other way around. This is what we have meant by the toys as agency.” Ultimately,

toys are in our control rather than the other way around (Sutton-Smith 1986).

In the family context, parents are gatekeepers who control access and provide

guidance for technology use (Lundtofte 2020). Parallel to understanding what digital

play means to the players, it is essential to highlight the parental and caretaker role in

enabling and valuing technology use in association with play. In the study conducted

by Brito et al. (2019, 129), parents mentioned these barriers to adopting new play

technologies: “(a) their perception of the presence of digital media in the lives of

their children [is] already excessive, addictive and harmful to other aspects such as

social skills and physical activity and (b) not seeing worth in investment in high-

price toys without being sure that children would play with them for a long time, and

benefit from developmental and educational stimulation from them.” But, as noted

by Thomas and Hocking (2003), fears are not always in proportion to actual risk

levels (cf. in Cowan 2020, 13).

Parental beliefs about play are fostered by the individual, culture, and society

(Fisher et al. 2008, 315). In an article from 2010, Ruckenstein quotes Eeva Berglund’s

Katriina Heljakka

(2007, 77) notion of Finland10 being a curiously technophile country. Despite

this observation, many find it difficult to understand how technologies influence

and support play, even in Finland. However, as Ruckenstein (2013, 476) writes,

“technological developments, products, and services are an inescapable element of

children’s everyday life.” Indeed, technologies saturate our world (Isbister 2016a,

2016b) and require new operational skills and literacies to develop alongside

their use. Eckhoff (2017) finds a critical exploration of the role of digital media in

contemporary childhood as necessary.

Digital play pivots around using devices in/for/with and “as” play. Yet, in everyday

debates, for some adults, devices are the epitome of an unhealthy life (and play). In

his account of video games, Sutton-Smith positions the toy as a machine, isolating

and possessing the child (Sutton-Smith 1986, 75). A columnist for the Finnish daily

newspaper Helsingin Sanomat wrote in October 2022 that “the worst obstacle to

play is overly addictive digital devices. Children must be resolutely freed from their

power” (Mutanen 2022, B13).

Mascheroni and colleagues (2016) have found that parents’ worries depend on

their education, background, and parenting culture. Reasons such as parents’ lack of

self-confidence and knowledge of online media are given in earlier research (Ibid.).

For example, families with lower incomes experience a generational digital divide.

Marsh and associates (2020, 10) acknowledge that parents face common dilemmas in

the governance of technology use, such as how much digital technology they should

let children use or what apps and games should be allowed as part of their children’s

play. But each family addresses these complexities in different ways, and attitudes

toward technology use in children’s lives result from social relations. Takeuchi

(2012, 55) writes:

[…] any child’s particular relationship with these technologies is shaped by the people

around them — parents, siblings, teachers, friends, neighbors, and so on. And these

interactions are, in turn, influenced by individual maturity, family values, institutional

policies, cultural norms.

Ellen Seiter has described computers as a transitional object, “‘moving children

from playing with toys and games’, to pursuing media-based fan activities with

them” (Seiter 2005, 96). Further, Seiter argues that children use computers for

entertainment (2007, 16; 90). Today, children play with tablets, smartphones, and

laptops (Kudrowitz & Follett 2014). Furthermore, in parallel to devices, play happens

through software that delivers the play content. Digital devices play a crucial part

in how play moves us in the contemporary world. Yet, they are also one of the

10 The author’s country of residence.

Introduction

main entities that increase the complexities around technologically enhanced play.

Mascheroni and colleagues (2016) suggest three reasons for parents’ management of

digital devices: the complexity of the devices, the lack of skills needed to update and

adapt their use habits, and the co-use and supervision of use becoming less available

or ineffective due to the personalization and portability of digital devices (Haddon

& Vincent 2014; Mascheroni & Ólafsson 2014). Today, these concerns are growing,

as toys themselves are transforming to some extent into sophisticated play machines

alongside other devices used in play. In this way, adult experiences and perceptions

of digital play vary across concerns of excessive device use and beliefs regarding the

limited creative affordances and re-playability of technologically enhanced toys. In

fact, play machines carry with them the fear of addiction and enslavement. As shown,

some find it hard to link play to device use altogether. Another prevailing idea about

technology-oriented play manifests as a belief regarding the detrimental consequences

of playing with technology; there is an imbalance, a regulation of time spent with play

content channeled and prompted through devices, and a possible encapsulation — or

according to Lauwaert’s (2009) observation, an over-domestication — of the player

into the indoor environment, especially in regards to playing digital games. These

issues will be discussed throughout the next passages of this chapter.

***

The exploration of the artifacts of digital play must begin with an elaboration

on games. Isbister (2016a, 2016b) positions games as a “rich terrain” and realm for

experience design, which plays an increasing role in our everyday socio-technological

experience.

Gaming is simultaneously considered the dominant category of digital play11 —

and at the same time, ambiguously, one of “non-play.” On a general level, I outline

gaming (analog, digital, and hybrid) as one of the most significant forms of play in

the early 2000s, structured as a sub-genre of play practiced by people of different

ages. Based on a classical definition, in games, players partake in activities directed

toward “accomplishing specific goals within an established set of rules” (Suits 1967).

Free play (with or without toys) is often considered open-ended, but a game usually

has a goal, rules, feedback system, and various winning conditions, and participation

in games, like playing in general, is a voluntary activity. Gray (2015) claims how

games with rules, such as board games, video games, or competitive sports, provide

scripted ways for friends to interact and connect. The locus of the domestic space

is of importance for how games are introduced to children’s lives: Mertala (2018)

explains that the first gaming experiences — that is, being a player and a follower —

are gained at home.

11 Games have also been assigned the position of “the dominant cultural form of the XXI

Century” (Zimmerman & Chaplin 2013).

Katriina Heljakka

Digital games have been seen as paradigmatic of new media (Kücklich 2004, 2),

and their impact on other realms of play is significant. Video games are becoming

central to youth technology culture (see, e.g., Ito et al. 2013). Fizek (2017) describes

video games — understood here as digital games — as instances of everyday

techno-culture:

A digital game is an act of communication and a playful exchange involving some

degree of control negotiation between the human and non-human, between the player

and the machine. (Fizek 2017, 6)

Digital gameplay happens with and through devices and platforms: “Today, digital

play includes playing video games on televisions with video game consoles, computer

games, games on phones and tablets, hand-held video games, and augmented reality

and virtual reality games found on different platforms” (Flynn et al. 2019, 55).

Playing games may contribute to various forms of skill-building and cognitive

abilities. In the 21st century, games have attained a permanent position as media

that entertains and can enhance and support player development in many ways.

According to game scholar Frans Mäyrä, games challenge the players: playing games

involves creating, testing, and modifying strategies and skills needed in the game

(Mäyrä 2008, 3). Game researcher Sonja Kangas (2009, 58) has stated that (digital)

games do not offer the same freedom as open-ended play. However, according to

Jane McGonigal (2011, 20–21), playing digital games involves imaginative problem-

solving that is both enjoyable and developmental. Players enjoy exploring the limits

of game design (Isbister 2016b, 67), and limits are part of the game’s appeal: “Games

aren’t appealing because they are fun, but because they are limited. Because they erect

boundaries. Because we must accept their structures in order to play them” (Bogost

2016, x).

The motivations to play with and through digital technologies are varied and

multifaceted. Play satisfies social needs and aims in addition to individual ones (Gray

2015, 236). Referring to Chesher (2004), Moore (2011) speaks of the “stickiness” of

game screens.12 To play a game is to experience it, see, touch, hear, smell, and taste

the game, move the body during play, feel emotions about the unfolding outcome,

communicate with other players, and alter standard thinking patterns (Tekinbaș &

Zimmerman 2003, 314).

Richard Bartle’s (1996) player typology categorizes players into killers, achievers,

socializers, and explorers and points to the need to understand different aspects

of player behavior. Whereas killers are known to enjoy competition, achievers are,

according to this theory, gratified through accomplishment. Explorers are adventurers

12 Rushkoff (2006) even speaks of “screenagers” when referring to children in the

digitalizing age.

Introduction

and investigators motivated by solving mysteries, and socializers play games to enjoy

interacting with communities.

Despite the existence of player types with various motivators and qualities,

playing is a social activity: Isbister notes how most people who play digital games

play them with others (Isbister 2016b, 43; ESA 2015). Games create interactions

through dialogues: Isbister (2016b, 63–64) sees the role of game designers as social

engineers who employ game elements to create social situations that are interesting

and compelling, even from a social perspective. That is to say, our play partners

enable communication through play:

In games, participants test and tease one another. They assert themselves and adjust

to the challenges directed at them. For such reasons, play should be seen as a dialogue

rather than a straightforward expression. (Henricks 2017, 11)

Digital gaming has become a common leisure practice (Crawford & Rutter 2007).

However, for many, playing digital games is not considered playing at all. Indeed,

as Lauwaert (2009, 41–42) pointed out some time ago, “new media technologies

in general, and the Internet, personal computers and hand-held gaming devices in

particular, have recharged tensions between domestication and urbanization.” The

negative impact of digital gaming on the lives and leisure time of children is accentuated

in a deluge of conversations around “game addiction, violence, aggression, gaming

disorder, desensitization to violence, obesity, and other pathologies that might

correlate with playing video games” (Hilvoorde 2016; cf. Spitzer 2012). Despite the

provocative title used in a commentary on digital play written by columnist Madekivi

(2021) — “Gaming is opium for the soul” — the opinion piece quoted in the following

tried to approach the subject from a more understanding viewpoint:

So what makes getting stuck with digital devices so dangerous for young people? It has

been researched that excessive screen time combined with lack of sleep has an underlying

effect on the weakening of cognitive skills such as language and memory. At the same

time, it takes time away from daily exercise and exposes you to muscle tension and

wrong positions. Otherwise, the balance of life is shaken. Friends and hobbies remain

outside, personality experiences change, and gaming becomes an escape from reality.

Unexcused absences from school gradually increase.

[…] With children, their example, guidance, education, and jointly agreed rules of the

game are the means that responsible parents can use. […] Age limits have been made to

be observed. Digital time should be regulated, but flexibility should be given to certain

situations.

Katriina Heljakka

The column makes several critical points about the concerns about digital

play: risks to physical, mental, and social well-being. Again, the writer stresses the

responsible role of the adult, who should set the example for the appropriate use of

devices and guide, educate, and formulate rules for children’s engagement with them.

The fears related to digital gameplay share common ground with the ideas

concerning device use in other forms of digital recreation: One of the fears of playing

with technologies is the passiveness (immobility, in particular) they seem to cause.

However, Fantozzi et al. (2018) argue against the passivity or one-sidedness of using

digital media: Children may actively use technology in multiple ways just like adults

do — to interact with others and extend play (Fantozzi 2012). That being said, even

digital play can be purposeless. Further, it may be transgressive, even risky.

***

Play can connect people, but according to popular belief, contemporary play is

mainly about play that emerges from solitary interactivity between a player and a

device, most notably a device with a screen.

The most articulated fear related to the technologically oriented play of the

contemporary kind are the screens that channel content for play in the playing of

games and the case of some toys. Devices with screens are seen as problematic for many

reasons. Flynn et al. (2019) note how screen media use is often linked to the sedentary

lifestyle of children (American Academy of Pediatrics 2016). Additional concerns

about screen time accentuate fears associated with monitoring and surveillance, not

only through screens but by “intelligent” devices, which we surround ourselves with,

resulting in the human looking at herself in play and being looked at and captured by

screens while playing. Screen time associated with entertainment consumption is a

concern for many adults, parents and educators in particular, most often in reference

to playing digital games during free time.

Developing technologies may also influence where and in which contexts play

takes place. The partial disappearance of street games at the cost of indoor play may

result from other reasons, such as ‘stranger danger’ (see, e.g., Davey 2012). The most

burning questions regarding play seem to relate to increases in screen time and

consumption and contemporary children’s decreased ability to play, which are often

considered to profoundly impact modern childhood.

The tumultuous move from face-to-face interactions into communication

through screens for utilitarian purposes, such as education and work, makes it

possible to question the motivation to spend time with screens during leisure time for

the sake of non-utilitarian play. Over the past decade, screen time for young children

has increased while play, including active play and play with toys, has decreased

(Common Sense Media, cf. in Healey et al. 2019, 4).

The history of the notion of screen time precedes current mobile technologies.

Hilvoorde (2016, 1) notes how “the first generation of electronic games, such as

Introduction

Pong, was more or less categorized as ‘screen time’” in its time. Curiously, whereas

concerns about children center around too much screen time and too little play, adult

consumption of screen-based devices is not under a similar critical lens. Interestingly,

as Plowman and Stephen (2014) write, “the concept of ‘screen time’ is rarely applied to

television, which enabled the playing of Pong: most of the concerns expressed about

young children’s time with screens is focused on touchscreen devices.” Excessive

use of digital technologies with screens is believed to cause digital fatigue, even

‘technostress’ (for technostress in the adult context of working life, see, e.g., Dragano

& Lunau 2020). For these reasons, researchers Flynn et al. (2019, 54) have believed

it “critical to consider whether the nature of digital play benefits or harms children’s

development.”

However, conversations and critical discussions on screen time are often shallow.

Plowman and Stephen (2014, 14) point out that deciding what counts as screen time

is complex. To better understand screen time related to play, we must start with simple

questions, such as: “What does “screen” mean? What does “time” mean?” (Ibid.). The

virtual world and the use of its applications, such as social media platforms, have

led to a situation in which, for example, family members have different rhythms,

timetables, and lifestyles, potentially leading to conflicts. But to be more precise, why

is that engagement with screens fraught with concerns and negative preconceptions?

Many adults prefer children to be engrossed in “free play” instead of watching

and interacting with screens (Levin, 2015; cf. in Erdogan et al. 2019). Animated and

dynamic play associated with digital media consumption in parallel to developing

playthings has caused concerns, for example, about the rapid increase in screen time

among today’s children (Plowman & McPake 2013). This disposition to “screen play”

accessed through “screen time” comes across in popular entertainment of present

times, which addresses screen time in association with toy play: “I thought we were

gonna limit screen time to thirty minutes a day,” says the mother of nine-year-old

Cady during a car ride, when observing her daughter operating a toy through a tablet

in the popular film M3gan (Johnstone 2022).

Consumption of screen time in the domestic context is an everyday challenge

in many family lives, as technology-oriented play often manifests with and together

with smartphones, tablets, computers, and consoles; some people claim that these

devices immobilize players through encapsulation indoors.

One concern related to overtly used time with digital technologies is the supposed

adverse effects of screen-based devices in limiting children’s bodily (physical) mobility.

For example, many fear that screen time steals opportunities for outdoor play. Cumbo

et al. (2014) refer to digital recreation, stating that children in their pre-teen years

(8–12 years of age) living in urban, Western contexts increasingly spend their free

time indoors engaging in digital recreation rather than outdoor, child-directed play.

This recreation, positioned in this thesis as play, has been noted as a solitary activity

that, harshly put, will predict their future occupation: “With the toy, we habituate

Katriina Heljakka

children to solitary, impersonal activity; and this is a forecast of their years to come as

solitary professionals and experts” (Sutton-Smith 1986, 25). Sutton-Smith agrees that

video and digital games can be conceptualized as media that constitute play worlds

and critiques their role in caging play in indoor environments by writing:

[…] they redirect the attention of children who previously would have turned toys

and group play for excitement to the often more solitary activities engendered by our

decidedly subjective and consumer-oriented society. I think it important to realize we

are witnessing an enormous encapsulation and movement indoors away from all our

traditional play. Many of us still grew up not too far from woods and wildlife and farms,

and our play involved animals, harvests, mountains, and lonely seasides or urban

streets (or even suburban sidewalks), and endless outdoor ball games. (Sutton-Smith

2017, 182)

While children’s independent mobility seems to be shrinking in the offline world,

human mobility across digital spaces is becoming more fluent and effortless. Still, the

fears of decreased time and space dedicated to traditional play (as non-technological

play), still considered a more genuine form of play — are troubling for many.

For some, the indoor life that interaction with screens often implies causes

concerns: children should instead spend time in the fresh air outdoors, on

playgrounds, or according to many in Finland, in nature.

***

This doctoral thesis strives to overcome the challenges of single-handedly seeing

technologies as having harmful effects on play by asking next, What is the position of

the playing human being within this changing technology landscape?

Smith et al. (2016) have found that children of preschool age play for longer

durations and at higher intensities outdoors. But increasingly, mobile technologies

have enabled play to re-enter the physical outdoors. Examples of structured play

experiences in recent years have shown forcefully how location-based games such

as Pokémon Go (Niantic 2016) have lured masses of players of different ages to move

about their surroundings and, simultaneously, to become mobilized by the game

mechanics promoting both bodily, spatial and geographical movement. Another

example is Geocaching, a type of GPS-supported outdoor treasure hunt based on

“caches” hidden in urban landscapes and nature. In other words, technologies also

move us in outdoor space.

Affordances of virtual play spaces have also given rise to social and mediated play

(Kafai & Fields 2013). Children with higher-income parents use more touchscreens

(Nikken & Schols 2015). However, it is not only the children who are at it. In the

digital age, a vast amount of work-life and pleasure content is mediated, consumed,

and manipulated through screens. As demonstrated, screen time is often presented

as if it’s undesirable, but “screens perform different functions, and we use them in

Introduction

different ways to do different things” (Plowman & Stephen 2014, 14). Using screens

in play has benefits, as they, according to Soute et al. (2010, 442), “allow rich feedback

and efficient information exchange.” Further, playful interaction through the screens

of connected devices means that digital technology enables us to stay in touch with

other representatives of homo ludens. That is to say that screen use can be positive for

the facilitation of play.

Research on play conducted in 2010–2020 allows the researcher to focus on a

restricted period of time, during which the use of screens in play has proliferated.

This moment in time also marks a shift in using smartphones for play in terms of

their camera technology instead of digital cameras — the play machines of interest

for the first case study in the thesis. The evolution of screens is notable and relevant to

remember when considering play, as between 2010–2020, for example, the screens of

smartphones have undergone significant changes in the size of the screens. One aim

of this thesis is to shift perspective from being enslaved by the presence of screens

to being empowered by them through the use of connected mobile devices and

media platforms like cameras and smartphones, which easily link to social media,

as well as the more emergent field of connected toys and toy robotics, such as social

companion robots. Pocket-sized technology and hand-held devices mean portability,

an essential feature of devices that set mobile play in action. In robotics, the demand

for portability is replaced by the robot’s ability to move. This also applies to the toy

robots investigated in this thesis. During 2010–2020, new Internet-connected toys

have been launched, both screen-based and screenless. Notably, at the end of the

decade under inspection, screens (and window screens!) became a central means

of communication due to the restrictions of the COVID-19 pandemic. As observed

in the final publication of the thesis — a case study on speculative toy fiction —

the concept of the screen may be radically different in times to come as it may take

completely different forms than is the case today.

***

While “we don’t need computing to play,” as Sicart asserts (2014, 99), technology

expands the portfolios of our playful repertoires, which may enhance our play

experience in many ways. New technologies change our time use and direct our

attention in new ways. Nevertheless, relationships to technology use may be subjective.

Technicity (Dovey & Kennedy 2006; cf. in Enevold 2014, 2) emphasizes the connection

between human subjectivity and technology. While digital play experiences may

manifest as highly self-expressive and individual, this thesis accentuates the social

aspect of engagement with what is treated here as the play machines that traverse the

limits of devices that cater to gaming experiences only. Sicart (2014) wisely notes that

while games are a manifestation and form of play, they are not the only one. Thus, to

further broaden the perspective on digital play, I begin to build the argument that it

is necessary to look at digital play beyond gaming by asking: What if there is more to

21st-century play than playing digital games?

Katriina Heljakka

All gaming is play, but at the same time, digital play represents a much broader

realm than the design, playing, and theorizing of digital games. In other words,

digital play is not only digital gaming. To move beyond the limits of games, this thesis

seeks to explore the developments of digitalization, mediatization, and robotification

— hence, digital, networked, and Internet-connected play outside of “gaming” or the

playing of digital games.

We seek not only consumable experiences online but also cognitive and creative

challenges of digital cultures and communities. Despite acknowledging that a great

deal of contemporary play manifests as various forms of pre-structured and industry-

designed and delivered gameplay, in the article-based thesis at hand, play is more

often seen to lean on the creative (paidic) rather than the competitive (ludic) realms

of human culture, including structured playthings other than games.

“Some play behaviors are more ritualistic or rule-bound (ludus); other expressions

are more spontaneous or improvisational (paidia)” (Henricks 2015a, 5). In Roger

Caillois’s (1961) terms, paidia means the “spontaneous manifestations of the play

instinct.” Parallel to ludicism, there is the paidic end of play that celebrates childlike

and sometimes seemingly irrational play — play where imagination and creativity are

at high stakes. This is how I see technologically enhanced toy play playing out.

To understand what creative digital play can be outside of competitive games,

the thesis is interested in toys and play machines and their tendency to mobilize the

players physically, cognitively, and emotionally, unlimited by age.

As shown in the case studies presented in the publications of the thesis at hand,

an essential part of digital play outside of games happens in association with various

toys — actual toys and digital devices that extend the understanding of what toys

are evolving to in the contemporary world. As previously mentioned, Sutton-Smith

(1986) notes how the toy can be seen as a machine. While machines appear to many

as assistants and tools to serve the needs of automation and production, toys, for the

most part, have the role of functioning as the artifacts for (non-productive) play in a

leisurely and (productive play) in the educational sense.

Computers enable both functional uses and those related to creative exploration,

also recognized as playful behavior with toys. The dichotomous “nature” of the

computer as both a tool and a toy have been acknowledged in earlier research:

The digital machine itself, being a work tool and a toy at the same time, unites those

two seemingly mutually exclusive qualities. On the one hand, a computer is a digital

calculator based on mathematical game theory (von Neumann 1928, von Neumann

& Morgenstern 1944), performing work-related tasks; on the other, an entertainment

centre used in free time. (Dippel & Fizek 2016, 9)

Koltay (2011, 211) reminds us, “technology is just a tool, which does not determine

how we must act.” A study by Chaudron and colleagues (2015) found that young

Introduction

children mostly use digital media to play games and watch streaming, on-demand, or

engage with mass-produced entertainment content. The study reported that only a

few parents had loaded educational apps, and few children had the skills for content

creation. In the context of this thesis, it is therefore more fruitful to ask what exemplars

of homo ludens, the playing human beings, want to do with technology given that the

use is not constrained or instrumentalized, but rather voluntary and free play-like,

just like the use of toys.Thrift (2003) considers toys to be open to multiple usages. In

a similar vein, technologies enable many forms of engagement. In current times, the

worlds of technological development, toys, and their use as a form of play intersect in

a stronger sense than ever before. Ho et al. (2018, 2) differentiate between 2D and 3D

technologies — interactive devices and toys — observing that “2D interactive devices

such as iPads®, smartphones, and tablets are increasingly becoming an important part

of playtime for very young children.”

According to previous research, the tablet is the dominant screen in children’s

play lives (Marsh et al. 2018). The advent of the tablet happened in conjunction with

the launch of the iPad in 2010 (Marsh et al. 2016, 243). Children nowadays, and

even a growing number of adults, see tablets as toys (Lundtofte 2020; Ihamäki &

Heljakka 2018).13 In this way, the boundaries regarding play between games, toys,

and play machines continue to dissolve: Games and toys already share similar

qualities. Although the exact definition of a game presents problems, it is still thought

that games are meant to be played (Stenros 2015, 41). According to Avedon (1971),

games have seven unified factors: 1) reason for existence, 2) action patterns, 3) rules

governing action, 4) number of players required, 5) participant roles, 6) participant

interaction patterns, and 7) outcome or premium (1971, 419–426). In Suits’s definition

(1978, 41), playing a game voluntarily seeks to overcome unnecessary obstacles.

Games are distinguished by the presence of external rules (Sutton-Smith 2010).

Moreover, games have goals. According to Pulsipher’s definition, players must be able

to influence the outcome of a game by making choices about non-obvious options.

Otherwise, it is not a game, although it may be a story, toy, or riddle (Pulsipher 2012,

39).

Creativity and imagination, which are closely linked with toy play, are also

present in gameplay: Even play with rules can be imaginative when these rules are

open to adaptation (Cowan 2020, 9). Similarly, the absence of rules is not clear-cut in

toy play; in all forms of social play, rules begin to form at some point. At a time when

adults are increasingly showing their toy relationships in public, on social media,

and in physical places such as toy events, and as the boundaries between adult and

children’s toy cultures are blurring, the worlds of games and toys have converged

13 Contrary to belief, digital devices are not all getting smaller (Plowman & Stephen 2014),

but in fact take larger physical formats than smartphones with small screens. Tablets

illustrate one form of this development. Then again, new foldable screens that enable

increased portability have started to emerge in smartphones.

Katriina Heljakka

in many ways (Heljakka 2013). Today, many games have toy-like features, such as

aesthetics or players’ avatars (Heljakka 2012b). The other way around, through its

digital features, a toy can be said to contain some rules and goals for interaction, such

as the IoToys scrutinized in this thesis. This means that the studies undertaken for the

thesis highlight paidic play patterns that rely on human creativity in setting players’

own goals for their playing and being creative within the boundaries they create

themselves. It is worth noting that what begins with paidia may come to encompass

more ludic features as the playing develops into a more structured and social activity,

with goals and expected outcomes, as is the case with playbor.

***

Why study the technologization and digitalization of play in reference to play

machines?

Societal trends have always affected perceptions of play, and technological

development is no exception. As illustrated in this thesis, it is possible to see how

some relate current developments of play to the commercialization and digitalization

of culture. Whereas many see technology as relevant for education and children’s

cognitive development, once devices are implemented in more structured play

in preschool and primary school, another fear is the concern over diminishing

imaginative capabilities for those engaging in technology-based play.

One of the strongest motivators to undertake the research journey described

in this thesis was to find evidence proving the beneficial aspects of technologically

driven play that inspires and influences mobility and movement of the body and

mind; to remedy the general fears and misconceptions associated with digital and

Internet-connected play, I was determined to explore the topic through my empirical

research. First, I have thought that adults — educators, parents, and other caretakers

— need to be convinced that digital technology will not crowd out creative play

outside of gaming that happens either in physical play, outdoors, or in the imagination

of players. A second motivation for this research has been to underline, through

scientific investigation, how digital technology not only influences children’s play

in positive ways but players in age groups beyond traditional understandings of the

“play age”: from the toddler years into preschool, and further ahead into adulthood

and senior age. Next, the connections between digital play and its capacities to

contribute to creativity and imaginative processes over the life-span will be discussed

in more detail.

***

Today, children in developed Western countries live in a play-rich environment.

I tend to agree with Gutnick and colleagues (2011), who observe that as digital media

has permeated every aspect of adults’ lives, it’s unsurprising that children’s lives

have been impacted as well. On the one hand, adults may easily interpret children’s

Introduction

actions with toys (and other everyday objects) as play. On the other hand, children

may find that adults can limit their play activities (Glenn et al. 2013) by interrupting

play (Rogers & Evans 2008). In research conducted by Stephen et al. (2013), it was

found that technology itself did not drive children’s experiences; instead, their

desires and family culture shaped them. In most drastic terms, it has been argued

that strong adult control may inhibit play (McInnes et al. 2011). As illustrated by

the Frankenstein paradox discussed earlier, “children’s imaginations, it is said, are

always being threatened by the emergence of new machines — toys, television,

video games, and so on,” Sutton-Smith observed (1992, 4). “Some worry that play

involving technology is limited in some way, as they fear that it constrains children’s

imagination” (Marsh 2017; Levin & Rosenquest 2001). Bird (2020) describes this

concern to accentuate how children’s play skills are believed to diminish with the

prevalence of technologies, one of them being pretend play. “The operative word for

defining pretend play is imagining” (Hassinger-Das et al. 2017). As previous research

shows, traditional and converged forms of play are not oppositional but interrelated

(Edwards 2013). Converged play can also lead to imaginative play (Ibid.).

Nowadays, digital technologies are a taken-for-granted aspect of children’s

everyday lives; “they are constantly surrounded by people who play digital games and

take advantage of communication technologies; these might be their friends, older

siblings or parents” (Ruckenstein 2010, 508). Kafai (2021) states that technology is

part of children’s fabric in their everyday lives. Contrary to many adults, they do

not feel threatened by computational media or other programmable devices. Instead,

they experience their explorations and interactions as enjoyable. “Children’s interest

in technology, which begins with play worlds at kindergarten age, is later maintained

by other digital devices and services” (Ruckenstein 2013, 480).

The scenarios presented by new technologies broaden the range of play experiences

(Yelland 2011). Raessens (2006) has noted how technologies stimulate play behavior.

Exploring childhood play has long-standing roots in studies of childhood and early

education. It has been observed that:

CHILDREN LOVE TO PLAY. They naturally engage the new and find ways to interact

with it. They joust. They explore. They spontaneously invent. They engage in the

moment, and it engages them. (Woolsey & Woolsey 2008, 128)

Let’s experiment: Would it be impossible to think that in a future instance, the

quote by Woolsey and Woolsey (2008) above could instead account for both children

and adults and their creative relationships to technology use and read like this:

CHILDREN AND ADULTS LOVE TO PLAY WITH TECHNOLOGY. They naturally

engage with new technology and find ways to interact with it. They joust. They explore.

They spontaneously invent with new technology. They engage in the moment with new

technology, and it engages them.

Katriina Heljakka

Why is it hard for many adults to interpret children’s engagement with digital

technology as play?

In a paper by Fantozzi et al. (2018, 88), a parent remarks, “Well, I just don’t

want her sitting around pushing buttons,” referring to children’s use of technology-

oriented toys. This concern of the possibly pejorative effects of engagement with

technologies has recently found its way to popular fiction as well: In the trailer of a

movie (Risto Räppääjä ja villi kone, a Finnish film from 2023) continuing the famous

saga of Finnish Risto Räppääjä, the aunt of Risto — a boy around 11 years of age is

introduced to the world of video games — asks, “Do you want to be in a relationship

with a machine for the rest of your life?” (Salomaa, Selin & Helle 2023).

If playing digital games is not the only way of playing, then what more is digital play

about?

In the context of this thesis, the focus gravitates toward exploring how play makes

us move in association with the use of technological devices and software for reasons

outside the realm of games. I have decided to call these devices play machines.14 These

artifacts and entities of present times can be differentiated from non-technological

toys with no connection to digitality or devices. As commodities — and toys — are

made more technological, this socialization experience of playing with them may

become more crucial: digital toys are an early dip in the bath of commodified

technology, constituting what Pesce (2000) describes as a “new class of toys.” This

is one example of how technology has become domesticated. Essentially, this thesis

deals with what is understood as technology and how play relates to this powerful

realm of humanity — our environment, communication, interactions, and digital

play behavior.

Interestingly, Isbister (2016a) points out the capacity of games to take focus away from

the novelty of the technology and instead direct attention to personal and social tasks and

goals. This is also a valuable insight into explorations of more open-ended and creative

types of play, such as the technologically oriented toy play scrutinized as the employment

of play machines — digital cameras, smartphones, connected toys, and toy robots.

At the same time, it is important to remember that technology influences creative

play beyond play with “real” devices. Dyson (2006) notes how children may pretend

to take pictures with cardboard cellphones. Again, adult-created toys produced by the

industries of play (Heljakka 2013) familiarize children with the patterns of social and

family life and reflect the world views — ideology, tastes, fashion — and technological

advances of adult conceptions (Smirnova 2011). An important cultural function of

toys is to bind the child into the family (Sutton-Smith 1984). Besides improvised and

14 They are either digital cameras, smartphones, and social media platforms as “second-

level toys” or Internet-connected and “intelligent” digital toys, such as various toy

robots.

Introduction

self-crafted “technology toys,” computers, laptops, and cameras have found their way

as accessories to various character toys, such as animals and toy figures.15

***

To discuss the “functional devices” as play machines more thoroughly, let us move

next to consider the following question: What are the devices that support digital play

of the open-ended and creative kind?

This thesis builds on the idea that play happens through portable, digital, and even

connected devices that represent everyday technologies that have either undergone

a domestication process in present times, such as digital cameras and smartphones,

and social media platforms; those that will become fully integrated into the home

environment and educational contexts, such as the emerging Internet-connected

playthings as an evolvement of interactive toys; and finally, social robots, which are

speculated to become a more normalized part of labor and leisure of society in the

future as assistants, tutors, learning companions, and quite possibly — play partners.

Technological development advances rapidly, and during 2010–2020,

technological innovations merged and made some devices redundant. Through

ownership of mobile devices such as smartphones, players have access to high-quality

digital cameras, and separate devices are no longer needed to partake in what is

conceptualized here as photoplay — or visual documentation of toys and play through

photography (see e.g., Heljakka 2011; 2018a). Similarly, interactive toys with cutting-

edge capabilities, such as the possibility to connect to online worlds, make them what

is recognized as IoToys, referring to Internet-connected toys. The Internet, again,

extends the play space, interconnects players, and connects the privacy of the home

with the public arenas of play (Lauwaert 2009).

In research, toys integrated with technologies are, for example, called smart,

high-tech, interactive, and robotic (ter Stal 2017). Fernaeus and colleagues (2010, 39)

explain the difference between robots and other digital devices, understood in this

thesis as play machines: “unlike a piece of software that is installed on a computer

or a mobile phone, a robot is an active, tangible artifact that interacts directly with

the world around it.” In the context of this thesis, however, these playthings are also

considered play machines, all of which demarcate things with interactive affordances.

***

According to Plowman (2004), the term “interactive” has been applied to a range

of playthings from plush toys to dolls and construction toys that are computationally

15 Look carefully at the cover image of this thesis, and you will see vignettes of miniature

plastic devices borrowed from the (traditional, i.e., physically material) toy chest. (These

small-scale imitations of play machines come from the toy collection of the author’s

daughter.)

Katriina Heljakka

enhanced. Interactive toys “include technology-enhanced battery-operated toys and

toys with computer chips installed that make the toys talk or act in certain ways”

(Johnson & Christie 2009, 287). Bergen (2012) categorizes technology-enhanced

toys into those with limited and broader affordances. Toys of this kind, conceptually

understood as smart and interactive, range from simple plush animals that say or sing

a few phrases when a button is pushed (i.e., exemplifying a technologically enhanced

toy with limited affordances) to sophisticated robotic animals and childlike characters

that simulate many of the actions of real animals or children (i.e., technological toys

with wider affordances).

“Feedback and control are two new important features of interactive play

technologies” (Kafai 2021). Pesce describes the two necessary elements of interactive

toys as follows:

All interactive toys must have at least two different types of components: sensors which

allow the toy to know what is happening in the environment around it, and affectors,

which allow it to respond to the environment. There are sensors to mimic every sense

that we possess: light sensors, microphones, switches that turn on or off when tilted (a

sense we have in our inner ears), pressure switches (which sense touch, much like our

skin), and so on. (Pesce 2000, 25)

Smart toys “leverage some form of computational power,” and they “appear to

have a capacity for adapting their interactivity to the abilities of the player” (Allen

2004, 179). They may contain embedded electronic features (such as a microphone,

camera, sensors, accelerometer, gyroscope, compass) that enable them to interact

with their users and adapt to their actions. Those toys are not necessarily connected

to the Internet. The newest development threads in this field are smart, interactive

toys of present times — Internet-connected toys (IoToys), which have intricate

connections to wider digital material ecosystems (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019),

and social robotics, such as social companion robots labeled as toys (or, alternatively,

toy robots). As ‘connected toys,’ they are ‘designed to connect to the Internet and

therefore remote servers that collect data and power the toy’s intelligence’” (Future of

Privacy Forum & Family Online Institute (FOSI), cf. in Chaudron et al. 2017). Such

toys “have the facility to share those recorded data, the ‘play data.’ Play data can be

recorded by the toy or device while the user is playing” (CogniToys Privacy Policy, cf.

in Chaudron et al. 2017). These are not merely consumer-level entertainment robots

(Jones & Deeming 2008) but entities that often cater to possibilities for edutainment

and playful learning.16 They can be conceptualized as toys that can be controlled

16 Playful learning is used throughout the thesis to denote teaching and learning activities

including play-based approaches that allow for enjoyment through exploration, such as

object play (including the use of technologies) and creative play. For more on playful

learning, see, e.g., Whitton (2022).

Introduction

remotely or programmed to perform diverse actions. Furthermore, these Internet-

connected toys may include sensors, making distinguishing them from robots

irrelevant. They are, in fact, considered toy robots, and this notion makes it possible

to link to robotic pets, also understood as social companion robots. Indeed, the play

machines are many, but a blunt division can nevertheless be made into digital devices

and screen-based technologies of interest for this thesis, such as smartphones and

digital cameras, which are mainly used for functional purposes (communication

and photography) not understood as play, and to actual devices meant for playing

purposes, i.e., toys and toyified robots.

Mobile and robotic media afford liveness, affective stickiness, and portability

(Berriman & Mascheroni 2019). The toys described above encourage open-ended

exploration and play but demand the players’ attention at the same time. Previously,

non-technological toys were said to send signals to their players: “toys persuade

them and others, including the children themselves, that they love” (Sutton-Smith

1993, 241). Through technological development, toys have moved from a subtle

invitation to play to a more vigorous persuasion technique, if not strategy, to direct

and make demands for the players to care for and nurture them.

Sicart (2014) sees fascination arise with mechanical and procedural toys, as

they are played with in order to see how they react. Smirnova (2011, 35) describes

interactive toys as differing from (traditional) dolls and soft toys “in that they have

an independent life of their own.” Seth Giddings (2019, 68–69) describes how IoToys

mobilize imaginative processes in three ways: Firstly, they are designed for the

imagination to foster imaginative play. Secondly, like in history, they have served as

microcosmic models of social, cultural, and technological orders and attitudes. “And

thirdly, recent developments in the use of advanced networked, interactive, virtual and

mechanical technologies in toy design add to longer-established commercialization,

franchising, and ‘mediatization’ of toys.”

***

In summary, this thesis seeks to answer how current digital technology influences

human play behavior positively and creatively in interaction with digital devices and

media outside (or on the fringe) of digital gaming as play machines that celebrate

activity, agility, amicability, and most of all, movement of body and mind, aiming at

progression, not regression.

Technology understood in a digital and connected sense weaves a thread

throughout the argumentation of the thesis — homo ludens of the 21st century is

invited to play through the use of devices and digitality and incorporates cameras,

connected toys, smartphones, screens of social media and social robotics in play,

which generate motion and emotion, and therefore, multidimensional mobility of

the human body and mind.

“The body, fantasy and/or available toys and play partners are choice points

of convergence of the focus of play,” writes Frappier (1976, 194). Entertainment

Katriina Heljakka

and play experiences are often mediated through interactive (media) technology

conceptualized here as digital technology. I intend to highlight creative player

engagement with digital media and related devices by accentuating contemporary

play’s physically mobile, mentally agile, and emotional tendencies, emphasizing

the positive and productive aspects of human evolution through digital play, and

suggesting its relation to physical, cognitive, and mental movement.

As this chapter of this thesis illustrates, digital technologies cause concerns

about addictive screen-usage, encapsulation indoors, and excessive playing of games.

However, as argued, there are other kinds of digital play that highlight the open-

ended and creative aspects of play.

On the one hand, this thesis attempts to demonstrate how digital technology has

made play more perceivable in the physical, digital, and social realms. On the other

hand, it shows how the previous perspective on play as an ephemeral phenomenon

is partly a thing of the past: technologies such as (digital) cameras, smartphones,

software like apps, and perhaps the most influential dimension of the developing

communicational means; the emergence and strengthening influence of social

media has brought play into the public sphere. By offering a more comprehensive

approach to digital play beyond digital gaming, the findings of this work will inform

practitioners, scholars, and designers of play as an activity that transcends the limits

of players’ ages and highlights the creative and productive uses of digital technology

in its various aspects.

***

The structure of the remaining part of the thesis is the following: In the Background

section, play as an evolving area of cultural study is discussed, and the theoretical

notions of digital culture considered highly important for the thesis — digital play

and digital toys — are explained. Section 2 highlights the theory on play used in the

thesis and positions the meanings and values connected to play in society as part of

contemporary leisure, learning, and productive endeavors. This section argues for the

emergence of and movement toward a post-digital era, in which the understanding of

digital play needs to be expanded. Section 3 explains the combination of qualitative

methods used, their rationale, and the treatment of research materials and research

questions, including ethical viewpoints. Section 4 briefly presents the consecutive

case studies and my role in their design, execution, and reporting, and considers

their limitations. Section 5 goes on to present the publications highlighting research

conducted with various play machines (Articles I–VI) and provides evidence gathered

through the six case studies and discusses, synthesizes, and elaborates these findings

of the studies each with their unique focus on digital play, followed by Sections 6

and 7, which present the discussion on the evolution of play with machines as a

form of digital and connected play, lay out the conclusions for the research, and offer

guidance for future research.

Introduction

1.1. Background: The transforming nature of play

The background for the research conducted with an interest in technology, toys, and

mobility begins far earlier than the beginning of the 2000s. In fact, the merging of

play and technology is speculated to have begun with the employment of human

creativity that led to the birth of the first artifacts associated with and used for

purposes other than survival.

To look at the evolution of play, let us begin by asking what really has changed

in children’s play during the past 500 years. To answer this question, let us try the

following: Playful interventions often begin with a “throwback task” asking the

participants to travel back in time into their childhood and to reminiscence about

situations where play happened. Instead of leaning toward a personal memory of

play, I want to reach back further in time, not arriving at a moment in the history of

technology but of art: Flemish Renaissance artist Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s painting

Children’s Games (ca. 1560), in which the artist describes the amusements of his time

that also included objects classified as playthings.

According to Google Arts, more than 230 children are occupied with 83 different

games in the painting, and the artwork gives “an encyclopedic” view. Despite

representing an adult perspective on play, the work serves as an intriguing subject for

Figure A. An AI-enhanced version of Pieter Bruegel the Elder’s painting Children’s Games.

Katriina Heljakka

those interested in play cultures (with a particular accentuation on object play) because

the functions described in it in visual terms can be interpreted as manifestations of

the various ways that children play. This is how an adult artist of his time depicted

children’s play to happen.

Art historian Amy Orrock’s doctoral thesis from 2010 informs that play in the

painting has been interpreted earlier in at least two ways. She writes:

[…] some scholars have seen the children in the picture are sinister and deformed, and

have argued that their games are emblematic of adult folly. To other interpreters, the

children appear to be innocents, their actions filled with childish delight in the physicality

with play which transcends the centuries. (Orrock 2010, 18)

When referring to the painting, Soute and colleagues (2010, 436) state: “In the

‘old’ days, before the introduction of technology, entertainment for children was

fairly straightforward. A child played with toys or with other children.” The forms

and patterns of play occur in the painting both as intangible alongside “free play”

activities and more tangible — and therefore more accessible — forms that present

more possibilities to analyze the play. “These games are rich in social interaction,”

Soute et al. (2010, 436) note, and “the rules are often few and simple, appropriated

and adapted by players.”

Play is considered a substantial part of early childhood education, but in Bruegel’s

painting, the playing children seem occupied in playing outside of educational

aims. In the 21st century, the supposed “Century of Play,” digital technology use has

increasingly expanded the phenomenon of play and playfulness into the interaction

of people of all ages within learning, work, and leisure.

Whitebread et al. (2012) distinguish five types of play: physical play, play with

objects, symbolic play, pretend play, and games with rules, the first two being the

most important for this thesis. Essentially, and similarly, as Orrock (2010) observes,

the Bruegel’s historical painting depicts both dynamic human interaction through

bodily and physical playing — running, climbing, dancing, and, in parallel, playing

that centers around various objects. Physical play often involves activities that

require eye-hand coordination, such as playing football, climbing trees, or playing

on gymnastic equipment (Bjorklund et al. 1998). In a bodily sense, the children in

the painting are occupied with locomotor play, movement in any or every direction

for its own sake, for example, in chase, tag, hide and seek, and tree climbing (Hughes

2002).

Playing with an object is manipulating it and testing its abilities to create meaning

and value for play. In Henricks’ terms, using an object for play is to experience the

satisfaction of trying to control it (Henricks 2006, 186).

In Bruegel’s work, the play materials on offer are represented by games in which

players take advantage of some physical resources. These are explicitly articulated as

Introduction

various playthings, understood here as toys. It is the case that toys are usually our first

experience learning about the material world.

In the Western world, modern toys came into existence in the period between

1550 and 1770 as a result of the concatenation of three processes: mass production,

new notions of childhood, and “toys increasing involvement in a world of mechanism

as ‘little machines’” (Thrift 2003).

Basing his analysis on Bruegel’s painting, Finnish play scholar Lönnqvist states

that common playthings in the 16th and 17th centuries were hobby horses, spinning

wheels, balls, stilts, barrel wheels, dolls, and doll cribs (Lönnqvist 1991).

Diverse and sensory-rich materials are crucial to support children’s active play

(Berriman & Mascheroni 2019). Which skills are reinforced by which toys? Helen

Boehm (2003, ix) provides the following suggestion of abilities that the choice of a

plaything can affect skill-building on many levels:

• Cognitive (thinking and problem-solving skills)

• Visual discrimination (observing and seeing)

• Visual/Motor Skills (eye-hand coordination)

• Auditory Discrimination (listening)

• Tactile (touching and physical connection)

• Creativity (imagination and artistic skills)

• Large Motor (coordination, running, and climbing)

• Small Motor (fine coordination and finger dexterity)

• Instructional (facts and pre-academic learning)

• Socialization (cooperative play with empathy)

• Independence (individuality and self-confidence)

Boon and colleagues (2020, 9) list play types, which may also be perceived in

Bruegel’s painting: “Balancing, being entertained, caring, collecting, communicating,

experimenting, exploring, fiddling, following, keeping captive, kicking, made-up

games, manipulating with objects, rolling, sensing, sharing, throwing, traditional

games, transitory play actions.” What is of interest here is the movability of their

playing devices and the tendency of these devices to generate movement and mobility

in the players on a bodily and mental level.

According to The Strong Institute of Play (2023), the ball, the world’s most classic

and famous example of a non-digital, mobile toy, is one of the earliest playthings. In

Bruegel’s time, toys were the products of handicrafts, often made of leftover materials.

The skills of toy making were passed on from generation to generation, unlike the

tradition of making playthings out of organic materials, such as pinecone cows.

The industries of play (Heljakka 2013) — a technology-driven sector — operating

Katriina Heljakka

nowadays with cardboard, textiles, plastics, rubber, and computer chips to produce

brand new toys, is preceeded by centuries of toy makers crafting playthings of, for

example, natural materials, such as bone, wood, leather, and yarn to amuse children

with their skillful handicraft techniques. The first connection between toys and

technology was, in this way, realized through the use of tools in handicrafts.

Moreover, when Children’s Games was painted, the understanding of media

was somewhat limited; Gutenberg had innovated the movable-type printing press

around 1440, but instead of printed words, play culture lived on in folklore; verbal

storytelling and artifacts sculpted by the human hand — toys and modes of storytelling

represented media in their own right, and they did not mix as they do now. The

industrial production of toys began much later with the organization of workshops,

which in Central Europe started to serve wealthy families interested in adorning their

living spaces with curious miniatures, such as tin soldiers, doll houses, and other

objects that mimicked humans or animals. The professionalization of toy making

and growing consumption paved the way for toys and story worlds to connect within

the domestic space. Toys started to tell their own story about the lifestyles of those

who purchased them; they would no longer be objects meant only for play but also

objects that spoke for their owners and could be used as part of identity construction.

While tracing the changes that have taken place in play culture over the past 500

or even 100 years is a fascinating endeavor, a doctoral dissertation investigating the

topic of play must inquire a far narrower time, mainly if it is conducted with digital

technology in mind. This thesis aims to shed light on how technology in a digital

meaning has affected human play. Concentrating on the past decade, namely the

years 2010–2020, highlights how rapidly evolving technologies have influenced the

tools, content, and cultures of digital play. While the concept of play has not changed

radically over time, what constitutes a toy at the time “is substantially different than

what it was during the previous century” (Healey & Mendelsohn 2019, 2).

Thrift (2003) goes through the history of toy commodification, recalling their

association with the mass media. In the UK, the BBC broadcasted a series on a set of

small wooden toys, and in the US, a Shirley Temple doll was launched in the 1930s.

It was only after the 1950s, however, when toys were combined with mass television

advertising, that the most vital link between toys and mass media was tied.

Julian Kücklich (2004, n.p.) writes that “play is not just a mode of interaction the

user is subjected to, but also an attitude that she brings to the medium in the form of

notions and expectations about the technology or text.” My interest is significantly

guided by the same question that Kücklich asks: “How do users interact with new

media, and how do the practices of interaction shape media technology?” However,

to be precise, I am asking how players are engaging with play machines as a form of

digital technology (and media).

To continue the thought experiment presented in this chapter, one could

ask what Bruegel’s painting would look like if it were portraying today’s children,

Introduction

demonstrating the playing children at the dawn of the 21st century, the “Century of

P l a y.” Today’s playing manifests between online and offline spaces through devices,

which, more than ever before, are considered a category of “toys” — as playthings —

in parallel to their other functional uses.

Assumably, a 2023 version of Bruegel’s painting would involve the “ever-evolving

portrait of the 21st-century child” (Takeuchi 2012, 37), portraying playtime spent with

digital devices (mobile phones, tablets, and connected devices, such as smart toys,

IoToys, and non-connected social robots) and social media. I would believe there

to be crowds of children, gathered around multiple screens, portable and connected

devices afforded by the nearly ubiquitous accessibility of the Internet, but I would

know there to be people of all ages interacting with each other, not just engaged in

communicating, or information searching, or entertaining themselves, but actively

involved in interactive and connected toy or game play made possible through

evolving media and digital technology, and the industries of play. In this animated,

digital painting, I envision constellations of people, assemblages of artifacts and

media technologies, and many forms of play happening — energetically, frenetically,

and faces emoting feelings of joy and maybe of concentration. Furthermore, the

playing would occur indoors and outdoors in physical locations, even across virtual

spaces. From the perspective of the future, devices and play machines would still be

of interest to the players, although their physical forms might vary from what we

recognize today.17

***

In the journal Pediatrics, researchers Healey and Mendelsohn (2019) recommend

the following: “Recognize that one of the most important purposes of play with toys

throughout childhood, and especially in infancy, is not educational at all but rather

to facilitate warm, supportive interactions and relationships.” For this reason, toys, in

current times, could also be recognized as vehicles of empathy development, objects

of resilience (Heljakka 2023) that offer companionship and comfort to their players,

or even friendships of sorts.

Before introducing the case studies undertaken for the thesis to look more

closely at the transforming nature of play, let us review the literature on the essential

components of digital technology in reference to play — namely, the terminology

introducing digital culture, digital play, digital (and hybrid) play environments, digital

players, and digital toys.

17 In 2023, Artificial Intelligence (AI) made it possible to start to play with digital text

and images through generative language models much faster than ever before. The

manifestations of this thought experiment together with AI use resulted in the images

replaying Brugel’s artwork with Adobe Firefly/Photoshop, featured in this thesis. (See

Figures A-G).

Katriina Heljakka

1.1.1. Digital culture

Culture is an umbrella term for the actions partaken in play — we play as part of

cultures, and our playing contributes to culture. Johan Huizinga (1938) argued

in Homo Ludens that culture derives from play. This thesis is conducted in digital

culture as a sub-branch of digital humanities, which allows steering attention from

the machine’s capacities to human agency as a user of play machines, i.e., the digital

and Internet-connected toys explained further in this part of the thesis.

Digital technologies combined with the properties and aspirations of human

entities create digital cultures. Digital culture is predominantly visual culture

originating in the physical world and social media cultures online, enabled by digital

technology.

“Digital” itself is intangible, but the outcomes of digital culture often manifest in

terms of visual aspects. Engagement with digital culture means reciprocal interaction

with it. Digital culture has a close relationship with digital media: “The term ‘digital

media’ refers to digital devices (such as computers and mobile phones) and to

products or outputs including apps, games, photos, websites, interactive stories,

songs, messaging, blogs and video that are viewed, read, played or created on these

devices” (Plowman et al. 2012). For the sake of clarity, in this thesis, digital media are

spoken of in the name of play machines, even digital toys.

“Young children in the 21st century and post-industrialized societies participate

in highly technologized and digitally mediated cultural landscapes” (Bird & Edwards

2015; cf. in Marsh et al. 2005; Vandewater et al. 2007). Media environments entertain

and socialize (Çetintaș & Turan 2018). “Games, films and other media are an integral

part of children’s lives which they get inspired and challenged by and which has an

undeveloped potential” (Lahtinen & Svanqvist 2005, 1).

How digital media impact children’s experiences depends on the age of the

children, whether there are other children around, the devices and content available

to them, and the values and attitudes of the people who look after them (Plowman

& Stephen 2014). Here is the place to highlight how digital cultures are also a highly

relevant area of study in adult play lives.

Digital technology mediates content through devices, and here, play machines

may be used for digital play, productive or unproductive. Central to these machines is

the interaction they provide: Takeuchi (2012) observes how digital media offer more

control for users over how they experience delivered content than do books, radio,

and television. The interactivity associated with these media makes up a playful space

that is highly interactive. Andrew Darley, author of Visual Digital Culture, defines

interactivity as “a distinctive mode of relating to audiovisual representations or

fictions” (2000, 156). Kücklich (2004) notes that the concept of “interactive media”

implies the notion of “passive consumption” in other media, such as with television:

The introduction of television in every household changed children’s play behavior

Introduction

after World War II, with a slow reduction of physical play (Sutton-Smith & Rosenberg

1971; cf. in de Vries 2021, 249). Scott (2018) presents another view by stating that

interactions with television and other digital devices can be playful and that children

may be more or less active during this playful activity. To broaden the perspective, as

early as 2004, Kline (2004, 145) already wrote that interactive media (i.e., electronic

media and video gaming as antecedents to play machines of 2010–2020) was “a highly

convergent medium combining learning, play, and entertainment in a synergistic

experience.” In these ways, as homines ludentes-playing human beings-we continue

to relate and position ourselves as actants within digital culture.

1.1.2. Digital play

“Play is culturally cultivated” (Brown 2009, 199), and “all media are playable when

we look at them in the right light” (Bogost 2016, 117). Being playful can “transform

virtually any environment to make it more stimulating, enjoyable, and entertaining”

(Barnett 2007, 949; cf. Cowan 2020). Play becomes mobile as it moves across media

cultures (Moore 2011), and in the context of the thesis at hand, play moves between

players, devices, and (social) media cultures and the “media ecology” that Granata

(2014) calls the digital world.

Play culture is media culture, and the two realms have a dialogical relationship

reinforcing and changing one another (Jenkins 2004). Pink et al. (2018, 27) assert that

“play is increasingly part of how people engage with a contemporary digital world.”

This thesis explores the nature of play as part of current techno-culture. From

the perspective of this thesis, it is essential to see digital cultures evoke play(fulness)

in human minds and bodies as they illustrate how play moves and makes us move

— physically, cognitively, and emotionally. Thus, digital culture is playful culture and

digital play manifests through the use of both playful media (Reid-Walsh 2018) and

playable technologies.

Play is now conducted, and player identities are constructed through media

formats (Henricks 2015b, 116). Playing extends from the intimacies of solitary

behavior to the arenas of social, even public play. “New media cultures are connected

cultures” (Marshall 2004, 43). Kücklich (2004) refers to this connectedness as the

human being constantly enclosed in the mediasphere.

Jo Bird (2020) talks about children’s digital participation. Gerard Jones (2003)

reminds us that children, too, should be considered the users of media cultures. He

writes:

When we consider children in relation to mass media and pop culture, we tend to

define them as consumers, watchers, recipients, victims. But they are also users of that

media culture: they are choosers, interpreters, shapers, fellow players, participants, and

storytellers. (Jones 2003, 18–19)

Katriina Heljakka

To continue and put it more specifically, children are considered as the firsthand

players of media cultures. However, as shown in the thesis at hand, we also must

consider that play behavior is not limited by age — adults are players of media

cultures as well, including digital culture.

Digitality often brings to mind computers. Referencing the theory presented

by Paul Levinson (1977), Kücklich (2004, 9) claims that “computers have never

progressed past the toy stage.”18 Ultimately, this means that computers (or artifacts,

including computational elements) enable play. The development of digital media

began with computers. Computers “execute dynamic interactions between the

machine and human actors” (Murray 1997, 71–72) and demarcate the beginnings of

digital play. The first commercial computers became available in the 1950s. But what

is digital play?

“Digital play” refers to using technologies in a play-based way (Marsh et al. 2016).

According to Plowman and Stephen, there’s no simple way of defining digital play

(2014, 20), and they offer a general description of the term in regard to children:

Broadly speaking, it refers to children’s freely chosen activities with digital devices

and smart toys. In addition to play with digital toys, these activities could range from

dancing along to a song on YouTube, or using an app for drawing, to pretending to

talk to a distant friend or family member on a mobile phone that doesn’t work any

longer. Depending on the app, device or toy […] problem solving, self-expression and

developing the imagination can all be associated with digital play.

Digital play can never be altogether immaterial. What is needed are devices —

hardware — and access to software. Myers (2005) mentions the concept of “digital

media play.” Given that media has infiltrated the digital fabric of devices as devices

and platforms for play, I continue to use the term “digital play.” “The qualities of

the digital medium facilitate human creativity to build new forms and sorts of

play – material, symbolic, and imaginary” (Dippel & Fizek 2016, 2). “Researchers

and practitioners have traditionally recognized many different forms of play, such

as physical play, object play, and symbolic play, with different kinds of benefits”

(Whitebread et al. 2012). “Digital play can incorporate and extend any of these other

types of play, and therefore has the potential to provide a wide range of benefits in

terms of children’s health, wellbeing, learning and development” (Gray & Thomsen

2021, 9). As noted, this idea should be extended to include other age groups as well.

A play environment is where toys and games are enjoyed (Levy & Weingartner

2003, 5). Furthermore, and more precisely, a digital play environment may offer itself

as a setting where particular toys and games are enjoyed and as the primary setting for

18 Seymour Papert has even described the computer as “the children’s machine,” as cited in

Rieber (2001).

Introduction

play. The development of technologies related particularly to digitalization — digital

play environments, social media playgrounds, apps, etc., have allowed the sphere of

play to expand from the material into digital spaces and have joined them in the

name of converged play. In the early 2000s, Brenda Danet noted “cyberspace” as a site

for play, as it affords all kinds of activities related to different forms of play (Danet

2001, 7

–

8). The evolution of cyberspace has been rapid, including the now emerging

space of the metaverse, which falls out of the scope of the research conducted for this

thesis.

However, it is evident that the emergence of both virtual worlds and social media

has affected the evolution of play culture on a more general level. For example,

Myers observed how the popularity of social software and social games has been

one of the major success stories in the gaming industry during the first decade of

the 2000s (Myers 2010, 129). Moreover, it is justifiable to consider online platforms

as playgrounds and digital play environments of present times, which children also

access:

Recently play environments and materials have changed, with digital materials becoming

increasingly available for young children. Parents’ preferences about the importance

and appropriateness of digital play may influence the quality and the quantity of digital

play opportunities children receive at home. (Erdogan et al. 2019, 131)

“It is inspiring to see the ways in which various ‘communication tools’ or ‘social

utilities’ are being repurposed by their users to become playing fields,” Frans Mäyrä

wrote in 2011 (19). Popular examples of interactive play environments include social

media platforms (such as Instagram) and digital applications that cater to open-

ended play (such as Toca Boca, a children’s digital play environment accessed online)

or gameplay (such as geocaching or Pokémon GO). Notably, location-based games

have blurred the lines between engagement with physical and digital environments,

simultaneously creating possibilities to engage with both realms (Mäyrä 2017b).

1.1.3. Digital (and hybrid) play environments

I acknowledge that research on digital play, or in broader terms, on the relationship

between technology and play, is by no means a novel area of academic inquiry.

For example, Yelland (1999, 217) has studied the “impact of the new information

technologies on play and as pl ay.”

19 Kücklich sees the relationship of the player to the technology used as meaningful.

He writes, “play is not just a mode of interaction the user is subjected to, but also an

Katriina Heljakka

Digital play is often placed in opposition to traditional play (Mustola et al.

2016). However, as Nicola Yelland discovered in the late 1990s, tradition meets

with innovation, enriching understanding of engagement with new information

technologies:

Traditional activities can now be complemented with different experiences that have

been made possible with the new information technologies. Those who do not embrace

such events as opportunities may be in danger of losing touch with the popular culture

of young children and their families. (Yelland 1999, 220)

Conversely, this thesis aims to place digital play in parallel (and in connection)

to traditional play, considering the phenomenon as an emergent field of play that

evolved thanks to the introduction of digital technologies.

Ruckenstein (2010) states that toys encourage particular forms of play and social

interaction and notes the hybrid character of children’s play practices. Plowman

and Stephen note how today’s children are adept at mixing traditional (non-

digital) and digital play (Plowman & Stephen 2014, 22). “Digital culture cannot

be thought separately from memory-based making,” De Kosnik (2021) notes. And

in this context, toy players as play makers operate through creative acts involving

physical objects and communication technologies (tools) distributed through online

platforms (networks), e.g., the IoToys investigated as part of the evolving field of

digital technology in this thesis. In this context, digital play is hybrid play.

The convergence of play has been conceptualized as hybrid play (Heljakka

2012; 2016, Tyni et al. 2016, Paavilainen et al. 2018). Again, hybrid play products

expand previous understandings of corporality, immateriality, and the playful object

experience. It is no longer uncommon to see toys and games lending elements from one

another to provide multidimensional play experiences (Heljakka 2012b). Hybridity

concerning connected toys provides potential added play value within physical and

material experiences (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2019). Already in 2004, Sutton-Smith

pointed to the “massive hybridization” of integration between electronic media

and toys, games, and books. Since the publication of the book Toys, Games, and

Media edited by Jeffrey Goldstein, David Buckingham, and Gilles Brougére (2004),

the understanding of what hybridity means for the cultures of toys and play have

developed further.

Tyni and colleagues (2016, n.p.) described hybridization in the following way: “New

technologies enable development where immaterial products become materialized in

novel ways, while material products and environment will be augmented with digital

services. In this evolution immaterial, digital services will form multifaceted value

attitude that she brings to the medium in the form of notions and expectations about

the technology or text” (Kücklich 2004, 6).

Introduction

networks with material products.” A characterization of hybridity was later given by

Maurer and Fuchsberger (2019):

What ultimately characterizes hybridity in play is more than complementing the digital

with the physical. Interrelating a variety of entities and actors, such as the players,

physical objects, and social aspects, as well as introducing the non-verbal, the fuzzy,

analog, and ambiguous, constitutes rich hybridity in play. (Maurer et al. 2019, 19)

Earlier theory on hybridity suggests the categorization into different types of

hybridity (Heljakka 2012b): conceptual hybridity, the hybridity of affordances for play

related to paidia/ludus; technological hybridity, hybridity between digital and material

technologies; artefactual hybridity, hybridity of production materials; thematic

hybridity, hybridity between different media (i.e., transmediality); and functional

hybridity, hybridity of play forms actualized in interaction (toy or gameplay) with a

player. For this thesis, the dimensions of paidia/ludus and technological hybridity are

most relevant.

In some ways, hybrids are also tangible. Technologically enhanced play as a form

of hybrid interaction does not emerge from “intangible” content for play, such as

wordplay and the use of language as a form of social communication, but instead

from tangible resources for play, which are used simultaneously combining physical

entities (play material, such as toys) with digitally operated devices and platforms,

which are partly physical in their form but digital in their content.

Exemplars of influential scholarly work on hybrid play cultures include, for

example, The place of play: Toys and digital cultures, “Maaike Lauwaert’s ambitious

attempt at describing how internet culture and technology have affected geographies

of play in the twenty-first century” (Murnaghan 2011, 520).

1.1.4. Digital players

Who plays digitally?

Digital play — aside from the playing of digital games — is often investigated

exclusively from the viewpoint of children. This thesis aims to add to the knowledge

base on digitalizing and Internet-connected play through a broader understanding of

play as a life-long and life-wide phenomenon and by shedding light on how various

technologies are used to supplement, extend, and enhance play in combination with

traditional playthings, or to connect players of different ages in a multitude of ways.

When the book Toys, Games, and Media (2004) was published, Sutton-Smith

noted how the emergence of these media phenomena related to digital play was of

relative unimportance to children. Currently, however, “digital play is woven into

the cultural, aesthetic, emotional and political fabric of children’s lives” (Marsh

et al. 2020, 10). The term “digital play” has been used and defined by researchers

Katriina Heljakka

such as Bird and Edwards (2015) and Stephen and Plowman (2014). But as said,

there’s no simple way of describing play, and the same goes for digital play. Broadly

speaking, it refers to activities that young children choose using digital devices and

toys (Plowman et al. 2010). Plowman and colleagues (2010) describe digital play as

interacting with information and communication technologies that can be actively

supported in preschool education. Guided digital play is one of the subtypes of

play where preschool teachers can guide digital play for learning purposes, such as

teaching language and math skills.

The possibilities of digital technologies are seen here as a basis for human play

across the lifespan, complementing more traditional forms of play until they dissolve

and converge entirely. Edwards (2013) conceptualizes converged play as related to

children’s famous cultural artifacts and texts, including digital media. This also

applies to adults, as the studies undertaken in photoplay, world-playing, doll dramas,

and toy tourism for the thesis illustrate. As shown in previous research, these cultures

are hybrid or phygital: Current times recognize a new bridging between the digital

and analog. The playful era of the 21st century demonstrates a dematerialization of

culture in terms of playthings and simultaneous re-materialization of play (Heljakka

2012b). This means that digitalizing play entails formations of hybrid play, in which

children, adults, and even transgenerational groups of players participate.

1.1.5. Digital toys

Processes of play unfold in toys, playgrounds, technologies, and social groups (Sicart

2014, 2). From infancy onwards, we are not only touching objects but are also being

touched by objects. “It is the order of the relationships to objects and between objects

that creates people through socialization” (Miller 2008, 287).

Objects have always been used in play. Hassinger-Das et al. (2017) note that any

object used for play can be considered a toy, including everyday objects utilized in play.

According to Sutton-Smith’s (1993) expansive conceptualization of toys, they can be

seen as gifts, objects, tools, compensations, property, fashions, and deconstructions.

According to semiotician and game researcher Mattia Thibault (2017), it is

unlikely that we would find a civilization that did not have play equipment. Daily,

improvised toys such as sticks and cones in nature become play equipment in young

players’ hands and imaginations. In today’s age, connected objects serve this exact

purpose but with different techniques relying on sharing online content and those

created and consumed through devices.

My previous research interpreted toys as media representing children’s first

material culture resource (Heljakka 2013). (Non-digital) toys are defined as artifacts

‘‘designed or intended (whether or not exclusively) for use in play by children

under 14 years old’’ (Toys (Safety) Regulations 2011). Today however, toys are also

increasingly part of adult play cultures, where toys are collected, customized, and

Introduction

creatively narrated through photography and crafts, and whole worlds of meaning

are built for toy characters materially and narratively (Heljakka 2013).

Industrially produced toys, as a means of expression that transcends generations,

offer opportunities for enjoyment, learning, and increasingly, empathy development.

Today, many industrially manufactured toys seem to be gaining ground as playthings

that serve as teaching aids for educational entertainment (edutainment) and toy-based

learning. These toys can be thought of as representing toys with a serious purpose

(for serious toys, see Ihamäki & Heljakka 2021). However, this development is not

new: Toys, such as tin soldiers, small stoves, and miniature steam engines, were given

to children in the 19th century to accustom them to using emerging technologies

(Oldenziel & Hård 2013).

“Play is deliberately working with the materials we encounter,” writes Bogost

(2016, 91). At the core of today’s play industries are the play products: toys, games,

apps, and even play environments. In fact, the ludic era (Sutton-Smith 1997) of the

current century parallels an “age of convergence where all things and all people can

play with and interpret objects in different ways through different media” (Geraghty

2014, 117).

Whereas research in digital games as animated and fast-moving spectacles is

closer to media studies, research on toys has leaned more on design and interaction

research, playful learning, and early childhood education interested in the capabilities

and affordances of static playthings. According to Bogost, toys as things themselves are

hybrids of nature and culture, humankind and the world, society and individualism

(Bogost 2016, 221). Moreover, what informs and influences their use are viral

phenomena on social media — (audio)visual, animated storytelling demonstrating

playthings and play forms. To compare, the concepts of what a toy is and what play

as a phenomenon represents evolve constantly. This is to say that while the basic

understandings remain, the meanings and associated values vary:

Indeed, the concept of “toy” has changed considerably over the last decade with the

advent of new technologies that have brought additional dimensions to objects that had

previously been relegated to a passive role in their interactions with children. (Yelland

1999, 217)

Merging of the physical and digital worlds, including innovations made in toys, is

made possible with new information technologies (Yelland 1999, 219). “The Internet

is altering, stimulating, and broadening the market for children’s toys, and fueled

by and sustained by the Web” (Seiter 2007, 83). Mark Pesce writes: “Our toys, writ

larger, echo profound revolutions in simulation, the science of materials, and digital

communication” (Pesce 2000, 8).

“What’s the fuss about going digital?” asks Edith Ackermann (2005) in her

conference paper titled Playthings That Do Things; A Young Kid’s “Incredibles.” The

Katriina Heljakka

research discussed in this thesis attempts to unpack the “fuss” by addressing issues

relating to digitalization and connectedness of play and how play is affected by digital

technologies, social media platforms, and digital toys that offer new landscapes for

play to at least partly answer Ackermann’s question.

***

Sicart (2014) goes so far as to argue that toys are a technology for play. Similarly,

toys can be regarded as media. Combining their thingness with technology and

media takes toys in the direction of machines that can be played with. In this thesis,

I give digital toys a central position in the experience of digital play, alongside other

playthings that all fit in the category of play machines.

The discussions around technological toys and technologies as toys have an early

beginning. To exemplify, in his foreword for a guide on selecting age-appropriate

toys, Sutton-Smith (1986) writes about the attitudes toward the early manifestations

of technologically oriented toys:

[…] along with the children we find ourselves spending more time with our toys, whether

these be called computers or video games. I know there will be those who wish this kind

of toy-laden world would go away. My own attitude, on the contrary, is that it is here to

stay and is becoming a fundamental part of the solitary education, skill differentiation

and confidence of the modern child. (Sutton-Smith 1986, xi in Boehm, The Right Toys)

It is necessary to remember that the concept of play is a social construction

(Stenros 2015, 115), just like the concept of the toy. Humans are the only animal

species known to modify playful objects for their offspring (Fagen 1981, ix). Doris

Bergen has noted how playthings evolve as the culture evolves, and the toys and play

activities reflect the technological change at all age periods. For example, toy trucks

and train play and play with toy telephones became popular as technology created

such devices (Bergen 2015, 63).

A book published in 1975 by the iconic New York-based toy store, F.A.O.

Schwartz, discusses how difficult it sometimes is to draw the line between the

(functional) capacities of a plaything, as compared to a “gadget” for children, in other

words — atoy:

It is always a challenge to decide how fine gadgets for children should be. The perfect

walkie-talkie or the horn that would be acceptable in a symphony are a lot better than

play requires. Toy stores have found it difficult to know where to draw the line. At times

the gadgets available for children are good enough to fill the requirements of an adult

looking for a simple version of a machine. (F.A.O. Schwartz 1975, 127)

Introduction

In traditional thought, toys are children’s own currency, objects, and paraphernalia,

valued for their attractiveness and (re)playability. Hassinger-Das et al. (2017) divide

toys into informal (everyday objects) and formal toys (things produced for the

specific purpose of play). Toys provide structure to play (Back et al. 2017). Any item

that can be used for play may be considered a toy. Fleming (1996) also argues that

any object can temporarily become a toy. To extend this thinking on improvised toys

(Thibault 2017) as the extensions of play, as discussed in the thesis at hand, it is not

only contemporary playthings that aim to afford play, but for many, it is the mobile

digital technology and social media platforms that suggest, invite, encourage, and

even stimulate play. Interestingly, screens of televisions, smartphones, and tablets

also being understood as “toys for children” is of recent development.

“The interaction between the child and the toy is a sensory experience that involves

auditory, visual, haptic, and kinetic communication” (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019,

5), which influence the experience of playability (and replayability). Playability as a

term aims “to indicate the extent to which a certain game has the capability to provide

enjoyment for a player over an extended period of time. Therefore, playability is

closely related to replayability” (Kücklich 2004, 5).

Playability is not just a feature of games and toys, but it arises from human

interaction with those playthings. As Bogost argues, “all media are playable when we

look at them in the right light” (Bogost 2016, 117), and “all media start out as toys”

(Levinson 1977).

Inevitably, contemporary media are a notable force that inspires and influences

toy making, as well as the players and their uses of digital technology in association

with current toy media. Therefore, it is no surprise that today’s toys include miniature

versions of technological devices — mobile phones, cameras, and laptops, to name

afew.

Doris Bergen observes how technological changes in toys and other play materials

have been extensive during the last ten to twenty years. In the past, the context of

play involved concrete manipulation of physical and traditional play materials and

face-to-face interactions in the home, school, neighborhood, playground, or other

venues. But “the advent of technology-augmented toys and virtual play experiences

on computers or other electronic devices is producing new venues for play, which

creates a new environment for the psychological study of it” (Bergen 2015, 63).

According to a traditional definition of a plaything, it is mainly an object a child

uses in various play activities. It can be intended for indoor or outdoor use, for

playing alone or together. Children use toys as instruments of play and interaction

(Healey & Mendelson 2019, 1). However, industry-produced and mass-marketed toys

are usually invented, designed, and manufactured by adults. Play equipment often

includes material that the child modifies to make the play equipment for himself

(Salminen 1988, 11).

Katriina Heljakka

The researcher and research context are inseparable from the area of inquiry.

My position as a researcher looking at the toy industry, toy players, and toy cultures

has broadened my understanding of the functional similarities between toy play

and digital gaming. During 2010–2020, the concept of play material has expanded

beyond the physical and, like play with technologies, may be conceptualized as digital

play so can toys with digital features be understood as digital toys.

Blocks, bricks, and sandboxes are brought up by Kafai (2021) in her discussion

on electronic play. These playthings have their equivalents in the digital realm —

interestingly, they intermesh traditional play ideas with digital technology. For

example, in digital toys, physical manipulations trigger digital responses (Berriman

& Mascheroni 2019).20

Sometimes, it is impossible to distinguish between the two play media discussed

in this thesis — open-ended toys and more “closed” games. An example is the

so-called non-games marketed alongside traditional digital games as games without

structured goals, objectives, or challenges. In non-games, players thus have the

opportunity for greater self-expression and free play, with the player defining their

own goals independently. Game designer Will Wright has used the definition of

“software toy” to refer to such digital games. Software toys (Wright 2007) can change

the world when players explore and discover multimodal affordances for play that

propose clues and invite specific actions to take place in play. Software toys come

with non-quantifiable goals. According to Stenros (2015, 113), SimCity, for example,

becomes a game when players add their own goals. Similarly, a game can become a

toy or a playground when a player abandons the official rules and goals of the game.

According to Antle (2007), materiality is critical for children to adopt tangible

toys. Contemporary devices are sensory-rich media (Woolsey & Woolsey 2008).

The toys serve dual roles, both as physical objects for traditional play and as

technological tools for virtual engagement. As a result, the boundaries between

offline/online and physical/virtual play blend together when children incorporate

their interconnected toys into their daily activities (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019,

9). Sung (2018, 250) notes that “a digital toy may directly trigger children’s interests

and provide an interactive environment for children to experience novel technology.”

Moreover, smart and connected toys offer a medium through which digital play can

be approached and comprehended. Screens often imply that handheld devices are

20 Minecraft, for example, seems to serve as a good example of both the playfulness of

digital games and social playing with toys that encourage cooperative action. A game

with toy-like features, such as Minecraft, can be seen as a more open-minded play

tool than a traditional digital game: As stated on the game’s website, Minecraft is a

game based on laying and breaking blocks: “Minecraft is a game about breaking and

placing blocks. At first, people built structures to protect against nocturnal monsters,

but as the game grew players worked together to create wonderful, imaginative things.”

https://minecraft.net/.

Introduction

needed to play. Nowadays, a physical toy can be controlled with an existing smart

device.

“Digital toys can serve as catalysts for new forms of play and can have a positive

influence on the content of more traditional forms of play” (Johnson & Christie

2009, 284). Jayemanne and Nansen (2016) consider mobile devices and touchscreen

interfaces as gestural interfaces that reshape children’s media culture. As this thesis

illustrates, there are many reasons to expand our understanding of these devices as

second-level toys in themselves, which are used to prompt and enhance play in many

ways. Simultaneously, digital game elements, such as game characters, are undergoing

toyification (Thibault & Heljakka 2019) as they transform from digital entities into

physical toys.21

Technologically enhanced toys provide technological agency. “Technological

artifacts and humans are both actants. Therefore, technological artifacts are agents

with purposiveness. In humans, this appears as intentionality” (Orlikowski 2005).

Rather than examining playing with or the imaginative and dynamic manipulation

of virtual objects (or characters online), this thesis focuses on bridging the physical

materiality of traditional play objects and environments with mobile and connected

technologies addressing hybrid play. Technology toys as interactive entities represent

what research describes as intelligent (tangible) objects with sensors, actuators, and

computing power, that provide feedback to players’ physical activity (Bekker & Sturm

2009).

Digital play, increasingly, also means Internet-connected play. “Computing is

becoming more and more connective,” Thrift wrote in 2003 (p. 392). Character toys,

connected toys, robotic creatures with camera technology, mobile devices, and social

media communication platforms have evolved in the cross-sections of these areas

and may be conceptually understood as digital toys, explained in more detail in the

following.

One novel group of networked toys is represented by the Toy Internet (IoToys).

These toys are a subset of the global Internet of Things (IoT) phenomenon. The

Internet of Things is a concept that refers to the connection of any device to computer

networks. The Internet of Things can be seen as a giant network of artifacts. Essentially,

they include sensors and communication capabilities built into everyday objects.

Whereas the Internet of Things (IoT) means physical objects that are embedded

with electronics, sensors, software, and connectivity that support the exchange of

data, the Internet of Toys (IoToys) are sensory interfaces, such as robotic toys that

21 This development becomes evident also in the decoration of devices with functions

other than those designed for the purposes of play: “Several companies have developed

products that wrap around a smartphone or tablet, turning it into a creature with a

screen” (Kudrowitz & Follett 2014, 243). Personalization of devices makes them “toys”

in a decorative sense, which adds on to their conceptualization as “toyified” gadgets.

Katriina Heljakka

allow children to access media content (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019, 1; 4), that

connect actors and objects, such as toys. Furthermore, they create an “environment of

affordances” (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019), which makes an entirely new playground

sometimes hard for players of any age to understand. Previous research illustrates

diverse ways of viewing this novel environment of interactive and interconnected

toys. On the one hand, quoting Plowman et al. (2010), Sung (2018, 237) notes how

most parents were ambivalent toward young children’s play with technological toys.

On the other hand, according to Ruckenstein (2010, 504), the Nordic debate on

digital toys often understands these toys as “an unnatural intrusion into the lives of

young children.” Caution is healthy, as connectivity may mean complex issues arise

from the toy owner’s relationship with the toy company and the one in control of the

software.22

What differentiates playing digital games from playing with technologically enriched

toys, such as smart, connected, and robotic toys?

Fizek (2017) notes that “in a digital game, most processes are automated and

hidden from the player’s view.” The same goes for the digital toys. The contact between

the player and the digital game is mediated chiefly through a flat screen. Again,

smart and interactive toys are three-dimensional play machines that are sometimes

controlled by mobile devices and played supported by smartphones and tablets. In

2003, Luckin and colleagues defined digital toys as having tangible interfaces not

bound to a desktop computer; this is one of the most central differences between

digital games and digital toys.

Due to the increased prevalence of digital toys, “we are in the midst of another

revolution in toy design and use” (Hassinger-Das et al. 2017). To give an example of

new interactive playthings, there are the internet-connected toys, which Palaiologou

et al. (2021) describe as a “fluid entanglement between digital and non-digital.”

Berriman and Mascheroni (2019) conceptualize smart toys like this as hybrid objects.

A simple yet illuminating definition given by Mascheroni and Holloway (2019, 4)

states that IoToys are sensory interfaces that allow children to access media content.

Palaiologou et al. (2021) note the ability of IoToys to communicate with children

and vice versa — this is one of the main differences between IoToys and traditional

22 “Most smart toys are ‘hybrid’ products – where the physical object (the toy) is owned

by the customer, yet the presence of embedded and connected software means that

the customer is subject to long term contractual obligations,” and issues related to data

security (collection of biographical data), device security (the toy hijacks surveillance,

tracking, or problem behavior), children’s privacy (data collection), overuse, lack of

authentic play, lack of parent-child interaction, play that is too controlled/contrived, or

health implications from electromagnetic radiation (Chaudron et al. 2017, 8). “Dating

from 2015, this looks at toys such as Activision Skylanders and Disney Infinity to

consider how the data generated by playing with toys such as these can reveal details

of children’s everyday lives and to what extent children, and their parents, are aware of

what the technology can do.” See Marsh (2017).

Introduction

toys. Today’s interactive toys are smart, automated, networked, and hybrid (Giddings

2019). As defined by Peter et al. (2019, 29), these toys:

• are devices that need energy

• rely on one or more types of sensors (e.g., visual, audio, haptic)

• are software-controlled smart and connected toys

• are both smart and connected toys that interact with children

• may be able to move in the physical world

In 2014, Kudrowitz and Follett (2014, 245) wrote about how digital play needed

more face-to-face social elements and tangible interaction. This no longer holds

true as digital play affordances are incorporated in physical and Internet-connected

playthings like IoToys. In present times, in this way, tactile toys and artifacts connect

players to the virtual world (Arnott 2019, 135). “All objects in our lives will become

smarter and will be animated by digital technologies, but the kids who play with

them will lead the way,” says Thrift (2003, 389).

Plowman et al. (2010) use “digital devices” to denote tablets, smartphones,

laptops, and other computers used for leisure, work, or study, but these also include

activity trackers, digital cameras, voice assistants, and internet-connected or “smart”

toys.

Nicholas Negroponte, founder of the MIT Media Lab, “looked into the future and

decided that it would be digital and interactive” (Pesce 2000, 89). Both interactive

devices and interactive toys represent commodities and consumer-level technologies

and are, in this way, industrially produced artifacts that often come with a screen of

sorts. “Recent developments in the use of advanced networked, interactive, virtual and

mechanical technologies in toy design add to longer-established commercialization,

franchising and ‘mediatization’ of toys” (Bak 2016; c.f. in Giddings 2019, 69).

According to Nigel Thrift, Tamagotchi, developed by the Japanese company

Bandai in the mid-1990s, was the first commercially interactive toy in the world

(Thrift 2003, 397). The original Tamagotchi, “the precursor of the artificial pet

movement in 1996” (Rault 2015), is a handheld egg with a digital screen.

***

Through play, we learn the interaction and communication skills required to solve

problems and better understand our own individual-level activities and the activities

of environments and communities. Playthings may contribute to these processes, as

children train communication by playing with toys (Alves et al. 2010). Toys familiarize

children with technology (Ruckenstein 2013, 481), and impact interaction in play:

[…] when the world of computers intersected with the world of toys, the concept of

interactivity, of two-way communication between toy and child, opened up a new

Katriina Heljakka

universe of possibilities. Now toys could listen to children, observing patiently as they

worked at various spelling exercises or games, and read to them personally, like a

watchful parent, constantly assessing performance, gently extending the boundaries of

the child’s knowledge. This reactive intelligence produces something greater than the

sum of its parts: the child often feels more engaged and so works — or plays — harder.

(Pesce 2000, 19–20; cf. in Thrift 2003, 395–396)

Critical voices have been aroused by the enchantment with interactive playthings

like smart toys, which “with their strong initial appeal and attractiveness due to fancy

gadgetry, may spoil children” (Johnson & Christie 2009, 287). Such toys have been

envisioned to steal playtime from traditional toys of the players, who, after their

interactions with the toy, “may then find other ordinary toys less appealing” (Ibid.).

Hassinger-Das and colleagues (2017) state that “extra effort will be required to ensure

that electronic toys provide the same type of enriching experience as their traditional

counterparts.”

Hinske, Langheinrich, and Lampe (2008) recommend that toys that have been

designed with technology components (also augmented toys) must follow certain

design guidelines that draw on the existing criteria for good toy design. They should:

a) be “fun”

a) offer a mental challenge

a) be age appropriate, reliable, and easy to understand and use

a) encourage imagination

a) give immediate feedback

a) further extend the play while supporting physical and social interaction

If a toy is augmented with technology, these authors suggest that all traditional

toy qualities should be present and that the technology enhancements should provide

added value. Another set of criteria relevant to studies interested in the effects of

augmented toys is formulated by Carr (2000) and includes transparency, challenge, and

accessibility. Transparency refers to the ability to understand the concepts inherent in

the toy; challenge means that the toy has affordances that increase possibilities for

action; and accessibility points to the amount and type of social participation the toy

affords, i.e., the number of players participating in playing with the toy. The term

“affordances” is explained in the following sub-section.

1.1.6. Affordances

“Dr. Toy” Stevanne Auerbach has rightly claimed that “the wow is not a toy — it’s

what you can do with it” (in Heljakka 2013, 361). Toys (or, more precisely, their

designers) seek to control play through affordances (Norman 2007, 66–69). The

theory of product affordability is derived from the theory developed by the

Introduction

American psychologist James J. Gibson (1904–1979) claiming that environmental

factors contain clues as to how they can be exploited. “With products that require

less knowledge for their operation, learning usually occurs by following cues within

the interface (Margolin 2002). These cues are recognized in the design field and,

for example, in human-computer interaction theory as affordances. An affordance

is a quality of an object, or an environment, allowing an individual to perform an

action. The theory of affordances describes how we perceive an object’s potential

uses, for instance, how seeing a chair affords sitting. In this way, “affordances name

the range of apparent possibilities that an object or device is capable of performing”

(Bogost 2016, 162), or affordances set the circumstances that condition the use of an

artifact (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019). According to affordance theory, affordances

represent the relationship between an object or environment and an observer.

Affordance theory has been used in design research and ergonomics by design

theorist Donald Norman, among others. The idea of affordability related to objects

and the environment, presented by Gibson and later developed by Norman, provides

a theoretical starting point for reflections on the digital play discussed in this thesis.

The reasons why, for example, the video and photography of toys have become

popular can be understood by interpreting the affordances of toys themselves and by

looking at play machines and play environments used as tools and contexts for play.

A toy is known to offer a variety of physical, fictional, functional, and affective

offerings for play, that is, materials related to manufacturing materials, storytelling,

functionality, and emotion; for example, physical toys may have tactile, functional,

narrative, and emotional features (see Heljakka 2018b in Paavilainen & Heljakka

2018). A toy with more affordances might have more play value because it could

allow for more types of play (Kudrowitz & Follett 2014, 248).

Quoting Norman (1999), Berriman and Mascheroni (2019) write about how the

affordances of digital toys are made up of natural and deliberate clues. While natural

clues refer to inherent properties of objects (size, shape, or material), deliberate clues

are information incorporated into designs to direct people to discover possible actions.

Play does not stem from the playthings alone: There are “situational affordances that

may play an important role as well” (Boon et al. 2020, 13).

Affordances are a relevant entry point to investigate the converging realms of toys

and technology in terms of physical and digital dimensions. The research undertaken

for the case studies at hand aims to address both the toys’ perceivable and hidden

affordances.

In three-dimensional toys, such as dolls, action figures, and other types of

character toys, we know based on their physicality and functionality what can be

done with them in terms of object play (i.e., play that involves manipulation by the

hand). Physical constraints may be related to their mechanical properties, such as

articulation and, thus, “poseability.” The concepts of perceptible and hidden affordances

refer to instances where “objects do what it looks like they should be able to do” or

Katriina Heljakka

when their “uses […] are not apparent” (Shaw 2017, 593–594; cf. in Lundtofte 2020).

For digital toys, their perceived possibilities for action are not always so apparent,

and hence, must be uncovered during play. Indeed, James Cronin refers to the work

of Paul Virilio and Slavoj Žižek, who observe that we are already experiencing a

“disappearance” of technology as multi-platform tools become smaller, faster, and

disappear from physical sight, only to become more integrated into our daily lives

(Žižek 2003, 18; cf. in Cronin 2011).

As illustrated by the case studies introduced in this thesis (Articles I–VI), the

capabilities of digital toys as play machines unfold in the processes of play. For

example, Berriman and Mascheroni (2019) suggest that these affordances are

categorized as liveliness, affective stickiness, and mobility in Internet-enabled toys.

Of these terms, mobility is the most central for the studies in the thesis at hand, which

approach play machines not only from the viewpoint of play with Internet-connected

toys but from a wider array of perspectives to arrive at an understanding of how play

moves us in 2010–2020 and beyond.

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

2. Positioning Play in Theory and Society

No technology is important — it’s the use of it that’s important. Mark Pesce, author of

The Playful World, How Technology is Transforming Our Imagination

The thesis deals with technological — digitalizing and Internet-connected

— play from the perspectives of children and adults, leisure and learning, and the

employment of technologies within these contexts. The following section, Positioning

Play in Theory and Society, combines theoretical ideas presented in earlier research

about the meaning and state of play in contemporary society as part of players of

different ages acting in other contexts. This section offers definitions of play, presents

theoretical views on the meanings and value of play, and discusses the dimensions of

play in contemporary society, which are relevant to the thesis.

***

The thesis presents interdisciplinary research: The theoretical threads used as

source points for the research undertaken in the subsequent case studies weave the

thesis first and foremost together with toy and play research (in enlarging the concept

of the “toy,” expanding understandings of the widening age groups of players, and

describing novel and hybrid play patterns with play machines), research on HCI

(human-computer interaction, in describing how the affordances of play machines are

appropriated in play), interaction design (in offering food for thought for new play

design), and early education (in illustrating creative ways of incorporating technologies

into the preschool environment). However, the most influential theoretical ideas

stem from the area of play studies, an interdisciplinary field of research, to which the

author wishes to contribute the most by creating new understandings of how play

moves us in association with digital technology through play machines.

The author is indebted to play theory, presented mainly by Western theorists,

namely American play scholars or those outside North America. Brian Sutton-Smith

is acknowledged for his wide-ranging interest in the meanings and possibilities of

play (Henricks 2015c, 386) and is one of the most influential theorists of play and

playthings referred to in this thesis. Alongside Sutton-Smith, whose work on toys

and play has significantly inspired the studies undertaken in this work, the research

has been most informed by other modern play scholars, such as Thomas Henricks.

Although canonical figures in play and game research are referenced, such as Johan

Huizinga and Roger Caillois, it is the theorists who have investigated the connections

of play to the areas of media and technologies and published their work in the

English language that have influenced this work the most. Parallel to the research

of play as its area of academic investigation, I have found research in education and

Katriina Heljakka

human-computer interaction most helpful in increasing understanding of how early

education experts and interaction designers approach play in their fields of operation.

The thesis highlights perspectives on what connects us with play machines. It

opens up perspectives on adult toy play as world-play as part of digital, networked,

and Internet-connected object play; the role of toy robots in developing socio-

emotional ability; and the importance of technology-enriched play for the well-being

of all ages. For example, highly topical play patterns such as the teddy bear challenge

were presented as a form of pandemic toy play. Additionally, the thesis aims to grasp

a glimpse of what the future of play holds by offering a perspective on a novel area

of research, namely speculative toy fiction, focusing on technologically enabled play

with possible “toyfriends” of the future.The focus of the studies representing various

approaches to technologies as play machines are captured in Figure 1.

Figure 1. The focus of Articles I–VI: Various approaches to technologies as play machines.

2.1. The Meaning of Play

Play has been examined in a variety of disciplines and theoretical perspectives, and

therefore, scholars of different academic areas have participated in discussions of the

essence of play and how it could be studied. Scott Eberle, former editor-in-chief of

the American Journal of Play, recommends that play scholars take a broad view to

approaches that might advance understandings of the multivarious phenomenon

that play is. He writes:

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

Because play is an interdisciplinary field, serious play scholars should acquaint

themselves with philosophical and literary approaches, with the insights of social studies

like sociology, anthropology, and history, and emerging disciplines like performance

studies, health and recreation, and interactive sciences. Nor should they neglect the

physical sciences. (Eberle 2009, 9)

But what is play, in essence?

To begin with, play theory is varied and ambiguous (Sutton-Smith 1997).

What characterizes play is its infinite variability (Sutton-Smith 2009). “At its core,

play is ambivalent and vague in all its aspects – its references, intentions, sense,

contradictions, and meaning” (Sutton-Smith 1997, 2; cited first in Dippel & Fizek

2016, 3). On the one hand, academics constantly refer to the difficulties of defining

play, even in the context of early education (e.g., Theobald et al. 2015). On the other

hand, if the players (especially children) were asked how they see the play, we might

gain insights into the phenomenon that would overcome some of these difficulties.

In theoretical terms, however, scholarly understandings of play must be

considered as they offer clever, concise, and contested ideas about the meanings of

play. Nevertheless, “it is notoriously difficult to pinpoint exactly what is play” (Back

et al. 2017, 3). Indeed, Cowan (2020) notes how adults find the definition of the term

play and understanding its meanings difficult. Others have pointed out the elusiveness

of play as a concept (van Leeuwen & Westwood 2008). Citing Schwartzman, Sutton-

Smith (1980) characterizes play as “a fickle creature of often elusive communication.”

Play is about communication — as formulated by Garvey (1977): “Playing is saying.”

Moreover, play sets various processes in motion. To exemplify, Bergen (2012) sees

transformation as the essence of play.

What I find in the light of the definitions given, however, is that play is relatively

easy to define, but it is instead the vastness of the definition that is troublesome.

The plurality of meanings that play encompasses may be complicated for many to

grasp unless involved in working with play as either researchers or play experts

with in-depth expertise in play in design, education, or within the industries of

play. Furthermore, what adds complexity to this endeavor is that experts sometimes

conceptualize play differently than parents (see, e.g., Fisher et al. 2008), let alone the

playing children (or adults!).23

There needs to be more explanations of what belongs to the phenomenon of play.

Sutton-Smith (1980) reminds us that cultural definitions of play must be considered.

Play is defined differently across disciplines (Sutton-Smith 1997), but there are

common denominators: Manifold attempts to define play have been made, some

23 For example, in their study, Fisher et al. (2008) found that mothers define play more

broadly than child development professionals.

Katriina Heljakka

of which will be presented in the following. To exemplify, play has been described

as a “multidimensional construct that varies in meaning across time, culture, and

contexts” (Cohen 2006, 18). Paul Frappier defines play in the following way:

Playing is a common phenomenon, a ubiquitous one. We are familiar with it and take

it for granted as part of the repertoire of human behaviors. At first glance, there seems

to be nothing obscure, ambiguous, or problematic about such a simple, well-known

activity. Without dwelling on it, we usually take it for granted that playing is one of the

many possibilities of engaging in an activity for limited amounts of time and with an

animated spirit of joyous relaxation. (Frappier 1976, 11)

Play is self-expression, and the best definitions of play are clearly expressed and

easy to understand, such as the one given by Gray (2015): Play, or being playful in the

definition of Gray, is (1) self-chosen and self-directed; (2) intrinsically motivated; (3)

guided by rules; (4) imaginative; and (5) conducted in an active, alert, but relatively

non-stressed frame of mind (Gray 2015, 125; cf. in Johnson et al. 2015). A similar

definition has been given by researchers working for the LEGO Foundation: “We

say learning through play happens when the activity (1) is experienced as joyful, (2)

helps children find meaning in what they are doing or learning, (3) involves active,

engaged, minds-on thinking, (4) as well as iterative thinking (experimentation,

hypothesis testing, etc.), and (5) social interaction.” (Zosh et al. 2017; The LEGO

Foundation, 22).

Despite its multifarious nature (Murnaghan 2011), there are more concise ways

of defining play. For example, recent work by Fehr, Boog, and Leraas (2020) explain

that the four defining features of play are that play:

• must involve positive affect and be fun

• is non-literal (themes and scenarios that occur in play are separate from

what occurs in the real world)

• is intrinsically motivating, and is flexible

“[T]he desire to play is fundamentally the desire to be,” says philosopher Jean-

Paul Sartre (1995, 170). How exactly does this desire manifest in human behavior?

Based on earlier understandings, play can also be perceived as a state of doing

and being actively engaged. In this way, play is “activepleasure,” as defined by media

scholar John Fiske (1988). That may result in personal gratification through autotelic

(or intrinsically motivated) play, as explained by Sutton-Smith:

Autotelic play is often given as the name for the kind of play where the individual

has freedom and control over what he or she does. But in addition, the play is said to

sometimes yield peak experiences of particularly high personal quality. (Sutton-Smith

1986, 112)

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

Play is generally seen mainly as an activity of children, which, depending on their

attitude, is seen as either an enchanting, functional experience or a useless passage

of time compared to cultural creativity, which is considered lucrative. Ruoppila

(2014, 9) defines play as an internally motivated activity of a child, which Helenius

and Lummelahti (2014) specify as an activity in an imaginary situation. Imagination

plays an essential role in the definition of play (Piironen 2004, 13−14).

The International Play Association (IPA) provides an interpretation of “play”

regarding children and the context of Article 31 (Plowman & Stephen 2014, 19):

Children’s play is any behaviour, activity or process initiated, controlled and structured

by children themselves. Play is non-compulsory, driven by intrinsic motivation and

undertaken for its own sake, rather than as a means to an end. It may take infinite

forms, but the key characteristics of play are fun, uncertainty, challenge, flexibility, and

non-productivity. While play is often considered non-essential […] it is a fundamental

and vital dimension of the pleasure of childhood and is an essential component of

children’s development.

According to Nachmanovitch (1990, 43), play can be understood as an attitude,

a playful way of doing things. Alongside free and open-ended play, play is an

activity determined by the rules, the playground, and the participants. According

to Caillois (1961), play is a voluntary pattern of action determined temporally and

locally. In Caillois’ thinking, play is thus defined as a voluntary, special, insecure,

and unproductive activity that is regulated and imaginative. Play has rules based on

imagined rather than real life (Caillois 1961, 9–10). The belief that playing has no

definite outcome and is unproductive, as perceived by, e.g., Caillois (1961), needs

some critical inspection. To offer a counteractive view that concerns digital play, the

children involved in the multinational study conducted by Marsh and colleagues

(2020) and investigated the play worlds of contemporary childhood understood that

technologies can be used in productive and unproductive ways.

The nature of play develops, as the imagination allows, by playing alone or

together. Play is influenced by both the individual’s internal and external factors that

support or limit playfulness. Play is a voluntary activity that combines the player’s free

will with creativity. Play means taking over the world, dismantling and rebuilding it

(Henricks 2006, 185). Play allows people to understand life’s material and symbolic

contents and face the limits of their own forces (Henricks 2006, 219–220).

When permitting ourselves to play and freeing ourselves from everyday

constraints, by choosing to give ourselves limits and obstacles as rules, by taking it

upon ourselves to confront difficulties or to let be, to master or surrender, according

to Frappier, we affirm life, assert ourselves as voluntary agents of our activity, as

able and willing to share enjoyment, wonder, and excitement with others (Frappier

1976,196).

Katriina Heljakka

Thomas Henricks provides a valuable perspective on play by arguing that although

play is commonly an attempt at wish fulfillment and thus a (mental) psychological

affair, it also makes people deal with existing material (physical) elements — props

or “pivots” that facilitate thinking — and with existing idea systems (like language,

game rules, and other cultural directives) as well as with the interventions or other

people (Henricks 2015b, 115). What this idea leaves out is the relation that play has to

machines and devices — to the systems provided by digital technology.

Moreover, “play is a concrete activity in the world” (Henricks 2015, 115) and,

although nowadays often mediated by emerging technologies, visible in human

gestures shown toward and with the technologies. Simply put, concrete activities

materialize in how play moves us physically.

Play scholar Burghardt (2005, 9) views play as a peak experience that involves

positive emotions and affects, ecstasy, flow, relaxation, and optimism. According to

Csikszentmihalyi (1975, 37–38), play is the flow experience par excellence. Sometimes

play manifests as movements of emotion. Often, physical and emotional movements

occur simultaneously in play.

According to a definition by Klugman and Fasoli (1995), play is interaction. It

is “a major interactive process through which children learn about themselves, their

environment, the other people in that environment, and the interrelationships among

all of these” (Klugman & Fasoli 1995, 196; cf. in Yelland 2011).

“Play can refer to a plethora of individual actions or cultural activities. It can

include games, festivals, artistic play, gambling, and sports. It can be organized,

structured, or rule-bound (as in games). Or it can be spontaneous, unstructured, and

playful as in imaginary or free play” (Power 2011, 289). Indeed, play is a heterogeneous

behavior category (Dansky 1983, 72) for which a single acceptable definition of play

is hard, if possible, to make (Chudacoff 2007, 1).

“Play has been notoriously difficult to define” (Zosh et al. 2018, 1). Burghardt

(2005, xi) notes how even eminent scholars have faced challenges in defining play and

considered it more a mystery than a phenomenon that can be understood through

scientific analysis. Bernard Mergen underlines this unsolved quality of play by stating

that “play observed, recorded, analyzed, and classified is itself a kind of fantasy, one

that satisfies the adult desire to explain and to pretend to know what play is” (Mergen

1995, 271).

Notably, even researchers partake in the instrumentalization of play by

formulating their definitions according to their needs. Consequently, they add

further complexities to understanding play as a phenomenon. Although putting it

bluntly, it may be wise to accept the existence of play and to move on.

Sutton-Smith suggests that a definition of play should be broad rather than narrow

(1997, 128), for example, as is the case in defining free play: Free (unstructured)

play is considered valuable for its ability to enhance cognitive, social, emotional,

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

and physical development; foster creativity, imagination, and problem-solving skills;

educate and learn; and support health and well-being (Cowan 2020).

As a diverse activity, play is practiced by a large group of players (e.g., infants,

children, adolescents, adults, male and female players, gamblers, elite sports players,

playwrights, performers, and comedians) (Sutton-Smith 1997). In today’s world this

list could be extended.

For some, the functional nature of play is hard to confirm. Sutton-Smith has noted

how the voluntariness of play means that it must also be nonfunctional. According

to the scholar, this perception is questionable (Sutton-Smith 2017, 108). “Play is

extremely productive for the life of the playing groups involved” (Sutton-Smith 1986,

153–154). To take the idea further, it is fruitful to acknowledge the simultaneous

occurrence of the functional (productive) and nonfunctional (non-productive)

aspects to emerge in most forms of play and, at the same time, admit that play is

carried out both for intrinsic and extrinsic motivations.

For the sake of clarity, a distinction between playfulness and play is needed. One

clear-cut differentiation in defining the phenomenon is to think of play through

the approaches of human “being” and human behavior. To distinguish between

the ontology of play versus the philosophy (and theorizing) of play, Similar to

Nachmanovitz (1990), Frappier describes play as an attitude toward people, events,

things, and situations (Frappier 1976, 13). Similarly, Melasniemi and colleagues

(2022) point to John Dewey’s ideas in referring to playfulness as an attitude. While

an internal playful attitude guides the mental states, play implies actual behavior and

activities that are externally visible to others. Playfulness can be seen as an antecedent

and precondition to play. Consequently, play is doing something with a playful

attitude and is thus an important bridge from being to doing (Frappier 1976, 146,

196, accentuation in the original).

Seen from the perspective of this thesis, play represents a relationship to

technology, a mindset, and a curious stance to experiment and experience (e.g.,

Resnick 2006). As many definitions of play do not account for the digital aspects of

play. I lean on earlier definitions but develop them further to overcome this challenge

in suggesting a definition of play. Here, I state that:

Play is a voluntary, open-ended (unstructured), or goal-driven (structured) activity

that enhances emotional, physical, mental, cognitive, or social well-being by producing

enjoyment and gratification for players of any age, in which the human being employs

imagination, creativity, or skill to explore various objects, artifacts, environments,

systems, or assemblages of them in order to communicate and interact with oneself

or others productively or unproductively. To put it in simple terms, play can consist of

goal-oriented action, like in association with games, or more open-ended exploration,

as free play with toys. Contemporary play may take many forms: it can be solitary

Katriina Heljakka

or social, embedded in the physical, digital, or imaginative, exercised both offline and

online as part of leisure, work, and playful learning, extended with play(ful) things,

tools, technologies, and media, and engaged in by players of different ages, even between

individuals of different generations.

2.2. Play and Its State in Society

This section considers the importance of (the study on) play. The unpacking of

the controversial topic of devices used in association with digital play starts with

the phenomenon of greatest interest for this thesis, namely play most profoundly

inspecting current societal attitudes toward play. Gwenda Davey (2012, 115) claims

that “in the twenty-first century, in so-called developed nations, adult interest

in children’s play ranges from benign to malign; in between is indifference.”

One only needs to observe the growing number of media articles that deal with

digital vs. traditional (non-digital) play and primarily focus on the negative aspects

of digital play, most prominently digital gaming. Fisher et al. (2008, 306) observe that

“a particular belief about play fundamentally limits the activities that are identified

as play.” Often, as illustrated in the introductory section of this thesis, contemporary

play is most strongly associated with games and gameplay.

The importance of play has been easily undervalued (Moyles 2012). In work-

centered societies, in particular, according to Brian Sutton-Smith (1970), there is a

“triviality barrier” surrounding the serious study of play. At the same time, however,

claims have been made about the century we live in as the century in which play has

gained an elevated status.

Scholars such as Sutton-Smith have envisioned that the 21st century will be the

Century of Play — in essence, what he calls the ludic era (Sutton-Smith 1997). James

Johnson, one of the editors of The Handbook of the Study of Play, has observed an

unprecedented increase in professional and public interest in play in the last decade

(Johnson 2015, xi). Currently, the interest in play has risen within society and

academia.

Play is an interdisciplinary area of study that can be investigated from many

angles. So far, the phenomenon of traditional (i.e., ‘non-technological’) play has been

scrutinized from the perspectives of folklore, ethnology, cultural athropology and

cultural history, psychology, philosophy, art history, and artistic research, to name a

few areas. The scope of “play studies assumes that one can learn more about play by

examining carefully from many different angles rather than just one vantage point”

(Johnson 2015, xiii). The theoretical underpinnings behind the idea that play has

attracted particular attention in various research fields during the past decade are

grounded in understanding games as a powerful media.

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

Gaming is one of the most accentuated dimensions of the playful turn, ludic turn,

or ludenic age presented by Brian Sutton-Smith (1997), James E. Combs (2000), and

Eric Zimmerman (2015), to mention a few. Joost Raessens (2010) states that culture

and its actors have become increasingly playful, mainly due to changes in the media

environment. According to Raessens, computer games and other digital technologies,

such as mobile devices and the Internet, seem to stimulate playful goals and promote

the formation of playful identities (Raessens 2006, 1). These theoretical ideas on the

role of technology in contemporary play are highly relevant to the thesis at hand.

What consequences does the playful era have for studying and recognizing the value

of play?

Cultural and societal trends shape player preferences and play patterns. Play

evolves within society and culture. It has universal dimensions but also culture-

specific aspects (Smith 2010, 95). Undoubtedly, the Western context of the research

also affects the research undertaken. Playfulness — captured as part of a Western

worldview — manifests in our time as multimedia cultures of production, distribution,

consumption, and users, in which play equipment, the media, and user-players who

use both creatively play their own roles. One of the arguments in favor of the paradigm

of the playful era is based on the idea of cultural change: In the past, a work-oriented

society has become a society that emphasizes the importance of play and leisure (de

Jong 2015). Many have come to see why play is worthy of investigation, exploring it

from angles such as child development, media use, and education. Culturally, play

has always had significance for people of all ages, but during different times, societal

attention and appreciation of play have varied. For example, in the 1970s, Paul

Frappier noted that literature on play concerns almost exclusively the play of children

(Frappier 1976, 1). Sutton-Smith sees an explanation for this in the growing impact

of media-child stimulation, which materializes through news media, technology use,

and the influence of toys and games:

The last fifty years have witnessed unprecedented levels in Western culture of media-

child stimulation through newspapers, radio, television, video games, computers,

the Internet, mass-produced toys and games, cell phones, and the like. These media

supplements have made it increasingly common for parents to socialize their children

into this intense and varied simulation, which parents themselves now experience.

(Sutton-Smith 2017, 50)

For Sutton-Smith, the most apparent modern manifestations of play as a

consumable experience include children’s toys, computer and video games, attendance

at artistic and sporting events of the young and the old, and the plethora of other,

more specific entertainment available (Sutton-Smith 2017, 233–234).

This article-based thesis aims to offer complementary perspectives on the

evolution, culture, and digitalizing landscape of play, disregarding (or rather,

Katriina Heljakka

overcoming!) the triviality barrier mentioned by Sutton-Smith. In this thesis,

attention turns specifically to toys and play machines and their linkages to digital

technology.

While according to some, traditional (childhood) play is under siege, there is a

need to widen the scope of research to capture aspects of play that may be considered

non-traditional, including play that combines the areas of toys, technologies, and

mobility. This means an urgency to develop the understanding of digital play as both

a life-long phenomenon as well as a life-wide one — a matter of children, youth,

adults, and seniors (even as an interspecies phenomenon including playing animals)

and an object of investigation that traverses the limits of (early) education, leisure,

and working life. These expanding ideas on play will be elaborated on in more detail

in the following parts of the thesis.

2.3. Play of Children and Adults

Can all ages play? In her historical review of the role of play, Nina J. Lieberman raised

the question of adult-oriented and child-oriented play and suggested that, during the

Middle Ages, the Renaissance, and even the Age of Enlightenment, child’s play was

not only minimal within the individual’s lifespan but was accorded little importance

in human development as such. If play was emphasized, written, and sung about,

it was the adult’s play. To be specific, Lieberman pointed out that, in particular, she

referred to adult play among the leisure class (Lieberman 1977, 143–144).

Frappier (1976) notes how Friedrich Froebel (1782–1852) suggested that play

is for children, not for relaxation, but the most significant aspect of childhood.

Lieberman claims that the trend toward child-centeredness in perceptions of play

began in the 18th century, developed in the 19th, and had become acknowledged by

the 1930s as the characteristic mode of behavior in childhood.

Lieberman writes: “Within the historical perspective, we can, therefore, say that

the movement has been from adult games to child’s play, and correspondingly, the

underlying philosophy has moved from a competitive, rule-dominated foundation

to the spontaneity, freedom, and sense of fun associated with child behavior”

(Lieberman 1977, 13).

For children, play is considered a “natural occupation” (Ummanel 2017) and

the child plays to adapt, grow, and socialize in and with the world (Sutton-Smith

1997). Sutton-Smith (1980) notes how Karl Groos’ notion of play as a socializing

phenomenon became the central thesis about play in the 20th century.24

Children’s rights to influence, speak, and explain matters relevant to their everyday

lives are recognized globally in The Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)

24 Karl Groos is a philosopher and psychologist who lived 1861–1946, and who offered

instrumentalized views of play.

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

(United Nations 1989). Hence, children’s right to play is also recognized. Cowan

(2020) describes the phenomenon of children’s play with words such as vibrancy

and variety. Studies on children’s play contribute to the overall understanding of play

by showing consensus on how children find the activity enjoyable, casual, and as

something that happens with a lack of adult involvement (Einarsdóttir 2004).

When it comes to playing, it is still wondered in general debates (or perhaps

rather, in the minds of the adults themselves) why adults would use their time for

such a “frivolous” activity. Here, the notions of time, consumption, (expense!), and

usefulness vs. futility intersect. Time is by far the most precious of human resources,

and time should be well spent for children in play and adults in non-play activities.

However, the age of players has expanded. Or rather, societal and cultural trends

have made it possible to view players of the 21st century as a broader demographic

group than before. The idea of “maturing while becoming” encompasses all age

groups. This means that growth happens at every age, and play has significance for

the processes contributing to our growing minds, mindsets, and creative capabilities.

Sutton-Smith argues that there is more to play than its manifestations in

childhood:

What is particularly ludicrous is the view that nursery school play is the only true kind

of play. This is something like saying that the true nature of language is to be found in

baby talk. (Sutton-Smith 1986, 155)

Nevertheless, when it comes to digital technology use, Woolsey and Woolsey

(2008) identify youth as the expert in digital domains because of their playfulness.

It is possible to consider children and youth as leaders in the development of

using technologies for playing purposes and the adults who wish to maintain their

youthfulness as their followers. Kücklich perceives the desire for youthfulness to play

its part in adults’ relationship to play:

The characteristics of play seem to contradict basic values in western societies such as

sincerity, diligence and dedication. But there are indicators that suggest a change in this

perception of play. In cultures that emphasize youth as a desirable state, which is to be

prolonged and upheld by all means for as long as technically possible, playful behaviour

might be one of the ways by which their members can present themselves as youthful.

(Kücklich 2004, 2)

In addition to the romanticization and nostalgia for traditional, non-technological

childhood play and the criticism against, for example, media technology, journalistic

media, its audiences, and play, researchers at the beginning of the 21st century have

become seemingly more interested in adults’ fascination with various play tools

Katriina Heljakka

and services, play behavior related to these aspects of play, and adult play. Kücklich

(2004, 14) also states that “play is not infantile; toys are not just children’s playthings,”

meaning that the instruments for play belong to other age groups in parallel to the

one of children.

In 2023, the body of research on adult play has grown significantly, transcending

the boundaries of research on adult play within the realm of digital gaming, into

areas such as adult toy play (Heljakka 2013) and playful learning in higher education

(see, e.g., Whitton 2022).

In addition to technological development, Sutton-Smith (2017) considers the

existence of adult play and talks about ludic liberalization in his work, mainly as an

individualistic project and a consumption-related activity. Seen in this way, adult play

is not exclusively located in the communality of sport; for example, play has become

increasingly personal, while social media reveals its visible and shared nature and

the qualities of toys at play. In the digitalizing and Internet-connected age, players

encompass broad groups of individuals both demographically and professionally —

preschoolers, school children, educators, working and retired adults, and seniors all

have their own interests and relationships to play. One example may be found in

ideas on toys. According to traditional thought, toys exist to serve the child (Gorman

O’Neill 2017), but with the emergence of kidults — or adults who accumulate, create,

and find meaning in toy-related activities (Heljakka 2021), toys also exist to serve the

adult imagination and creativity.25

2.4. Play in Leisure, Learning, and Productive Endeavors

The Strong National Museum of Play perceives play as a process by stating in

its exhibition texts that “play moves. It’s a cycle of events and mental states.” It is

possible to conceptualize this movement between the previously discussed notion

of childhood-adulthood and the theoretical axis of the themes of health-depression,

leisure-recreation, entertainment-learning, unproductive play, and productive play, or

playbor. All of these areas have relevance for the thesis at hand, as play is investigated

as not only a leisurely activity but as behavior that has consequences for learning and

contributes to productive endeavors. While offering avenues for self-expression and

socialization, play contributes to our well-being.

Let us first look at the first axis, health-depression: The opposite of play is not

boredom but depression: Stuart Brown lists the consequences of long-term play

deprivation for adults as a “lack of vital life engagement, diminished optimism,

25 While kidults represent the ASYL (adults staying younger longer), adul-kids can be

perceived as representatives of KGOY (kids growing older younger). For the consequences

of this “age compression,” see Heljakka (2013; 2021).

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

stuck-in-a-rut feeling about life with little curiosity or exploratory imagination to

alter their situation, predilection to escapist temporary fixes […] alcohol, excessive

exercise (or other compulsions), a personal sense of being life’s victim rather than

life’s conqueror” (Brown 2014, n.p.).

To emphasize the meaning of play in today’s society, previous literature

acknowledges the many benefits play has for human health. Bogost (2016, 101) notes

how the benefits of play are expressed predominantly in terms of their resultant

underwriting of mental (and often physical) healthfulness. Again, play in itself

is perceived to benefit the players by contributing to mental states, such as “total

abandonment, no worry, joy, clear thinking, energy, curiosity, wonderment, pride,

connection, movement, imagination, relaxation, therapeutic” (Brannen 2002, 67–77).

Overall, however, associating play with health benefits introduces some problems:

Alexander et al. (2014) summarize how (i) play is viewed as a productive activity

and legitimizes it as a health practice; (ii) tropes of “fun” and “pleasure” are drawn

on to promote physical activity; and (iii) children are encouraged to self-govern their

leisure time to promote health. With this understanding, the researchers think that:

[…] by regulating children’s play to be healthy and active, and thus normalizing the

ways in which children are encouraged to play, other relevant qualities of play may be

neglected. Indeed, while playing simply for fun (that is, frivolous pleasure) is considered

a common experience of childhood, it appears to be less important than the more

productive and explicitly active play for health. (Alexander et al. 2014, 1201).

However, as one contributor to a healthy life, play is not limited to childhood,

fitness, or sports (Marshal 2002, 73). Paul Frappier, who investigated adult play in his

dissertation written in the 1970s, asked: “Is there a value to play other than diversion

and recreation?” He writes about play’s association with pleasure and “uselessness,”

which have contributed to evoking suspicion toward it (Frappier 1976, 2). This brings

us to the second axis of leisure-recreation. Indeed, he continues, “play in its essence

has a definitive quality of non-purposiveness, of being an end onto itself, of being

pleasant, of being pursued for the fun of it. This links it rather closely to pleasure. Our

attitude towards pleasure conditions our attitude towards play” (Frappier 1976, 52).

To clarify the role between genuine play and recreation, it is possible to see

how play differs from “recreation, which is understood as activities with a function,

such as artistic, sporting or community engagement” (Cowan 2020, 10). Leisure is

undertaken for the sake of pleasure and recreation to express oneself through creative

activities or to partake in communal life.

On the one hand, according to the numerous definitions of play presented in

the thesis at hand, play can be intrinsically motivated. On the other hand, play may

have extrinsic goals. Consequently, playing happens both in the name of leisure and

recreation.

Katriina Heljakka

However, the places and patterns of leisure and play undergo changes. One of these

changes related to play is the intermingling of leisure activities like entertainment

and education. In the intersection of these areas lies edutainment, a combination

of entertaining ways (often associated with leisure activities such as toy play) to

deliver educational content and, therefore, learning possibilities. Resnick (2006, 3)

has observed how “there has been a surge of computer-based products that claim to

integrate play and learning, under the banner of ‘edutainment.’” This development

manifests on the axis of entertainment-learning.

Hirsh-Pasek and Golinkoff (2011) have stated that the dichotomy between play

and learning is false. However, critical views have been expressed about the value

of childhood play outside of education: Children’s subcultures and freer play forms

are denied when play is interpreted through an analytical lens in association with

learning (Cole et al. 2017). Indeed, progressive and productive forms of play tend to

be valued over non-productive ones.

Time used in play provides fun, relaxation, entertainment, and educational

socialization (Auerbach 2004, 13). For children, play caters to the need to adapt to

the world and to create new learning experiences (Elkind 2007, 3). Playthings, play

environments, and philosophies in pedagogy all contribute to this process.

Cole and colleagues (2017) note that different forms of play create different kinds

of cultural environments for learning. Early childhood education is one of the most

notable areas of academic inquiry into play (Scarfe 1962). For example, in the U.S.,

educators and caretakers are encouraged to play with children and to use play as a

means of teaching (Smith 2010, 92).

Though learning happens right from birth, you may wonder how we build more

complex, higher-order skills such as creativity, critical thinking, collaboration, and

problem-solving. One approach – often overlooked – is play! (Zosh et al. 2017, The

LEGO Foundation, What We Mean By: Learning Through Play)

While the consumption of entertainment is rarely viewed as productive, learning

is considered highly productive for the individual regardless of age. “All types of play

offer opportunities for active learning” (TOY, Together Old and Young Course 2021).

Play is a natural way for a child to develop physically, mentally, emotionally, and

socially (e.g., Piaget 1962; Guha 2011; Piaget & Cook 1952; Yogman et al. 2018).

Playing is closely tied with creativity, problem-solving, and innovation through artistic

pl ay. To Lieberman, “combinatorial play” is an essential ingredient in imagination for

rearranging known facts and a condition for producing unique solutions to existing

problems (Lieberman 1977, 149–150). Carl Jung (1875–1961), the renowned Swiss

psychoanalyst, has said that the creation of something new is not accomplished by

the intellect but by the play instinct. Again, Einstein defines play as the highest form

of research. Indeed, as discussed in the following, play has a close relationship to

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

creativity, novel ways of thinking, and learning — play moves our bodies and minds

in such ways that we come to learn about the world, each other, and perhaps most of

all, ourselves.

Theobald et al. (2015, 345) describe “a denigration of the role of play in favor

of more teacher-structured and formal activities.” Simultaneously, play is regaining

momentum as a recognized and legitimate learning activity (e.g., Singer et al. 2006).

More positive stances toward play acknowledge the potential and benefits of the

phenomenon both on the level of institutions and individuals. For example, Theobald

et al. (2015) conceptualize play as a learning resource. Bennett et al. (1977) have

described play as an educationally powerful process. Fisher et al. (2008, 305) view the

role of play as a “structured, educational thrust for early academic preparation.” These

views commonly consider play as a means to an end and, thus, an instrumentalized

resource. To exemplify, Roach argues that “play in education is situated as a means

to an end, a method of ensuring the progress of students through the academy and

into the marketplace” (Roach 2013). In this way, play receives even more perceivable

instrumentalized values guided by educators and, as a consequence, is considered a

pathway to constructive rather than disorderly behavior.

The tools, techniques, and technologies used in playful learning manifest in

interactions between structured learning scenarios and materials intended to activate

students and generate learning experiences. In the current world, there is much

interest in playful learning and, even more concretely, in game-based or even toy-

based learning (Ihamäki & Heljakka 2018). To illustrate, different playthings and play

environments afford and promote educational benefits in different ways:

[…] the particular kinds of toys the child persists with over ten to fifteen years contribute

to training in human skill. It is not surprising that athletic parents are eager to provide

balls, bats, gymnastic and other equipment. What is not generally realized is that

there are as well other less well recognized ability curriculums in the world of toys. For

example, there is a training in the spatial relationships an architect or designer might

need through blocks, tool sets, trains, and model kits. There is a training in the logic

and mathematics that a scientist might use through number of games, electronic games,

chess, and science kits. There is a training of the verbal skills of the writer through

books, word games and riddles. And there is training in the interpersonal skills needed

by the salesperson and politician through puppets, telephones, and theater games. In

such myriad ways toys are used by children to develop the skills that they find most

rewarding for themselves. (Sutton-Smith 1986, xii in Boehm, The Right Toys)

However, play and learning are complex concepts (Theobald et al. 2015), and so

is the concept of playthings, especially when connected to the phenomenon of play.

“Play-based learning is a feature of Anglo-European early childhood pedagogy

where young children have long been argued to learn through active, hands-on

Katriina Heljakka

engagement with objects and through social interactions with others” (van Oers,

2013; cf. in Bird & Edwards 2015, 1149).

Today, current education often means learning with the newest tools, hence digital

learning. Arnott (2016) sees technologies as tools that can support play and learning

experiences in childhood. However, Bird and Edwards (2015) argue: “A significant

problem for early childhood education has been how to understand the pedagogical

use of technologies in a sector that values play-based learning.”

Critical voices have been raised about the marketization of education (Selwyn

2011), marking rhetoric of progress through technology (Plowman et al. 2011)

as learning technologies and environments evolve and new educational media

technology branches out.

Sometimes, learning intertwines with edutainment through interactive learning

experiences with digital technology: Smart toys and toy robots, such as the IoToys

investigated in this thesis, have been labeled as “teachable machines” (Druga et al.

2019). Despite the clever neologism that edutainment presents, Hall et al. (2022)

observe how toys that claim educational benefits are rarely backed up with empirical

studies that prove their educational benefits, even if these would be the primary

selling point for the toy.

In the context of this thesis, it is necessary to ask the following questions: “Is it

important that young children learn to use digital media as part of their play?” “What

opportunities does digital play provide for learning?”

The presumption is that all forms of play educate in one way or another. Growing

up with digital media means playing and learning with it (Takeuchi 2012). Yelland

(2011), who has studied children’s learning, suggests that making new technologies

available enables and extends playful explorations within playful learning.

Still, to be considered learning tools, the usability of playful technologies must

be assessed in terms of their suitability to be used as part of playful learning, which

means learning through active participation (Resnick 2006).

Because of these reasons, “most people would agree that children’s experiences

with technology – whether for play, learning, or communication – will have significant

implications for their future lives,” write Plowman, McPake and Stephen (2012).

Fisher et al. (2018) identified electronic media to be marketed as having

educational benefits (Kaiser Family Foundation 2005). Some toys, like the Internet-

connected (IoToys) presented in this thesis, have a clear educational purpose. Johnson

and Christie (2009) have observed the potential opportunities that technological

advances in toy manufacturing bring to early childhood education. “Digital play can

incorporate many different kinds of play, and so it seems to have great potential to

provide children with the benefits of playful learning” (Gray & Thomsen 2021, 4).

Tools and systems for play that are designed to be functional for learning require

understandings of how children learn. Through their Digital Play Framework,

Bird and Edwards (2015, 1149) discuss “how children learn to use technologies as

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

cultural tools, first by exploring the functionality of technologies through epistemic

activity (according to Oxford Languages, ‘relating to knowledge or to the degree of its

validation’), and second by generating new content through ludic activity.”

Yelland (2011) notes that those who advocate for traditional play-based curricula

tend to discourage using new technologies.

The role of adults in allowing use and access to devices is fundamental: Parents

may either support or hinder learning by guiding and restricting children’s interaction

with tablets, smartphones, or apps (Marsh et al. 2015; Plowman et al. 2008; 2010).

Which digital media are best suited to the needs of young children when considering

playful learning?

Plowman et al. (2012) have identified digital cameras or mobile phones as having

extended the range of possibilities for learning and playing. “Tools are not only

things to be discovered in their own right; they are means to personal self-assertion

or autonomy or Mastery,” writes Sutton-Smith (1986, 144). Playing with technologies

contributes to skill-building, competencies, and literacies.26

Koltay (2011, 212) refers to a definition of media literacy given by Auferheide

(1992), who identifies it “as a movement, which is designed to help to understand, to

produce and negotiate meanings in a culture of images, words, and sounds.” Media

literacy means the ability to access the media, understand and evaluate different

aspects of the media and media content critically, and create communications in

various contexts (European Commission 2007). “Children need a broad range of

holistic skills – skills such as creativity, communication, collaboration, problem-

solving, and self-regulation – as well as knowledge of academic subject areas and

technological literacy” (Gray & Thomsen 2021, 4). Wohlwend and Peppler (2013)

recommend that play should be valued as literacy in itself. Media literacy is a notable

concept in reference to contemporary play.

Lynch (2017) has predicted that by 2020, 77 percent of jobs will require digital

competency. One part of digital competency is literacy, and when conversed in the

context of digital play, it refers to both the user’s media literacy as well as multiple

literacies associated with play, such as ludic literacy (Mäyrä 2017a) and toy literacy

(Sutton-Smith 1986; Heljakka & Ihamäki 2018; Almeida 2023).

As stated by Mäyrä (2017a), ludic literacy includes understanding (a) technology,

(b) culture, and (c) social dimensions of games and play — the ability to step within

a game, interplay with others, and be creative within those frames. 21st century toy

literacy follows the same ideas, but applies them to toys and interaction with them.

In his foreword for the book Toys, Games, and Media, Sutton-Smith (2004)

expressed his excitement for what the volume would highlight in terms of the

26 In the context of Western childhood and learning in the domestic space, this has been

critically discussed under the concept of “curricularization of family life” (see, e.g.,

Buckingham & Scanlon 2003; cf. in Plowman 2004).

Katriina Heljakka

development of media literacy. The book addressed early digital media and the impact

of technology on media-related play by showcasing chapters on children’s use of the

Internet, computers, and early smart toys. Nearly twenty years later, this thesis takes

a digital media literary approach to contemporary play by further acknowledging

that the investigation of technologically oriented play — with specific interest in play

machines, such as mobile devices and social robotics in addition to the Internet,

digital cameras, and IoToys and the developed IoToys — demands a multimodal

understanding of media literacy and technological literacy, incorporating skills in

media, visuality, hardware/software, and finally, a developed toy literacy.

But what is toy literacy?

Play is multisensory, but “much play is based in touch” (Pesce 2000, 22). Allen

(2004, 181) observes that when we touch an object, the hand is usually the “organ

of stimulation.” Both manipulability and manual dexterity are essential when

considering tools and technologies for playful learning — both portable technologies

and most toys are “handheld devices.” Objects instigate and invite people to specific

actions (Keane 2005, 194), and screens affect digitally oriented object play. Naisbitt

and Philips (2001) combine “high tech with high touch.” The use of technological

devices has implications for playing: “Contemporary children have been described as

the touch-screen generation” (Rosin 2013; c.f. in Brito et al. 2019). According to Aziz

(2013), young children can perform seven basic gestures by age four: tap, drag, and

slide, free rotate, drag and drop, pinch, spread, and flick.

Digital skills attained in technologically oriented play can be skills in reference to

digital literacy: operating devices and navigating apps, finding information, keeping

safe, and creating digital content. These skills serve children in their education and

future employment (Marsh et al. 2020). Play is a practice of the mind and body

that requires agility in both senses. This physical and mental movement can also

be approached through the notion of digital dexterity, a facet of contemporary toy

literacy.

Even machines such as digital devices are material entities approached through

multitouch screens or natural interfaces. Jayemanne and Nansen (2016) discuss digital

dexterity as a particular skill among digital competencies. Digital dexterity should be

understood as a linking of physical skills of the hands and body to operate interaction

with gestural devices and to mobilize the device’s component elements. Physical

gestures as part of digital play relate to both productive and non-productive activity.

This means that previous assumptions of play and work are diluted. According to

literary character Tom Sawyer, work was seen as an obligation, whereas play has been

understood as a “non-obligation”:

Work consists of whatever a body is obliged to do. Play consists of whatever a body is

not obliged to do. (Mark Twain, The Adventures of Tom Sawyer; cf. in Alexander et

al. 2014)

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

The final axis of interest here is the one of unproductive play-productive playbor.

Play inspires creativity in both children and adults. What separates play from creation,

again, is the tendency of play to create possibilities, while creativity produces ideas

and artifacts (Power 2011, 316). Sutton-Smith (2017, 77) offers a compromising view

by proposing that most play could be seen as originative or open-ended rather than

systematically creative.

Play and creativity often go hand in hand, as they are bound by a common

denominator — imagination. There is no reason to separate play from imagination

(Ummanel 2017), especially not when playthings come to the fore of inspection. “In

new media cultures, play has moved center-stage in its significance in the creative

forms of production and recreation” (Marshall 2004, 43–44).

Playthings, such as toys as objects and artifacts, grant permission to play and

have the possibility to set the imagination in motion. Combined with device use,

the products of creativity become easily documented and effortlessly shared. In this

combinatory play, it mobilizes the imagination via creative device use that makes

playing productive.

This thesis demonstrates aspects of leisure and learning as play but does not

address play as a professional or occupational practice. However, human creativity

and user-created content change the nature of media production (Kücklich 2004).

Following this thought, one can claim that the 21st-century player is a content creator

and, thus, a producer of play who makes sharable play content out of anything, such

as unboxing videos (Blythe & Cairns 2009) or toy play with storytelling in focus. In

this way, device-enabled play contributes to the notion of seeing both children and

adults as playborers (Articles I and III in this thesis).27

Kücklich (2004, 16) asserts that “games now produce goods with a value in the real

world.” Therefore, gamification can be perceived as one form of playbor (Rey 2015).

In the thesis at hand, playbor is understood as the endeavors of the “professionals

of play” who produce entertaining and interactive content for others to consume

through their creative activities with toys (Heljakka 2021). Kücklich’s notion of

playbor deals primarily with the unpaid labor conducted by players who, e.g., create

content through activities in relating to “modding,” and whose creative productions

benefit game companies. It is important to note that in this thesis, I use playbor to

describe player activities that are productive in a similar sense to work, and that give

playing structure and continuity. While I also acknowledge that there are players who

can be considered consumers for the outcomes of playbor, I do not address their role

as content creators from whom, e.g., toy companies would profit. Undoubtedly, there

27 My prediction is that in the not-so-distant future, (adult) people will be playing more in

their daily lives as part of what has been understood to constitute their labor activities.

This provides more opportunities to study the areas of playful learning and playbor in

the adult context, for example, as part of higher education and work life.

Katriina Heljakka

are ways to benefit from play financially in regard to monetization of play, but this

matter is not the focus of this thesis. Instead, I regard playbor as a form of content

production derived in play.

Content of play means what is created during play, what is shared socially,

and what potentially inspires more play. The online networks and platforms used

to share play such as Facebook and Instagram also allow the consumption of play

through spectatorship. In this context, play becomes (semi)professional, productive,

perceivable, and in due course purchasable, as players of different ages produce

creations that have value once spectated and consumed by other players.28 This

productive realm of contemporary play is dependent on device use and social media

in documenting, distributing, and sharing the outcomes of play, which are predicted

to become more recognized in the era of post-digital play, elaborated on in the

following sub-section.29

The artifacts and devices both affect the players and enable and extend their

abilities to communicate (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019, 6). The technologies

as play machines presented and scrutinized in this thesis allow open-ended play

experiences beyond digital gaming. These can be experiences of either children,

adults, or intergenerational audiences, which have outcomes for leisure, learning, and

productive play and open-ended, paidia, and structured ludus (see Figure 2.) that may

further be analyzed leaning on the notions of health-depression, leisure-recreation,

entertainment-learning, unproductive play, and productive playbor discussed above.

28 This is understood in terms of a platform economy: “Platform economy is the tendency

for commerce to increasingly move toward and favor digital platform business models”

(Fitzgibbons 2023).

29 Virtual goods have already emerged in early adaptations of the metaverse in the “form”

and notion of NFTs (non-fungible tokens) in new (screen-play) media ecologies. As this

thesis deals with toys and devices with a physical dimension, entirely virtual creations

are left out of focus. Nonetheless, these goods are likely to receive more attention as

“toy-like” products of digital playbor in the upcoming years.

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

Figure 2. Facets of digital and Internet-connected play: Play as part of leisure, learning,

and productive endeavors as investigated in the thesis (and detected opportunities for future

research).

2.5. Toward Post-Digital Play

“The farther cultures move into post-industrialism the more important play

seems to become” Julian Kücklich (2004) writes. Post-industrialism refers to

“belongingorrelatingto aneconomythat is nolongerbasedonheavyindustry, such

as the making oflargemachines” (Cambridge Online Dictionary 2023). Oldenziehl

and Hård (2013) have noted how toys closely mirrored the adult industrial world of

the 20th century. In the 21st century, toys such as the play machines of interest for

this thesis, can be said to mirror the post-industrial world.

When exploring changes in play during 2010–2020 with a particular accentuation

on the digital and Internet-connected practices in relation to play, attention should

turn toward another theoretical concept, namely post-digitality. What significance

does post-digitality have for the realm of play machines as hybrid playthings? To begin

to answer this question, I turn to the digital dimension of physical playthings.

Katriina Heljakka

In the definition given by Berry and Schleser (2014), post-digitality describes

the situation in the evolution of the digital, when digitality and non-digitality blur

through mobile, pervasive, locative, and augmented media. “The post-digital is

represented by and indicative of a moment when the computational has become

hegemonic”:

[…] the historical distinction between the digital and the non-digital becomes

increasingly blurred, to the extent that to talk about the digital presupposes an

experiential disjuncture that makes less and less sense. Indeed, just as the ideas of

“online” or “being online” have become anachronistic as a result of our always-on

smartphones and tablets and widespread wireless networking technologies, so too the

term “digital” perhaps assumes a world of the past. (Berry & Schleser 2014)

What post-digitality (Cramer & Jandrić 2021, n.p.) means is this:

[…] a perspective that finds the distinction between ‘digital’ and ‘non-digital’ to be less

clear than it seems when it is rigorously inspected, and also less useful and relevant than

it often seems. The postdigital perspective thus breaks with the ‘new media’ paradigm

[…] the criterion of ‘analog’ versus ‘digital’ is not the most important.”

As de Vries (2021, 250) accurately notes, manipulation play can only be performed

by species that have hands. Indeed, object play has a role in human evolution: “the

reliance of Homo sapiens on material culture as a key adaptive feature is more

pronounced than it is in any other extant or extinct hominin” (Riede et al. 2018).

“The world isn’t there to be used, but to be played with, manipulated by hand and

mind” (Soni & Goodman 2017, 46). Intersections of material and digital cultures and

object play constitute hybrid interactions, which this thesis addresses.

In an Internet-connected age, the notion of post-digital play (Nansen et al. 2019,

92) becomes relevant: “In a post-digital environment, play multiplies across digital

infrastructures and environments.” Consequently, “digital childhoods are messy,

multifaceted, multi-modal and ultimately complex” (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019,

15). So are any manifestations of hybrid play experiences detailed and discussed

further on in this thesis despite the age or context of the players.

In a time when many physical toy brands already have a permanent position in

digital realms through their makers’ and marketers’ websites, social communities,

apps, and gaming platforms, it is not surprising that players of the same toys have

a digital presence enabled by the same means. Seen from this perspective, we have

reached a time in which play simultaneously evolves across the analog and digital

platforms through device-use (as in simultaneous playing with traditional toys and

digital devices — cameras and mobile phones — Articles I and III), between physical

toys and their digital counterparts (as in playing with traditional toys and their

Positioning Play in Theory and Society

manifestations on social media — Articles III–IV), and in a more developed sense

also as play machines, where the physicality and digitality seamlessly intertwine (as is

the case with IoToys, toy robots, and creatures of speculative toy fictions — Articles

II, V, and VI).

While technology is often positioned as a possible threat to the romantic notions

of childhood play, it is a fact that humans of all ages have some kind of relationship

with technology. Similarly, all digital natives, digital nomads, and adults, “the

perpetual digital immigrants” (Prensky 2001), have some relation to play, as will be

explained in the studies undertaken for this thesis. Therefore, it can be stated that

post-digital play is ageless and a matter of all those who have access and skills to use

digital technologies in their play.

Toys as the tools and instruments of play in combination with digital devices

create tangible entry points to networked and Internet-connected play. An

overarching theme in general conceptions of digitalizing play is the fear of an excess

of technological play. Pink et al. (2018) note that in a digitalizing time, activities

thought of as work, leisure, and play become entangled in new ways. In a post-digital

play world, the concepts of leisure-recreation, entertainment-learning, unproductive

play, and productive playbor become equally blurred. To increase health and avoid

depression due to excess use and addictions through use, players in the post-digital

age should be aware and informed, and therefore literate, about what a balanced

diet of interaction with digital technologies means. Assistance in this can be found

in the “Independent Worker’s Technology Bill of Rights” proposed by Weil and

Rosen (1997). That is still relevant. To reference some of its points, the bill declares:

“2. Technology is available to help me express my creativity; 5. I can use technology

to stay connected, informed, and productive — my way30; 9. Technology never needs

rest, but I do.”

To return to the positive consequences of how play moves us with and through

toys, technology, and mobility, the thesis provides insights gained in the six case

studies undertaken. The following section explains the methods for the studies

conducted with the players operating the play machines under investigation.

30 This work does not address critical views associated with connected toys, such as

monitoring, control, or even spying on the players. However, enabling an online

connection through a physical toy proposes even more challenges than is the case with

smartphones. This is to say that three-dimensional toys with hidden affordances are

still not expected to function as recording devices capable of transferring data through

networks in the same ways as communication devices. Marsh (2019) observes how

post-humanist accounts of play are now emerging. This development refers to the

robotification of play(things), which proposes even more challenging questions about

the roles of humans and animals (living) and robots (non-living) that will interact more

in playful encounters and situations.

Katriina Heljakka

3. Methods

All life is an experiment. Ralph Waldo Emerson

Play has been studied by employing diverse methods, such as observation in

the natural environment, observation in a structured environment, interviews and

questionnaires, and examinations of toy inventories, pictures and photographic

records, and other evidence of children’s play (Smith 2010). Additionally, play

scholars have employed a variety of tools of discipline inquiry, including archival

records, conceptual analysis, and philosophical investigations (Johnson 2015, xiii).

Hall et al. (2022) note: “Even with articulate older children, it can be difficult for

adults to understand or assess their play experiences.” Therefore, research on play,

on the play of children in particular, benefits from a multidisciplinary approach and

often research collaboration with scholars from different fields of academia. Indeed,

play studies present an inter-discipline (Henricks 2008, 171), and the thesis at hand is

based on an interdisciplinary theoretical framework connecting digital culture with

childhood studies and play cultures of adults and intergenerational players.

The thesis at hand represents exploratory research, “the soul of good research.” It

consists of an attempt to discover something new and interesting by working through

a research topic (Swedberg 2020, 17). The thesis title pays homage to Katherine

Isbister’s work, How Games Move Us: Emotion by Design from 2016 and, in this way,

celebrates the advancements made in (digital) game studies. I aim to complement

the ideas associated with movement in gameplay by presenting supplementary views

focusing on play outside but adjacent to digital gaming, namely in toy-play enabled

by digital devices and platforms.

This thesis, conducted for digital culture, attempts to answer this question first:

“How has play moved human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 in terms

of physical, cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?” The sub-question

inquires about the kinds of digital play encountered in interactions of people of

different ages as part of technologically enhanced leisure, learning, and environments,

where play is increasingly happening remotely, with and through machines and social

media platforms by asking: “How are the acts of play realized in each instance of

play through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing have for

the players in each study?”

These questions are answered in the six research publications, a collection of

book chapters, journal articles, and two conference papers, all offering eclectic but

informative perspectives on 21st-century play enabled by the use of digital devices and

platforms. These studies were selected as they represent a wide variety of instances of

engagement with the play machines that during each time throughout the doctoral

research allowed a different and timely perspective to toys, technology, and mobility.

The common denominator for the studies is play (see Figure 3.).

Methods

Figure 3. A word cloud was created to give an overview of the most common words identifying

the main focus of the research publications — play.

The investigations that have led to the evolution of the thesis are ingrained in

areas of media and communication studies, cultural studies — mainly studies in

toys, games, and play experiences — early education studies, and the field of human-

computer interaction. They aim to shed light on the practices of players of many ages,

whose playing is captured in different contexts, environments, and circumstances.

What play means to the player and what it does to the player are intriguing questions

that this thesis aims to answer from the perspectives of the case studies presented.

This section provides information on the means and motivations for data collection

and analysis of the studies conducted.

The thesis at hand lays out a detailed investigation of play through six studies in

which I have employed a case study methodology. Case studies refer to a research

method that engages in the close, detailed examination of a single example or

phenomenon (Calhoun 2002). Gerring (2004, 342) offers a useful definition of case

studies by suggesting that a case study is “an intensive study of a single unit for the

purpose of understanding a larger class of (similar) units.” “One of the primary virtues

of the case study method is the depth of analysis that it offers” (Gerring 2004, 348). In

line with Takeuchi (2012, 37), who has studied playing, learning, and growing with

digital media, I have opted to conduct the research through a case study methodology

employing suitable research methods chosen based on the area and participants

of each study because it “provides rich details on the processes, relationships, and

contexts.” Whereas case studies may not be generalizable, they can expand theory

(Yin 2003; Flyvbjerg 2006). The methodology chosen for the set of case studies was

intended to provide a rich, detailed picture of technologically oriented play in which

players are seen as imaginers, creatives, learners, and socializing subjects. Therefore,

this thesis takes a play-centric and a player-centric approach.

Katriina Heljakka

Jagoda and McDonald (2018) claim that the success of a game ultimately depends

on experience design that privileges the prospective player. Obviously, the same idea

applies to other kinds of play experiences as well — we need to let the players tell us

about their ways of playing. How, then, do we make sense of the diversity of play and

different groups of players?

In this thesis, the overall research method is qualitative with a descriptive design

to present the object(s) of study vividly and truthfully, acknowledging their richness

in all ways possible. It relies on content analysis (Ackland 2013) as the primary method

of approaching the data. This thesis takes the form of six case studies (forreference,

see, e.g., Yin 2016) examining devices and technology platforms in three broad

categories associated with toy play and play machines: mobile devices, social media

platforms, and social robotics.

“Understanding a specific medium requires a conceptualization that understands

and accounts for the specific characteristics of that medium” (De Grove et al.

2014,221). The central theme connecting these studies is the mobility, movement,

and emotions experienced in play. By highlighting the movement of digitally enabled

play, the thesis contributes to the area of play research considered from life-long and

life-wide perspectives, including leisure, learning, and productive play.

Marshall and Rossman (2011) categorize case studies as a major genre of

qualitative studies. These six case studies have been chosen as this thesis’s focus for

several reasons. Each is an exemplar in its particular area and has inspired other

research with similar features. Each case illustrates different kinds of play employing

various technologies previously identified as instruments that, in some way, enhance

play. In each case study, I have aimed to consider how play moves the player’s body

and mind within various spaces and contexts.

Four publications represent co-produced research that emerged from a

collaboration between academics in various stages in their scholarly careers. In two

studies (Articles IV and VI), the author was the sole contributor responsible for

ideating, designing, conducting, writing, and publishing the research.

While each publication offers a unique perspective into the broader theme of

how play moves us in mobile and emotional ways through the use of digital devices

and platforms, the author has sought to puzzle out common themes and, in this way,

bind the sub-studies together by reading the players, play machines, and related play

patterns through a similar lens — that of acknowledging and appreciating each age

group and context the playing happens in.

3.1. Playful Approaches to Qualitative Research Methodology

Research on play may be innovative in bending rules of thought, action, and

behavior. Firat and Venkatesh (1995, 251) write that “the joys of doing research must

be found not in the pursuit of a holy grail of singular knowledge but in capturing

many exploratory moments.”

Methods

Throughout the studies, playful approaches have been used to complement

traditional qualitative research methodology (e.g., Creswell & Creswell 2017; Strauss

& Corbin 1998). For example, children’s digital play cultures ask for explorative

angles to be taken in research (Lundtofte 2020). Parallel to traditional methods

of inquiry, the author has sought to be innovative in approaching the overarching

research question: How has play moved us between 2010–2020 in association with

device use — toys and play machines?

“All opportunities have a genesis: the processes of preparing, arranging, trying

out, and relating, which place you in a position where you can transform occasions

into opportunities and opportunities into actualities” (Hjorth 2005, 387). Alongside

one-on-one interviews, an often-used technique to collect participant data, the studies

included in this thesis employ unorthodox research methods, such as participatory

play interviews and play-tests.

Stenros states that most game researchers recognize themselves as active players

(Stenros 2015, 26). The “autoplay” I have been pursuing as a toy researcher since

the beginning of my research, i.e., autoethnographic play based on personal play,

self-reflection, documentation, and artistic activity, has become a natural way of

looking at the multifaceted phenomenon of play (Heljakka 2013). According to

Chang (2008, 89–102), such material aimed at self-perception and self-reflection is

important for play research. Harnessing digital technology in my own play practices,

for example, digital photography and toy-based photoplay, has also opened up my

understanding of the creative play activities of other toy players. My autoplay — the

autoethnographic research method — my personal and public manifestations of

play with my toys, often carried out with a digital camera or smartphone and with

social media sharing in mind — thus complements the understanding of play as a

phenomenon throughout this thesis. It has a fundamental meaning also for why the

first study reported in Article I was initiated.

The research includes digital ethnography (or netnography) to complement offline

participatory observation. Kozinets (2002, 62) has defined netnography as “a new

qualitative research methodology that adapts ethnographic research techniques to

the study of cultures and communities emerging through electronic networks.”

Netnographies can be short and focused on a single community. Following

the blogging, tweeting, videocasting, podcasting, social networking, and virtual

environments of adult toy players has informed the author about more details about

adult toy play than other empirical data could.

Furthermore, innovativeness has been a prerequisite for research involving

interaction with live subjects during the COVID-19 pandemic. In this thesis, two of

the studies published at the end of the project were carried out subject to pandemic

restrictions, meaning that the researchers needed to seek alternative approaches in

reaching interviewees and following study sessions focusing on playful learning. This

is where techniques carried out over distance came into question — for example,

Katriina Heljakka

research interviews were carried out over e-mail as well as through Messenger and

Instagram messaging. Article VI relies entirely on media material collected in post-

pandemic times by watching the movie Ron’s Gone Wrong (2021) and analyzing its

transcribed dialogue and news media articles.

3.1.1. Triangulation

The empirical background of this thesis builds on the idea of triangulation, meaning

that the phenomenon under scrutiny is approached from different directions. This

is known as data sources triangulation (Martella et al. 2013). “The triangulation

essential to social scientific advance demands the employment of a variety of (viable)

methods, including the case study” (Gerring 2004, 353).

Triangulation protocols are used to ensure accuracy and alternative explanations

of the data (Stake 1995). This was accomplished by collecting data from different

sources (i.e., adult players, preschool children, and their teachers) and using content

analysis methods (e.g., thematic analysis). The concepts and themes related to self-

directed play were expected to emerge from the multiple data sources.

3.2. Research Participants, Materials, and Research

Questions

Technological devices are essential in capturing, storing, and analyzing research

materials that are visual evidence for this research. Research materials, again, present

a collection of various forms of data ranging from transcribed qualitative interview

material, field notes from observations, play-test recordings, photographs, and videos,

including self-produced material by the children (drawings of IoToys) and adult toy

players (photoplay they have published on social media platforms and allowed the

researcher to use as part of the studies).

Before starting work on the research presented here, I had established a good

relationship with a local preschool and had initiated other studies co-designed with

two preschool teachers. For this reason, cooperation with the preschool continued in

fruitful collaboration.

The participants of the studies were between 5 and 75 years of age, and they

were chosen according to the approach used in convenience sampling (also known

as availability sampling). “Convenience sampling methods place primary emphasis

on generalizability (i.e., ensuring that the knowledge gained is representative of the

population from which the sample was drawn)” (Etikan et al. 2016, 4). The author

also considered which age group would be the most suitable to address, depending

on the form of play under investigation. To exemplify, most IoToys are recommended

for ages five years and up. As the researchers found it essential to conduct play-testing

with an appropriate target audience, the groups of 5–7-year-old preschoolers in the

Methods

context of Finnish early education came into question. This study is reported in

Article II. The study that aimed to investigate the robot dog as part of playful learning

in a kindergarten context was conducted later with groups of children of the same age

within the same preschool.

The adult participants who joined the research through interviews and self-

produced photoplay (Articles I and IV) can be described as experienced toy players

from Finland, the U.K., and Singapore. Again, the adults who joined the online survey

for the study presented in Article III have a firm background in geocaching practices.

Due to the international scope of the survey, they came from different countries. It

is important to note that some of the adults had participated in studies I had carried

out earlier. Some adults were interviewees for all three studies (Articles I, III, IV)

conducted.

It is also necessary to point out that most of the playthings, alongside the devices

that support the play with them, scrutinized in the case studies of this thesis, focus

on play material created by the American toy (and movie!) industry, namely Barbie

and Ken fashion dolls, and Blythe dolls (Article I), the multiple IoToys (Article II and

Article VI), and the Golden Pup robot dog (Article V).

The more universal teddy bears presented in reference to the publication on

pandemic toy play (Article IV) traverse the boundaries of North America. Lastly, the

B*Bot conceptualized in Article VI as a fictitious IoToys character also has its actual

toy version on the market, still with fewer features than depicted in the speculative toy

fiction Article VI scrutinizes. A detailed summary of research participants, materials,

methods, and research (sub)questions used in each study are gathered in Table 1.

3.3. Research Ethics

The research has followed the ethical guidance of the Finnish National Board of

Integrity (TENK 2019; 2021) concerning human subjects in human sciences. Still, it

has not been externally reviewed by a research ethics board. However, the guidelines

have been followed carefully, especially concerning child participants who joined

the researchers in the context of early education, namely Finnish preschool. The

preschool teachers took part in the design of the play-test sessions and approved the

final implementation. They were present during all sessions. According to guidelines,

research permission was also asked from the participating children and their parents

before data gathering occurred.

100

Katriina Heljakka

Publication

Context,

setting, players

(participants), and

sampling

Method data

collection and

analysis

Research (sub-)

questions discussed

in the thesis

Perspec tive on

digital play as

presented in the

thesis

Article I

“From Displays

and Dioramas to

Doll Dramas. Adult

World Building and

World Playing with

Toys.”

American Journal

of Play, volume 11,

number 3, 351–378.

Context: Adult

world- play

(pre-pandemic)

Age of players in

sample: Mature

players aged 25+

years

Media articles and

in-depth interviews

conducted as play

interviews

Convenience

sampling

Participant sample

size (n=4 adult toy

players)

Year data collected:

2015

Participatory

play interviews

and observation

(ethnography,

digital ethnography)

photographs,

(in- situ), (social)

media materials

(Instagram

photographs,

news articles,

netnography)

How do adult toy

players actively

engage in world-

building in their

world- play?

Playing with the

Camera as part of

world-play practices

Article II

“Persuasive

Toy Friends and

Preschoolers:

Play test in g IoToy s. ”

In Giovanna

Mascheroni &

Donell Holloway

(Eds.) The Internet

of Toys: Practices,

Affordances and the

Political Economy

of Children’s Play.

Palgrave Macmillan,

159 –176.

Context: Early

childhood education

(pre-pandemic)

Age of players

in sample:

Preschoolers aged

5–7 year s

Convenience

sampling

Participant sample

size (n=20)

Collaboration with a

preschool group in

Finland

Year data collected:

in 2017

Play-test recordings

(in-situ), group

interviews,

photographs, videos

Identification of

themes based on

the interviews,

audiovisual

data, and notes

of participant

observation

What could this

toy teach you, and

how would you play

with it?

a) alone with the toy

b) with other

children

Playing with

Internet-connected

toys as part of

playful learning

in Finnish early

education

Article III

“Toy tourism.

From Travel Bugs

to characters with

wanderlust.” In

Nicky van Es, Stijn

Reijnders, Leonieke

Bolderman &

Abby Waysdor f

(Eds.) Locating

Imagination.

Popular Culture,

Tourism &

Belonging.

Routledge, 183–199.

Context:

Intergenerational

and hybrid play

(pre-pandemic)

Age of players in

sample: Mature

players

Convenience

sampling

Participant sample

size: In-depth

interviews (n=7)

Survey answers

(n=45)

Year data collected:

in 2017

Interviews and

online survey

materials,

photographs

What are the

imaginative,

creative, and social

toy play practices

and the physic al

aspects of toy

mobility?

Playing with the

Smartphone in

the context of toy

tourism (or toyrism)

as part of paidic and

ludic practices

101

Methods

Publication

Context,

setting, players

(participants), and

sampling

Method data

collection and

analysis

Research (sub-)

questions discussed

in the thesis

Perspec tive on

digital play as

presented in the

thesis

Article IV

“Liberated

through teddy

bears: Resistance,

resourcefulness and

resilience in toy play

during the COVID-19

pandemic.”

International

Journal of Play,

December 2021,

387–4 04.

Context:

Intergenerational

and hybrid play

(during the

pandemic)

Age of players in

sample: Mature

players aged 45–75

years

Convenience

sampling

Participant sample

size (n=7)

Year data collected:

2020

Online media

articles (news, blog

writings), social

media postings

(images on Twitter

and Instagram),

brief inter views

with adult mature

toy players

supplemented with

their photoplay

Interview questions:

Did you participate

in the teddy

challenge in spring

and summer 2020?

Tell about your

toy play activities

during March–June

2020.

Please send

examples of

photoplay created

during the COVID-19

pandemic.

Playing with the

Screens with/

through social

media during times

of the Covid-19

pandemic

Article V

“Playing with

the Opposite of

Uncanny: Playful

Learning with

a Companion

Technology Robot

Dog vs. A Real Dog.”

Proceedings of CHI

Play’2020, Virtual

event, 2–4.11.2020,

262–266.

Context: Early

childhood

education (during

the pandemic)

Age of players

in sample:

Preschoolers aged

5–7 year s

Collaboration with a

preschool group

Convenience

sampling

Participant sample

size (n=16)

Year data collected:

2020

Learning situation

recordings

(audiovisual),

group interviews,

photographs, and

videos (in situ)

What empathic

responses guided

by SEL-related

activities can be

achieved in playful

learning with a

robot dog versus a

living dog?

Playing with S ocial

Robots (i.e., a

robotic dog and

a live dog) in the

preschool learning

context as part of

playful learning of

prosocial skills

Article VI

“Reading Ron Right:

Speculative Toy

Fiction, Friendship

and Design of

Future IoToys.” In

Proceedings of the

25th International

Academic Mindtrek

Conference

16–-18.11.2022,

334–338.

Context:

Speculative

toy fiction

(post-pandemic)

Age of (fic tional)

players in sample:

11 years

Year data collected:

2022

News media articles

on the movie and

transcription of

movie dialogue

were found online.

What are the key

affordances of the

fictitious B*bot

robot “Ron”?

Playing with

speculative toy

fiction (i.e., playing

with fictitious

“B*bots as “future

IoToys ”)

Table 1. Research data, analysis methods, and critical questions summarized.

3.3.1. Recruiting subjects and requesting their permission

Good research that involves human participants asks for respectful treatment of

them. Informed consent underpinned the research undertaken in the case studies:

This means asking the participants about their willingness to participate voluntarily

in the study and explaining the research aims. All informants have consented

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Katriina Heljakka

to the information used in an academic context as part of publications, such as

journal articles, book chapters, and conference papers. For case studies II and V, the

researchers prepared information sheets and consent forms, which were distributed

via the preschool teachers to the children’s families to familiarize themselves and, if

giving their consent, to be signed before the planned data gathering. The research

work performed in the context of preschools was conducted with the adequate

understanding and written informed consent of the head of the preschoolers and

their parents.

3.4. Responsible Data Management

Ethical considerations were made throughout the data management process, which

began with the planning, creating, and collecting of consent forms for studies II

and V, in which children took part (see APPENDICES I–II): First, the researcher(s)

informed the participants about the nature of and the motivation for gathering the

particular data that would be collected. The preschool teachers helped the researchers

distribute the forms to the parents before the study began. In the studies that involved

the participation of adult interviews made in person (Article I) and during the

COVID-19 pandemic in online environments (e-mail, Instagram, and Messenger,

Article IV), participants were observed in offline and online play environments. Due

to the sensitive nature of the data, the safe storage, transfer, use, and preservation

of data were acknowledged by the participating researchers. For example, the data

were securely stored on hardware drives behind passwords only known to the

researcher(s). Informed consent was collected from both the participating children

and their parents. The videos of the group sessions were used in the analysis. The

anonymity of the participating children was ensured in the storage, analysis, and

publication of research after generating and collecting the data. The metadata were

made searchable and accessible through the publications. Other data were not made

interoperable or reusable due to their sensitive nature.

In reporting the findings, the researcher(s) strived to treat the participants

with dignity as respectfully as possible. Anonymization practices were used with

consideration of the sensitivity of the participants, in this case for studies II and V,

in which the participants were preschool-aged children. In the procession of data,

participant names were replaced with pseudonyms except in case studies (namely

in studies reported in Articles I and III) in which the participants are identifiable

through their self-selected pseudonyms that connect the toy characters they play

with with the human personalities behind their online presence (e.g., Facebook and

Instagram accounts), and possible instances of photoplay that they have posted on

social media platforms were requested separately by the researcher to be included in

the publications (see Articles I–V).

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Methods

Studies reported in articles I, IV, and VI employ supplementary materials, such

as (news) media articles, as secondary data sets. This decision is grounded in the idea

of making visible the timeliness and geographical width of the research subject under

scrutiny to illustrate how the phenomenon of a study is not a concern of the location

where research takes place but, instead, unfolds as an international (Western) matter.

3.5. Data Analysis

The data analysis phase involves organizing and interpreting the data to answer the

research questions. The researchers used qualitative content and thematic analysis

methods to identify key themes that emerged in the data. Following Patton’s (2002)

model, our analysis in each case study involved making sense of the data by reducing

the volume of raw information followed by identifying significant patterns and,

finally, drawing meaning from the materials and subsequently building a logical

chain of evidence. To explore our data, we conducted a thematic content analysis.

Thematic analysis is a qualitative research method in which researchers identify

novel items and recurring patterns in a data set and organize these observations into

broader themes (Braun & Clarke 2006). It offers a flexible means of summarizing

critical features of a body of data, condensing extensive data sets in a way responsive

to their particularities and linked to the pre-existing research literature. Thematic

content analysis involves an inductive, reflexive process focusing on emerging ideas

and thematic structures (Hsieh & Shannon 2005). The thematic analysis includes

three major stages: identification of broad themes, subthemes, and their naming.

Similarities and differences across the data set can be highlighted as especially

useful for cross-cultural comparison (Braun & Clarke 2006). In the multiple case

studies of this thesis field, observation notes, photographs, audiovisual recordings

were all subjected to thematic analysis by organizing the individual data into themes

and making sense of these emerging themes in relation to and when answering the

research questions of each case study. On a broader level, in a synthesis made based on

cross-examination of each case study, the author then landed at the six perspectives

of device use in play, provided by the play machines central for each case, namely

1) Digital cameras, 2) Internet-connected toys, 3) Smartphones, 4) Screens with/

through social media, 5) Social robots, and 6) Speculative toy fiction.

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Katriina Heljakka

4. Case Studies

With my research, I participate in formulating an understanding of the state of play

by sharing ideas on the evolution of technologically driven play during 2010–2020.

While the articles of the thesis function as case studies representing multifaceted

aspects of contemporary play, they are by no means exhaustive. The challenge

with investigating play is familiar to anyone researching human culture: Once it is

adequately documented, scrutinized, and theorized, it has already moved to new

realms with new tools, environments, and functions for other researchers to grasp.

At the beginning of the 2020s, online and hybrid forms of play are as prevalent

as ever. With the global health crises, players have employed their imagination and

innovation in terms of play probably more than before. Thus, digital technology has

enabled us to be social players, even if physically present social interaction has been

limited for many.

As the articles presented as part of this thesis show, various forms of play differ in

their relationships to the key themes of the thesis — movement, and emotions.

To follow Jagoda and McDonald’s (2018) distinction between a proceduralist

focus on the play experience (which emphasizes rules, objectives, and systems) and a

play-centric focus (which emphasizes modes of player response), this thesis aims to

bring to attention the latter, accentuating a player-centric focus.

A commonality among the diverse case studies is their shared interest in digital

play as a practiced and lived experience associated with character toys, or “toys with

a face” (Heljakka 2013).31 In the selection of articles, each publication provides

a perspective on the practices of players as part of digital culture and does so by

focusing on different contexts and demographics of players, from preschoolers to

adults, as well as play as an intergenerational activity.

The rationale for including the inspection of players of different ages in the

study is to make the perspective on play as wide as possible and to illustrate the role

of digital technology in the lives of active players in different contexts. Each of the

studies presents empirical data on novel play scenarios of players of different ages and

highlights a unique perspective on how play moves us in a digital and connected age

as both a life-long and life-wide phenomenon.

4.1. Author’s Role in the Design, Execution, and Reporting

of Studies

In each of the six case studies, the author functioned as the lead author and

corresponding author, meaning that she was the driving force in generating the

31 In this thesis, the notion of character toys extends to both anthropomorphizable and

zoomorphizable characters, which are related to digital technology.

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Case Studies

firsthand ideas and designs relating to play for the studies and who mainly contributed

to writing and polishing the published papers prior to publication.

In each study, the author functioned with the primary responsibility of producing

the studies into a published format as both an observer of the participants and a

fellow player among the researchers with a co-author role. In three of the case studies

conducted for this thesis, particularly in the data collection execution and analysis

phases (Articles II, III, and V), cooperation with research colleagues and choosing

the right avenues for publication has been an essential part of the process. In the

articles mentioned above, research colleagues have contributed to the theoretical

frameworks, ideating and organizing the data collection and structuring the findings.

The publication platforms illustrate a wide variety of scholarly avenues suitable

for publishing research on the cross-sectional areas of digital technology and play.

These avenues represent a diversity of fields following ideas presented by the Leiden

Manifesto (Hicks et al. 2015), which states that “historians and social scientists

require books and national language literature to be included in their publication

counts.” In contrast, computer scientists require conference papers to be counted. As

a researcher based in the area of digital humanities and one with a solid connection

to the areas of toy and play research, I consider it vital to have published the research

on a wide array of platforms, with each of their traditions and requirements regarding

the structuring and formatting of the research. Nevertheless, what justifies choosing

the avenues for publication is that in each case, they have represented a suitable and

timely channel to participate in scholarly discussions on human interaction with the

world — through world-building, Internet-connected toys, toy tourism, hybrid and

transgenerational play with teddy bears, robotic dogs, and speculative toy fiction.

Notably, the reporting of studies has taken place in journals, edited volumes, and

conferences, which all welcome the publication of studies interested in play: The

articles are published in the American Journal of Play (2019) and the International

Journal of Play (2021); the edited volumes are on toys and popular culture tourism,

in which the chapters included in this thesis published are by renowned publishing

houses Palgrave Macmillan (2019) and Routledge (2020), and the two conference

papers are published as part of the proceedings of the well-known conference series

CHI Play (2020) and Min d Trek (2022).

4.2. Description of Articles

This section provides an overview of the case studies conducted. Each study

represents case analyses and the performed activities and lived experiences of play. In

the following, I will describe the main content of each sub-study. I aim to answer what

digital technology is used, who is using it, and how it is used to play within each of the

studies included in the thesis. The following section on Findings delves deeper into

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Katriina Heljakka

the contexts of the case studies to connect them with the particular devices used in

play and the ongoing debates about movements occurring in the play phenomenon.

The first publication of this thesis is a journal article titled “From Displays and

Dioramas to Doll Dramas. Adult World Building and World Playing with Toys”

(Heljakka & Harviainen 2019), which focuses on adult toy play in the context of

world building conceptualized here as world-play. The rationale for the study

presented in the article is to find evidence for adult activities with toys that happen

beyond collecting artifacts and represent imaginative and creative uses of offline and

online space and storytelling. Such object-related activities represent the displaying,

making of dioramas, and creation of doll dramas in association with technologically

enhanced toy play, in this case playing with camera technology and engaging with

photoplay or toy photo- and videography. Movement in playing with cameras

emerges as imaginative and emotional as the toy character’s adventures are captured

as part of the spatial arrangement of objects and narrative accounts of their “lives”

before sharing on social media.

The second article, or a book chapter titled “Persuasive Toy Friends and

Preschoolers: Playtesting IoToys,” captures how preschool-aged children engage with

technological toys by employing Internet-connected toys as part of their preschool

play activities. The objective of the study reported in the chapter is to find out how

children of preschool age (between 5–7 years) appropriate IoToys as part of brief

play scenarios, including in play-tests and a group interview situation, to understand

better how actual play with these toys takes place and whether or not it conforms

to the toy designers’ and toy makers’ ideas and integration of various affordances

in the toys. According to this study, the role of movement in playing with Internet-

connected “toy friends” is multidimensional — it concretizes as physical, cognitive,

imaginative, and affectionate movement and in terms of spatial and mental mobility

of preschoolers.

The third publication is a book chapter named “Toy Tourism. From Travel Bugs

to Characters with Wanderlust” explores the mobilizing tendency of contemporary

character toys when played with in association with smartphones. These mobile

devices enable location-based tracking, simultaneous photography of toys, and

social sharing of their adventures, which takes place in geographical contexts beyond

the players’ domestic space. In this study, paidic and ludic forms (Caillois 1961) of

toy tourism were scrutinized by interviewing adult toy players who either travel

with their toys or set their toys out to travel on their own as part of programs or

as Travel Bugs within geocaching practices. Movement is central to toy tourism as

perceived by its physically mobilizing tendency. Parallel to physical movement within

geographical space, the adult players interviewed and surveyed for this study also

expressed emotions arising from involvement with traveling toys; for many, the toys

are considered trusted travel companions to the extent that they would not dare to

part ways with their toys to set them out traveling by themselves. On the other hand,

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Case Studies

players of Travel Bugs take pride in their “toy friends’” accomplishments of traveling

extensive miles during their adventures.

The fourth publication, a journal article, carries the title “Liberated through teddy

bears: Resistance, resourcefulness, and resilience in toy play during the COVID-19

Pandemic.” The study reported in this article investigates a widespread phenomenon

within play that occurred at the beginning of the COVID-19 pandemic — the teddy

challenge. The research for this study only involved adult players as informants.

Still, the supplementary materials made by the media articles included in the study,

as well as the testimonials made by the interviewees in their comments, reveal the

intergenerational nature of this play form, which became a global phenomenon

thanks to the sharing of play on social media platforms, namely Facebook and

Instagram. Teddy bears displayed in the windows in the name of the teddy challenge

moved the players physically by inviting families to take (safe) outings to spot teddies

in the windows. The teddies also moved the participants by spreading the communal

message of hope amidst a global crisis — “by playing together, we will survive this

together.”

The fifth article is a conference paper for which the study was produced during the

first year of the pandemic. The publication “Playing with the Opposite of Uncanny:

Playful Learning with a Companion Technology Robot Dog vs. A Real Dog” explains

a study on how a robotic dog in parallel to a live dog was used in playful learning

to enhance prosocial skills among preschoolers. This study involved 5–7-year-old-

children, who, by their participation in the playful learning sessions, could inform

the researcher about the potential to use social companion robots in the context of

early education. Socio-emotional learning (SEL) is a telling term about how we may

be moved socially and emotionally in play. Hence, this form of movement is critical

for the study reported.

The thesis ends with a closing sixth article on post-pandemic toy play — ”Reading

Ron Right: Speculative Toy Fiction, Friendship, and Design of Future IoToys” — that

simultaneously represents futuristic play — and, namely, speculative toy fiction

investigating what future toys could afford and what their role could be for post-

digital play.

4.3. Limitations of Studies

The limitations that pertain to this article-based dissertation study may first be

understood in terms of the researcher’s firsthand motivation to investigate digital play

by concentrating on its positive aspects. Regardless, a cautious attitude toward novel

play machines is a healthy and understandable way of approaching them, especially

with young players in mind. This thesis’s Introduction and Background sections has

extensively discussed the potential challenges (and benefits) of using technologies

in and for play. However, the studies undertaken do not investigate safety, security,

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Katriina Heljakka

and privacy related to Internet-connected play. Instead, play is seen as a common

category of behavior and a way of using mobile technologies in that play. Moreover,

if other people or players are hurt or otherwise mistreated in play, the behavior is no

longer about play but about control and abusive behavior gone wrong.

It is worth noting that in the studies reported in the articles, the author has not

asked the participants what they think about the beneficial or detrimental effects

of their engagement with the various play machines. The focus of the empirical

investigation has strictly concerned the perceivable play experiences, or experiences

related to playful learning, and the researcher’s interpretations of them.

The children who participated in the two studies (Articles II and V) represented

male- and female-identifying participants. The survey conducted for the study

reported in Article III produced answers from both male- and female-identifying

participants.32 What needs to be highlighted, however, is the gendered nature of the

adult participants interviewed for the other studies (Articles I and IV) who were all

female-identifying — this produces a gender bias.33 The ethnicity of the participants

was not inquired.

All research conducted for this thesis involves activities associated with character

toys (dolls, action figures, and soft toys). Studies conducted with other types of toys,

such as construction toys (building sets) or toy vehicles (toy cars), could produce

different kinds of findings.

Future researchers will capture the nature of post-Covid-19 play in more detail.

Still, this thesis aims to highlight how play moved us through its mobilizing and

emotional tendencies before and during the pandemic of 2020 and through an

investigation of speculative toy fiction, even beyond that. It is, therefore, necessary to

stress the conditions in which play has taken place in the pre-, mid-, and immediate

post-stages of the pandemic, which have undoubtedly influenced play — and an

upsurge in device-based and network-connected activities regarded here as play — in

many ways.

Finally, a crucially relevant note on the context in which this thesis has been

produced: It should be stressed and acknowledged that while digital play is a global

issue (Erdogan et al. 2019), the thesis at hand is the work of a Scandinavian researcher

32 The researcher is not aware of any transgender or non-binary participants (perhaps

apart from the Ken doll, who has a player-generated backstory in Article I).

33 Even the gender of the researcher may affect the tendency to perceive play in a particular

way. To exemplify, Birgitta Almqvist (1992), a Swedish play researcher, claims that play

researchers who are male clearly see the transition from play to games, to competition,

to sports, while those who identify as female scholars see the transition from play to

intimate conversation, to drama, poetry, and art. In this thesis, the researcher aimed

to account for as many perspectives of play as possible. Nevertheless, there is an

accentuation in open-ended play (paidia) over more structured, goal-oriented, and even

competitive play (ludus).

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Case Studies

of play, who first and foremost studies play from a Western perspective, in particular

focusing most notably on play content (produced with physical digital devices and

playthings, on social media platforms) produced in and controlled from the North

American territory. Furthermore, although European and Asian research is regarded

as relevant in constructing a theoretical framework for the thesis, it is necessary to

highlight the influence of British and North American scholarship in play that has

enabled the publishing of the articles in this thesis.

Alma Gottlieb (2018, 14; c.f. in Rossie 2021, 463) observes how Europeans and

North Americans only represent 5% of the world’s population. Hence, doing research

in and of this context creates a bias, which brings to the fore WEIRD, a situation noted

by Henrich, Heine, and Norenzayan (2010). The “WEIRD” world acronym stands

for the “White-Educated-Industrialized-Rich [world from] Democratic [countries].”

Thus, it is fair to say that generalized explanations for play cannot be given from

research representing such a scarce part of the world’s population. Similarly, it is

justified to claim that the studies included in this thesis only capture a microscopic

view of the current play cultures of the world.

The focus of the American Journal of Play, indeed, is focused on matters of

play explored from a Western context. In contrast, the International Journal of Play

represents a broader perspective on play. However, while the chapters published

in books by Palgrave Macmillan and Routledge represent work published in the

U.K./U.S., the editorial work for these two volumes is international, meaning that

scholars from countries like Italy, Australia, and the Netherlands have been involved

in the editorial work. Finally, the conference papers published with CHI Play and

MindTrek involve editorial teams with international backgrounds. All of the outlets

mentioned above have welcomed the interdisciplinary work that the publications of

this thesis entail. In this way, these platforms for publication recognize the necessity

for multidisciplinary inquiry that research on play demands.

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Katriina Heljakka

5. Findings

This section of the thesis presents the main findings of each case study. It analyzes

the studies as part of a synthesis of the mobile and emotional perspectives on

digitalizing and Internet-connected play of contemporary times. Each case study

illustrates performances during digital play through human engagement with digital

technology. The key findings of the case studies and main contributions of research

are summarized in Figure 4. and Table 2.

PLAYING WITH THE CAMERA: Movement happens cognively within toy

players’ imaginaon and creavity in photoplay, physically, within the

inmacy of the home as part of toy displays and dioramas, and digitally

through socially shared doll dramas online. Emoonal movement is

generated as players form relaons with the toy characters.

PLAYING WITH CONNECTED TOYS: Movement results from the

players’ physical (and social) interacon, from cognive and

imaginave engagement by employing the toys’ aordances (physical,

pre-programmed, and educaonal aordances), and from emoonal

bonding invited by the ‘toy friends’ persuasion strategies for nurture

and care.

PLAYING WITH SMARTPHONES: Movement results from physical

(and geographical) mobility of the toys, as part of the cognive and

imaginave engagement with the character toys’ travels oine and

online, and emoonally, from the (oen long-term) relaonships

established between players and the toy personalies with wanderlust.

PLAYING WITH/THROUGH SCREENS ON SOCIAL MEDIA: Movement

results emoonally and imaginavely in the players minds by engaging

with the teddy bears and their stories displayed in windows, and

physically as part of making the toy displays, or on players’ walking tours

with the (game-like) goals of the teddy challenge in mind.

PLAYING WITH SOCIAL ROBOTS: Movement results from the players’

physical (and social) interacon with the roboc dog from cognive

and imaginave engagement by employing the toys’ aordances and

support from early educaon experts guiding the playful learning

situaon aiming at prosocial skill-building, and from emoonal bonding

invited by the ‘dogs’ cute appearance as the ‘opposite of uncanny.’

PLAYING WITH SPECULATIVE TOY FICTION: Movement results from the

physical mobility of the toy robot when interacng with the player,

and emoonal movement in the players’ mind through establishing

a friendship with the robot.

Figure 4. Findings of the case studies summarized.

111

Findings

5.1. Article I: Playing with the Camera

Article I of the thesis discussed in this section — “From Displays and Dioramas

to Doll Dramas: Adult World Building and World Playing with Toys” (Heljakka &

Harviainen 2019) — focuses on how the digital camera has been used by adults

for photoplay to capture displays, dioramas, doll dramas in toy play in the 2010s.

The study, conducted in pre-pandemic times, encapsulates movement generated

in and through play with digital technology as manifestations of the imagination,

materials, spatial arrangement of artifacts, and images of toy-infused environments

with or without the presence of character toys, conceptualized as world-play. “Central

to world-play is its relationship to technology and media” (Heljakka & Harviainen

2019, 359).

***

According to Koltay (2011), visual communication and information are becoming

more important. “In a world that is increasingly populated with stories from the

media, the reality is — now more than ever — governed by media technology and

images,” write Reijnders et al. (2020, 2). Research on the use of (digital) camera

technologies positions photography as a form of play (Heljakka 2012a; 2016; 2018a;

2023). “Theuse of camera technologies […] has become an integral part of toy play

Figure B.

112

Katriina Heljakka

today” (see, e.g., Heljakka 2016). Due to these developments, toy play has become

a more visual phenomenon, and consequently, play a more oculocentric, or vision-

based, practice.

The first case study of the thesis conducted with play machines centers around

digital camera use as technological devices that enable creativity and storytelling

through photoplay when combined with character toys. Research on play with devices

that enable creative expression is bridging play research with creativity research.

Creative play encompasses the transformation of information and awareness of new

connections, with an element of surprise. Creative play allows design, exploration,

trying out new ideas, and using the imagination with different tools, props, and

equipment (Hughes 2002).

Mathematician and computing educator Seymour Papert saw computers

alongside multimedia cultures, to provide children with “an autonomous zone free

from parental control” and, Kline (2004, 136) adds, “in which children constructed

and bonded through self-made play interactions”.34

The role of computers as creative tools has been noted by Resnick (2006, 1), who

sees their potential beyond processors of information and more as a resource for

human expression:

[…] in my view, computers will not live up to their potential until we start to think of

them less like televisions and more like paintbrushes. That is, we need to start seeing

computers not simply as information machines, but also as a new medium for creative

design and expression.

Similarly, Pesce has noted how the computer “can engage us as an intellectual

partner, playmate, or artistic palette” (Pesce 2000, 65). Sicart (2014, 99) has described

play and computation as “fellow travelers” as both enable ways of being expressively

in the world.35 Digital cameras as play machines function in a similar way.

34 For more on Papert’s work, see (1980) Mindstorms: Children, Computers, and Powerful

Ideas. New York: Basic Books, and (1993) The Children’s Machine: Rethinking School in

the Age of the Computer. New York: Basic Books.

35 In 2001, when articulating the relationship between computers and media, Lev

Manovich wrote: “There is no reason to privilege the computer as a machine for the

exhibition and distribution of media over the computer as a tool for media production

or as a media storage device. All have the same potential to change existing cultural

languages.” Coining the camera as a “new media machine,” Manovich (2001, 5) noted

the new media revolution as “– the shift of all culture to computer-mediated forms

of production, distribution, and communication.” These aspects are all relevant when

considering the movement related to technologies to what can be conceptualized as play

machines.

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Cascone (2000) has perceived “digital” as a “spectatorial condition” whereby “we

filter and graze, skim and forward.” Laricchia (2022) captures essential information

about cameras, which are:

[…] optical devices used for recording images, either as individual still photographs

or as part of a series of images such as in a video. Cameras operate using electronic

sensors or photographic film to capture visible light or other electromagnetic spectrum

segments. The first lasting photograph was made in 1826, captured on pewter covered

with bitumen. Today, most consumers own a camera in some form, although the

increasing popularity of smartphone cameras has meant less demand for stand-alone

camera products. Since reaching a peak of over 121 million in 2010, shipments of digital

still cameras have decreased to around eight million units.

“The perceived opportunities for action [in play] exist in objects such as toys but

also in other parts of the environment” (Bergen 2015, 436). Here, these opportunities

emerge from the physical environment, such as doll houses and room boxes in the

domestic space, but also from technology the player has access to while interacting

with toys. “Technologies mold and expand individuals’ relationships with objects”

(Ruckenstein 2013, 479), which has consequences for play. This also impacts how

new literacies are constructed. “The affordances of new technologies and the

saturation of media in different forms are reshaping when and how stories are

told” (Garcia 2017, 715).

Paul Dourish introduces the notion of “coupling” with technology. Objects are

coupled with technologies, and when technologies are coupled with our bodies, they

provide variable and flexible coupling opportunities for people to use them (Dourish

2001; cf. in Isbister 2016a).

Although a camera (or mobile device with a camera function) can be metaphorically

interpreted as a toy, it still has a function outside of playing. A photography device

can be considered a toy when it is intentionally perceived as a toy camera (i.e., a “toy

camera,” e.g., Diana- or LOMO-type cameras, or further back in history with the

Brownie cameras designed by Frank Brownell; see, e.g., Schlereth 1985). Toy cameras

are simple film cameras whose material (including the lens) is almost exclusively

made of plastic. Despite their name, toy cameras include a photography feature,

meaning they can take “real” photos. Toy cameras can be used to capture firsthand

toys on film, but here, the attention turns to digital cameras, which represent play

machines from the perspective of the thesis. When photographing toys (or engaging

in photoplay), the digital camera becomes an extension of its player, whose image-

producing function allows the photoplay to be shared on social media platforms in

a digital format providing possibilities for digital play. In this case, the camera also

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becomes a secondary “toy” to be used in play.36 Therefore, it is the first digital device

conceptualized in this thesis as a play machine.

Whenever adults imagine and create, says Gray (2015, 126), they are, to some

degree, playing. To an increasing extent, adults simultaneously employ cameras in

combination with dolls, action figures, and soft toys to create photoplay (Heljakka

2012a), still or animated toy photography, or videography. As a result of their

interaction with these character toys, mature players use their self-expression and

storytelling skills to narrate the “lives” of their dolls, which are then shared on online

platforms. Toys with a face — the so-called character toys — have found their way

into the experience world of players of all ages, and various dolls that are particularly

well-suited to posing, dressing, and putting on hairstyles are very popular with both

children and adult players. Adult world-play with contemporary character toys such

as My Little Pony (Hasbro) and dolls like Blythe (Tomy Takara) and Ken and Barbie

(Mattel) use the backstories of the toys (meaning their physical appearance, name,

and possible personality description) either as a springboard to extend the original

narratives or challenge these invitations to play altogether by creative customization

practices regarding altering of the toys’ aesthetics and contesting of their industry-

given backstories, such as narratives about personalities. In other words, in the

object play practices of adults, original meanings given to the toys by their designers,

producers, and marketers are either re-played, re-imagined, and even revolutionized.

The intentions of a toy designer and the expectations placed on the toy object

about the uses are ultimately based on assumptions, the realization of which can

be examined by analyzing player experiences. In this context, the concept of play

knowledge becomes significant. Play knowledge (including usage information and

context information, i.e., how and in what context an object has been used) refers

primarily to information related to play patterns (Heljakka 2015). A digital camera is

an essential tool for capturing play knowledge. Still, as observed, when used as part of

photoplay, it can also be regarded as a “toy technology” and a play machine in itself.

Photoplay represents toy-related and culturally significant play knowledge

that, when documented and shared, contains features of both creative and playful

activities. When researching photoplay, my focus is on 1) the creative, regular,

36 To complicate the image-making and recording capacity of toys even further, we may

turn to Barbie, the iconic fashion doll. Toy manufacturing together with popular culture

illustrates how camera technology has previously been integrated into a physical toy

character, namely Barbie. A creation of Mattel, the discontinued Barbie® Video Girl™

is described on Mattel’s website as follows: “It’s Barbie® doll vision! Create movies from

Barbie® doll’s point-of-view with a real video camera inside Barbie® doll (the camera lens

is in the necklace and the video screen on back). Includes USB plug-in cord. For ages

6 and over” (Mattel Global Consumer Support 2023). The hybrid doll was ironically

referred to in the dialogue of The Barbie Movie of 2023: “And Barbie Video Girl. I have

a TV in my back. You know whose dream that is? Nobody. Nobody’s dream” (Gerwig &

Baumbach 2023).

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repetitive, productive, and therefore playful features of toy play made visible on social

media and 2) the play knowledge that players of toys produce. Again, play knowledge

is based on the documentation produced and presented by the players themselves

on the one hand and the other hand on the material structured by the researcher

(forreference, see Heljakka 2015; 2022).

By employing characters, the results of photoplay illustrate existing similarities

between toy stories and gameful worlds. Avatars are a familiar concept in digital

games. For example, Wohlwend and Peppler (2013) observe that designing a

personalized avatar was the first step in entering the online community barbiegirls.

com. “When people play together as avatars, the game transforms from a private,

personal journey into real social interaction” (Isbister 2016b, 52). Westecott (2008)

observes how much of the digital play experience is mediated by the presence of a

game avatar or player character — the player’s representation in the game in a similar

vein, in technologically enhanced photoplay, toys representing humanoid, animal, or

fantastic life forms function as avatars that appear as material objects in the physical

world and as digital representations of these characters when captured by cameras.

Therefore, we can argue that the character toys of interest in this thesis are a

physical equivalence to avatars in games. They come with hybrid qualities continuing

the physical toy with a digital presence on social media and play with them is guided

by the manifold interactions being offered by the toy.

In this way, modern play with character toys is not necessarily limited to the

toy itself. In addition to cameras and mobile devices, the user experience involves

the simultaneous location of play on many different “platforms,” such as a) public

spaces like urban environments and nature (e.g., attractions), b) private spaces

like built environments (e.g., dollhouses, dioramas, and room boxes), and c) social

media environments (Flickr, Facebook, Instagram) in combination with camera

technologies.

The play performed in the context of this study emerges as imaginative, spatial,

and hybrid. First, playing with toys assisted by camera technologies can be understood

as technologically enhanced object play, which employs the toys as tactile entities and

relies on object practices (Rehak 2012), meaning activities such as collecting and

customizing toys.37 Again, the storytelling becomes visible through three spatial

arrangements: displays, dioramas, and doll dramas. In this location-inspired and

37 Roger Caillois (1961) sees play as unproductive, albeit regulated and imaginative. Both

the construction and the modification of the toy are most often conscious and therefore

motivated or purposeful activities that change the appearance of the toy relative to

the original object created by the toy designer. By modifying the toy, for example, by

customizing it, the player will expand its affordability in a way that resembles gameplay

patterns: the limits of the toy are tested and tested all over again. Thus, in addition

to traditional free-form play activities, toy play can also be seen as a purposeful and

productive activity.

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media-enabled play, the player is the protagonist driven by a visual strategy (Granata

2014). Photoplay begins with the organization of objects, in this case, toys. Displaying

is an activity recognized in collectors’ play endeavors but has its origins in childhood

play:

[…] it is essential to record that all children but the most inhibited ones go at the

opportunity of arranging toys on a small stage with a specific confabulatory eagerness,

some more somberly and systematically, others with a “flash” of a sudden “idea.”

Depending on their age, some may bid for time by first asking some questions or handling

some toys (in which case their initial selections can be quite suggestive), but soon they

become absorbed in a task governed by some imperative theme and by a certain sense

of style until the construction is suddenly declared finished, often with an expression of

posture and face which seems to say that this is it – and it is good. (Erikson 1977, 30)

Displaying toys is an important form of play in both children’s and adults’ toy

cultures (Heljakka 2013). The popularity of making toy displays has many similarities

to arranging collections. Toy play is an unorganized simulation (van Leeuwen &

Westwood 2008). Yet, adult forms of toy play illustrate players’ fascination with the

organization of objects within space — making displays and dioramas (interiors and

landscapes). This observation resonates with Berger’s notion of the tendency of homo

narrans to like telling stories to provide meaning to the chaos surrounding them

(Berger 1997, 174). Photoplay often employs dolls, which are narrated through the

act of photographing. Storytelling is considered necessary in giving the doll a “life”:

“Stories give the doll significance. A doll can be technically perfect(ly made), but

if no story is generated around it, it stays soulless,” says doll maker Maria Juudin

(Kerokoski 2021, SK B2-B3).

According to Leong and Bodrova (2012, 30), the last stage of children’s make-

believe play involves Dramatization, Multiple Themes, Multiple Roles, and Director’s

Play. When dramatizing, a child plans elaborate themes, scenarios, and complex roles

and spends more time planning than acting out the scenario. They can play more

than one role at a time, and the roles that emerge in play have social relationships.

Whereas a child can pretend rather than actually have a prop, and s/he does not need

a prop to stay in the role, the props of play are essential for adults. Just like in the

narrative play of children, objects like character toys can have roles and identities in

adult toy play.

Similarly to a child, an adult toy player creates scenarios that can be arranged

over several days. Play can be interrupted and restarted, adding and changing objects

within the built scenarios. However, a difference between the narrative play of

children and adults is that while language is used to delineate the scenario, roles,

and action and book language is incorporated into role speech in children’s role play

with character toys, instead of vocalized storytelling, adults write out the stories and

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dialogues of the toys as captions of photoplay, which are then posted on social media

platforms. Again, similarly to children, adults play a series of coordinated scenarios

that change in response to previous ones or players’ desires and use themes from

familiar popular media tropes appropriated from narratives known from various

media texts.

Creative and imaginative object play are central facets of world-play. According

to Molesworth and Denigri-Knott (2007), even fantasy creation is prompted by other

media, like science fiction and fantasy novels and films. On the contrary, socio-

dramatic play refers to the enactment of actual and potential experiences of an

intense personal, social, domestic, or interpersonal nature. Again, dramatic play

is play that dramatizes events in which the player is not a direct participator — for

example, the presentation of a TV show (Hughes 2002).

Doll dramas (dynamic, serial, co-created, continuous) with rich characters,

scenes, and themes are drawn from and mimic fantastic storytelling, such as TV

series, movies, and real-life phenomena, both personal and social; they show the joys

and burdens of human relationships, commentary on contemporary society, etc. On

some occasions, photoplay of adults is based on world-playing inspired by real-life

events, even the player’s own life. Adult toy play presented as photoplay often involves

either existential dilemmas recognized in human life or, on the contrary, humorous

parodies of these complexities of adult life.

According to Kücklich (2004, 38), “playability is coupled with replayability,”

the repetition of play activity, repeated and remodeled content of play. This is how

doll dramas play out, and thanks to their serial form and re-playability, these socio-

dramatic and dramatic acts of play carry a resemblance to formats of photo-comics

or televised, serial (and sometimes provocative) storytelling, sometimes reminiscent

of soap operas or telenovelas.

Referring to John Fiske’s Television Culture, Kücklich (2004) discusses the satirical

re-enactment of television shows. Marsh (2005) argues “that popular media, while

problematic, provide a significant site of learning in new literacies and technologies

that allow opportunities for productive critique” (cf. in Wohlwend & Peppler 2013,

142). In a similar vein, the photoplay of adults paints a picture of adult fantasies that

are materialized through the simultaneous use of digital cameras, toys, and various

arranged, built, or natural environments, but also the complexities of contemporary

life, such as the perceived necessity of sharing images of perfect and hyper-stylized

lifestyles — interiors, travels, fashions, and relationships on social media as ideas that

guide the playing.

Julian Kücklich (2004) writes about “a cultural shift taking place from spectators

to players,” referencing the work of Stephen Kline and associates (Kline et al. 2003,

18). The occurrence of this movement is also a relevant point to discuss in terms of the

thesis at hand: While movement may have happened from the more passive realms

of playful consumption in reference to television, spectatorship equally belongs

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to those participating in play in the 21st century. There is an audience for the doll

dramas, a phenomenon primarily produced in conjunction with (audiovisual) social

media platforms, a sort of playful spectatorship and fandom for the toy stories of the

present, realized in documentation and posts shared on social media. The seriality of

doll dramas brings the acts of toy play closer to game mechanics and ways of playing

“sandbox” games, like The SIMS:

Players interested in telling radically different sorts of stories have made use of The

SIMS as a tool for generating their own graphic novels and movies, by editing video

recordings of gameplay and sharing them on fan websites. These stories do explore

emotionally fraught social situations – bullying, weddings, breakups, and even eating

disorders. (Isbister 2016a, 39)

Although profoundly visual in their storytelling, doll dramas also communicate

through textual storytelling. Captions for photoplay, for example those shared on

Instagram, hold essential information that moves the story further by articulating

the adventures of the toys’ dramatic interplay or their movements as part of toyrism

(or, toy tourism, for reference, see Heljakka & Räikkönen 2021). This observation

parallels what Isbister noted earlier about (digital) gameplay with avatars: “Even

in this era of advanced graphics, the most malleable material for digitally crafting

identity and social interaction is still text” (Isbister 2016b, 53).

Using toys as extensions and avatars as parts of photoplay and doll dramas relates

to the “presentation of the self,” as highlighted by Goffman (1959). This means that

as products of creative play, the doll dramas cannot be separated by the players

responsible for them — nor their identity work and play with identities including

their own.

Social practices on the web stimulate players to mimic behavior. For adults using

digital camera technology as toy play, this means that published photoplay viewed by

like-minded adults produces more photoplay by those who are inspired to acquire

toys of their own and start producing and distributing displays, dioramas, and doll

dramas of their own.

According to media scholar Henry Jenkins (2006), women produce almost all

fan fiction, and “fanfic” readers have been women in most cases (Jenkins 2002). Fan

fiction functions as a point of reference for the doll dramas elaborated on in the first

case study of the thesis, Article I, as the works of fan fiction are conceptually adjacent

to the narratives and photoplay created in association with world-playing — creating

displays, dioramas, and doll dramas. In this sense, it becomes possible to see how the

leisurely endeavors of toy play become productive play, which carries similarities to

playbor.

The data for this study were collected via interviews with and observation of

adult players, all female-identifying, aged 25–40+ years. Visual data were collected on

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social media such as Instagram and Flickr and supplemented with notes taken at toy

conventions and adult-organized play dates. The interview materials were examined

through content analyzing techniques to detect patterns of behavior related to

imaginative and spatially emerging object play to answer the main research question:

“How does adult toy play function as world-building and world-playing?”

According to the findings of this study, adult activities with toys are deliberate

in terms of planning the use of time, space, investments, and resources dedicated to

play — playtime is a pastime that usually happens during leisure and viewed from

the perspective of this study, through engagement with material and technological

resources.

The more open the object toy is (e.g., character toys such as plush toys, action

figures, and dolls), the fewer “instructions for use” are attached to it by the designer

or manufacturer. Similarly, the more closed a toy is, the more closely its functionality

is related to a certain predetermined way of playing (for example, sets of building

blocks with technical features) and regularities that can be compared to the factors

familiar in games: mechanics and rules. Due to the more open affordances designed

for the toy object, toy play can be considered a voluntary, creative, imaginatively

challenging, and goal-oriented activity. Thinking of it as a productive activity, play

with toys can also have features of creative problem-solving and cognitively titillating

play in due course.

The playful affordances of dolls examined in the study are diverse: Primarily, it is

essential to see these character toys not only as collectibles but also as necessary means

of creative and imaginative self-expression. The individualized and customized dolls

are photoplayed in various situations and environments. Through toy enthusiasts and

fan communities, the toy object is thus built into a reflection surface for emotions

and appreciation, both for solitary and social play. The narrative artifact (Selander

1999) continues in toy stories created by players that are transmitted, shared, and

discussed on various social media channels through visual and verbal messages.

Dolls are collected, customized, and communicated about. In light of the findings of

this study, toy play for adults, as a form of world-building and world-play, is, above

all, a communal activity and thus representative of play in its social form.

Play with digital cameras, toys, and storytelling manifests as a solitary and social

activity. Doll play takes place primarily in the interaction between the player and the

toy, most often in the intimate setting of the home. Doll play has traditionally been

practiced indoors, where toys have been assigned their own places, for example in a

dollhouse or diorama as part of one or more still lives38.

Solitary play, or play conducted in the presence of one player using the technology

only (capturing images of toy displays and dioramas as in photoplay), happens in the

38 However, as illustrated in Article III of this thesis, various character toys are also

captured through photoplay in outdoor environments.

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offline context, while social play occurs in terms of using communication technologies,

as social media platforms are used to share the often serial and narrativized results

of the photographic sessions with the toys. In this way, photoplay essentially entails

social play, as the documentation of play is expected to be spectated once shared.

KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

Key findings of this study are summarized in the following to answer the main

research question: “How has play moved human players of the Western world in

2010–2020 in terms of physical, cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?”

• Through an investigation of adult play, we found that play is no longer

ephemeral to a large extent, as it is captured on screens of digital cameras

and simultaneously documented as photoplay.

• Before the domestication of smartphones, adult players most often used

digital cameras in their photoplay to capture built-play scenarios, such

as displays, dioramas, and doll dramas. The play machine that the digital

camera entails enables physical toy play to enter digital “playgrounds” and

may thus be understood as a critical component of their digital play behavior

of adults with interest in character toys and a desire to develop intriguing

and continuous narratives around them.

• World-playing with toys unfolds as both a solitary and social form of play

— displays and dioramas may be created solitarily, but doll dramas imply

sharing the toys’ adventures.

• Movement in association with photoplay happens in multiple dimensions:

physically in the locus of the home, cognitively in the use of creativity to

produce photoplay, and emotionally by forming unique relationships to the

toys considered as player extensions and avatars.

Key findings to answer the sub-question, “How are the acts of play realized

through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing have for the

players in the study?”

• Activities related to photoplay with toys include the narrativization of toys

in indoor spaces (such as displays and dioramas) with the help of digital

cameras and photography, documentation, and storytelling are are a

creative endeavor that contributes to the skill-building and identity play of

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adults in many ways. These acts of play contribute to the formation of play

knowledge.

• Adult world-play with toys entails movement of the imagination and

fantasy, photoplayed stories of spatial arrangements with character toys as

physical or manipulative actions, and screen-based digital efforts, i.e., hybrid

world-play. Consequently, play in the digital world moves toy-playing adults

(and toys!) physically in indoor space, between offline and online worlds,

cognitively through increased skills, and emotionally through sustained

attachment to character toys, with which relations are built through solitary

and social play.

• Sharing doll dramas on social media makes photoplay with toys

communicative — and thanks to comments exchanged on social media

platforms like Facebook and Instagram — a collaborative and even

co-creative activity in which toy enthusiasts share and cultivate meanings

associated with their personalized playthings. When shared and followed on

social media as photoplay, adult interaction with character-type playthings

become potentially mimetic and “playborous” — a resource for storytelling

allowing re-playing, re-makes, and re-definitions.

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5.2. Article II: Playing with Connected Toys

“There is a toy box, and there is a smart device. These realms are beginning to collide,”

Kudrowitz and Follett have observed (2014, 245). In the study investigating play with

connected toys — ”Persuasive toy friends and preschoolers: Playtesting IoToys,”

Article II (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2019) — we reviewed four digital and Internet-

connected toys with preschool children aged 5–7 years to explore their physical and

digital features and affordances, and the types of play activities they prompt in the

context of early education. The toys investigated in the study are conceptualized as

persuasive playthings that allow hybrid and connected play, both solitary and social.

The aspect of movement in IoToys is manifold — it relates to the capacity of toys

to generate physical, imaginative, and cognitive movement in the players, and to

the toys’ own ability to move. The persuasion technique of these toys points to the

invitation to play they send through their interactive affordances, which have many

consequences for play, including the generation of emotional responses related to

nurturing of, caring for, and forming relationships with the toys. Let us first consider

the aspects of the “toy box” connected with smart devices, “intelligence,” and the

interaction of these play machines.

***

Figure C.

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The evolution of intelligent toys started in the late 20th century. Already in 1998,

Resnick and colleagues predicted the emergence of smart and Internet-connected

toys by claiming:

Old toys will become smarter. New toys will become possible. All toys will be connected.

There will be new ways of playing, designing, learning, storytelling; when a teddy

bear sends a hug halfway around the world, when the heads on a child’s necklace

communicate with another to make lights sparkle or music sound, we will be playing

with the toys of tomorrow. (Resnick et al. 1998)

In essence, connected toys are interactive: “An interactive toy differs from a

regular toy in that it directly and purposefully interacts back. An interactive toy will

respond to the player on it. For example, an interactive teddy bear would laugh, giggle

or tell a story when the user tickles or squeezes it” (Hall et al. 2022, 3).

IoToys (or Internet-connected toys) represent an evolution of what was, in toy

industrial terms, once considered “electronic media.” In 2009, Johnson and Christie

wrote about how electronic toys are limited and repetitive. At least in some way, the

IoToys (or, Internet of Toys) of present times seems to overcome this hindrance, as

observed by Sylla et al. (2022):

The world of children’s toys has continued to evolve with advances in embedded

electronics, digital capabilities, and wireless connectivity. Smart toys and robots represent

an increasingly vibrant range of play objects that combine different capabilities such as

networking, processing and intelligent reasoning.

IoToys can be considered media and material objects (Mascheroni & Holloway

2019, 17) not explicitly centered around screens. IoToys are toy products, as articulated

by Kudrovitz and Follett: “A toy product is an item that is intentionally designed,

manufactured, and sold for the primary purpose of play” (Kudrowitz & Follett 2014,

237). They allow object play as material objects, meaning “play which uses infinite

and interesting sequences of hand-eye manipulations and movements” (Hughes

2002). Still, they are also playing machines with mobility of their own. Previous

research has defined smart toys as “playthings that do things” (Ackermann 2005).

I might add here that toys constitute a potent media of their own, and besides

an apparent collision — or rather convergence — of toys and intelligent devices is

supplemented by online media. In this way, “Physical toys have become media that

‘mediate what has not been mediated before’” (Bunz & Meikle 2018, 18).

Marsh (2017) has expanded the notion of connected play to explore how IoToys

creates networks of relationships (1) between children, (2) between children and

play objects, and (3) between play objects (cf. in Berriman & Mascheroni 2019). The

Internet of Toys refers to toys that connect to computer networks and thus are 1)

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connected to online platforms via Wi-Fi and Bluetooth but which can also connect to

other toys, 2) equipped with sensors, and 3) specifically related to children (Holloway

& Green 2016), also referred to playthings with hybrid qualities in this thesis.

“The most appropriate toy for a child is one that will challenge his interests and

abilities and be closely matched to his skills and maturity” (Boehm 1986, 2). Marsh

and colleagues (2014) find that the appeal of digital toys, with their affordances,

depends on children’s knowledge of those objects, “as well as the emotional aspects of

the affective dimensions of play and creativity” (Lundtofte 2020, 224).

“The first popular example of IoToys was toys-to-life, action figures such

as Skylanders or Disney Infinity, that are connected to a video game by means of

radio frequency identification (RFID), near-field communication (NFC) or image

recognition software” (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019, 1).

Referring to children’s play with technologically enhanced toys, Sutton-Smith

observed how “very little research has ever been given to a discovery of what the

children actually are doing and achieving with their play for themselves” (Sutton-

Smith 2004, ix). Holloway and Green (2016) ask how these new technology-enabled

playthings are integrated into children’s culture and how Internet-connected toys

may change play practices. The second case study of this thesis continues this

investigation by looking at these aforementioned questions in the context of playful

learning within early education pedagogy.

5.2.1. Screen-based or screenless toys?

Some IoToys, such as the Dash robot investigated in the study described in Article

II, are played with through an app. Essentially, however, many currently Internet-

connected toys are not operated through a screen — their interactivity stems from

in-built computers and sensors. Sensors can add functionality, and functionality adds

affordances. Earlier initiatives with interest in combining interactive technologies

without the use of screens have been proposed by Soute and colleagues (2010),

who developed the term Head Up Games, or HUGs (Soute et al. 2010; cf. in Boon

et al. 2020): HUGs “liberate players from facing down to attend to screen-based

interactions” (Soute et al. 2010, 435).39 Similarly, as proposed by the author, IoToys

can be thought of as representatives of HUT, or Head Up Toys. This has consequences

for the mobility that occurs in play: “Toys that don’t need a screen can be more versatile

and less cumbersome as children can move around with them and interact with them

39 One suggested solution to ease the friction between screen consumption and play are

so-called “Head Up Games” (Soute et al. 2010). In the supersystem of 21st century play,

these can be hybrid board games as well as location-based games that nudge players to

interact with their physical surroundings through the use of mobile devices.

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in different ways” (Plowman & Stephen 2014, 47). Potentially, future instances of

these kinds of toys may be used in more ways in outdoor space, as demonstrated in

the instance of speculative toy fiction discussed in the sixth publication of this thesis.

5.2.2. Guided digital play and hybrid playful learning

Despite complex technological systems, intelligent toys are becoming increasingly

affordable, especially for Western consumers, and are considered likely to become

widespread in educational and leisure play contexts. For example, sales of intelligent

toys covered by the Internet of Toys are expected to triple over the next five years

(Juniper Research 2017).

IoToys represent what Stephen et al. (2013) consider child-oriented technologies.

Giddings (2019) describes children’s relationships with IoToys as layered, in which

material technology and intangible imagination intertwine.

Currently, many digital toys promise fun and edutainment (or, educational play

with entertaining features) for children ages five years and up. Still, Sara Grimes

(2015) is cautious about configuring the child as easily amused. In the industrialized

world, educators believed playing with toys should not be whimsical but always

useful (Oldenziel & Hård 2013, 276–277), making “edutainment” a case of serious,

goal-oriented play.

Free play differs from adult-instructed activities because it is child-initiated and

child-directed (Skolnick Weisberg et al. 2015). However, the self-directed element

of the learning that occurs in the context of free play is crucial as it promotes rich

social, intellectual, and emotional development (Gray 2011; 2013; cf. in Spiewak et

al. 2016). Here, we argue for the benefits of free play that is sometimes understood as

non-functional and hence non-productive.

Connected toys can blur the boundaries between formal and informal learning

(Montgomery 2015, 268). As studies undertaken in recent years show (Heljakka &

Ihamäki, 2018; 2019), there has been a growing interest in early childhood education

to find out how intelligent toys could be used as part of more structured playful

learning through guided and free play, or toy-based learning.

The study by Hall et al. (2022) demonstrates that for experts’ interactive toys

have higher perceived educational value than traditional toys or other forms of

play. However, this is intuition or insight rather than based on direct evidence to

support this view. For instance, Plowman (2004, 211) describes the skepticism for the

claims made for learning with these “interactive learning partners” and, thus, their

educational value as the word “smart” is frequently used as a marketing device to

imply “a level of intelligence in the toy that will transfer to its user.”

“The activities that are appropriate for young learners of the third millennium are

dynamic, interactive, and interconnected” (Woolsey & Woolsey 2008, 130). A critical

way to explore the possibilities offered by modern toys is to explore them through

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play as part of the everyday context of early childhood education. The early education

environment provides a structured realm where open-ended and guided play can

occur. Learning environments are changing rapidly, with digitalization extending to

early childhood education environments. For example, new learning content can be

downloaded when smart toys connect to online environments. It is worth noting

how learning is approached not only through play and playfulness but also through

playful and toy-based learning, with smart toys as technologically enriched toys, as

IoToys and other intelligent toys become more widely part of preschool education.

Hybrid technologies and forms of playful learning have entered into the early

education context: “While technology certainly offers the possibility of mindless

interaction, in the hands of thoughtful teachers, it is a tool for creating, collaborating,

and communicating, and for play” (Fantozzi et al. 2018). Consequently, learning

environments transform into hybrid spaces, where “instead of differentiating virtual

and physical play, we should (re)think to play with multimodal playscape lenses”

(Palaiologou et al. 2021).

The study on IoToys conducted for the thesis also represents adult-led play. Skolnick

Weisberg et al. (2015) assert that guided play (adult-initiated but child-directed) can

be used for teaching preschool children. Guided play refers to “learning experiences

that combine the child-directed nature of free play with a focus on learning outcomes

and adult mentorship” (Weisberg et al. 2016, 177). Guided digital play is one of the

subtypes of playful learning in which preschool teachers can guide digital playing

with a learning purpose: Guided play can be used for teaching preschool children. It

may enhance the discovery of undemonstrated functions, whereas direct instruction

may inhibit this kind of exploration (Skolnick Weisberg et al. 2015). Although the

IoToys include educational value, in order for their educational promises to be

fulfilled, educators need to guide young children’s digital play in preschool learning

situations (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2018, 98).

5.2.3. Studying the affordances of IoToys

Interactive toys can produce new affordances (Thrift 2003, 402). “In the case of

traditional toys, communication and control of toys spurs from the child, whereas

communication with IoToys emerges from the toy which also ‘smartly’ positions

the child to be equipped to make decisions and suggest alternatives” (Palaiologou

et al. 2021). Traditional toys have a physical presence, but technologically oriented

toys offer other stimuli: Visual-based feedback, such as light and visual stimuli, can

attract children’s attention (Geke & Ludden 2013; Resnick et al. 1998; c.f. in Berriman

& Mascheroni 2019). “Digital toys designed with light-up interfaces are usually

more complex in functionality.” Such toys usually incorporate games, challenges, or

difficulty levels (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019). Mascheroni and colleagues (2016)

have described the approaches toward digital play in one way as a vehicle and, in

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the other, as an impediment to children’s learning. “Smart toys may be networked

together with other smart toys or WiFi in order to enhance play value or educational

features […]. Smart toys have intelligent characteristics, such as being able to speak

or undertake purposeful tasks, often claiming to support learning particularly in

Science, Technology, Engineering, and Maths (STEM) subjects” (Hall et al. 2022, 4).

Additionally, the Internet of Toys allows children of this generation to interact

with remote players. At the same time, these intelligent toys are updated with new

content depending on the player’s activities.

Smart toy friends are hybrid toys and most often represent animated characters:

robots, fantasy characters, plastic, and even plush toy-like playmates. The key is to

understand how their affordances that stem from different kinds of interactivity

provide for play. Therefore, we were interested in exploring how children discover

and actualize various affordances of the IoToys under scrutiny.

Berriman and Mascheroni (2019) have found that toys and digital features can

act as prompts, provide feedback, and engage attention through bodily movement,

facial expressions, and vocal sounds. The value of these capacities is to be decided

by players, and as Ruckenstein (2010, 511) argues, “children are remarkably quick to

drop a toy if they see no value in interactions with it.” For this reason, Ruckenstein

adds that “beyond affordances, a toy needs to have evocative power, and holding-

power.” It is also essential to notice that engagement modes vary, even with the same

toy (Hutt 1981). Our research aimed to consider the wow factor and its consequences

for play beyond the firsthand encounter with the toy. “While an affordance speaks to

an artifact’s straight-forwardness (clarity to signal its whereabouts), something more

is needed to sustain human interest, let alone enchant” (Ackermann 2005).

Flynn et al. (2019, 68) assert that “although digital play occurs in a different

context, it can resemble playing with traditional toys; both involve engagement in

exploration and the trying of new things.” Most often, toys encourage imaginative,

object, or bodily play. In a digital world, smart toys can be used in all forms of play,

considering their multisensory offerings. Marsh et al. (2016, 9) see hybrid play with

these tools utilizing both digital and non-digital features, allowing play to move

smoothly across the boundaries of space and time in a way that was not possible

before the digital age.

Smirnova (2011) takes a critical stance on interactive toys by claiming that they

prevent and reduce play actions. She categorizes toys of this kind as entertainment

that does not contribute to imaginative play. Smirnova (2011, 40) explains that

animated toys block independent creative play, and the children who play with them

“seem to become an appendage of the toy in that the toy guides their actions.” In the

worst case, following Resnick (2006, 10), “programmed toys appear to stunt creative

thinking.”

Following an analysis of digital toys conducted by Berriman and Mascheroni

(2019), investigations on IoToys toys can focus on analyzing the target age group,

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purpose, digital and physical components, and a description of how the toys are

used or interacted with. From their analysis and interpretation, researchers Hall

et al. (2022) identified three primary recommendations for smart, connected toys,

namely (1) the need for interactive toys to provide a safe, secure, and private way

to play and learn; (2) increased research, experimentation, and investigation to

explore interactive toy claims and potential; and (3) increased interdisciplinary and

intersectoral collaboration and innovation (Hall et al. 2022).

Wilson (2003) says that the usability of programmed technologies comes not only

from how they are meant to be used but also from how they are used. Ruckenstein

(2010, 504) agrees by saying that “in order to see how children use toys and

technologies for pursuing particular kinds of orientations to the world, one needs to

empirically engage with them.” Indeed, the capacities of IoToys are considered vast:

“Internet-connected toys can offer new, important opportunities for play, learning,

health, and educational support, thanks to their interactive and personalized features”

(Chaudron et al. 2017, 6).

Erdogan et al. (2019) rightly note that children do not entirely decide for

themselves what, where, when and with whom to play, and “when children work on

understanding the world around them it may be adults who see ‘play’” (Sutton-Smith

1986, 11). Thus, the vocabulary children and adults use for children’s play may differ

from one another. For example, children may not at all point to (digital) technology

use when discussing their play. Therefore, it is crucial to include children’s voices as

part of the research interested in them (see, e.g., Nicholson et al. 2015).

“People of all ages can be affected by the media, but preschoolers form the group

that is affected most” (Ostrov, Gentile & Mullins 2013; cf. in Çetintaș & Turan 2018,

57). Nevertheless, “remarkably little research focuses explicitly on what play means

to children” (Meire 2007, 3). “Qualitative research can provide a detailed picture of

children’s attitudes toward media usage” (Çetintaș & Turan 2018, 58).

Precisely for these reasons, together with my colleague, I wanted to discover how

preschool children would respond to the IoToys under scrutiny in a setting for guided

play and playful learning, simultaneously acknowledging the “pedagogization” of

children’s play (Rogers 2013; cf. in Cowan 2020, 22) — in this case, the edutainment

provided by the IoToys, and in this way, the instrumentalization of play for the sake

of learning and research.

With my colleague, we set out to study the four digital toys to gain more knowledge

about their various features and their capacity to invite players to interact. Similarly

to the study conducted by Conti et al. (2020), we decided to focus on preschoolers;

in Finland, this sample included 5–7-year-olds as in these years, “children develop

intuitive thought, characterized by realism, animism, and artificialism” (Piaget 1951).

Article II of the thesis, titled “Persuasive Toy Friends and Preschoolers: Playtesting

IoToys” (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2019), focuses on the Internet of Toys and the hybrid

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and connected play performed with them. The research, conducted in pre-pandemic

times, focuses on IoToys as “persuasive toy friends,” which were tested as part of play

tests carried out with preschool-aged children in the context of early education in

Finland. The study centered on the movement of toys and the movement of players’

imaginations and bodies by exploring the affordances of the toys.

In our play-tests, neither the teachers nor the researchers told children what

actions to take. Instead, we followed a guided play approach, which is a blend of adult

initiation and child direction and allowed the children to function as informants and

co-constructors of knowledge (Eckhoff 2017). Therefore, we trusted that children’s

reflections on their play would provide important contributions to understanding

how the digital, material, and hybrid affordances of the IoToys are employed as part

of a play-test relying on open-ended play in a preschool context.

The participating children also joined a group interview situation, in which they

were asked about their ideas of the capabilities and possibilities of Internet-connected

toys as playthings. The study focused on four toys based on their gender-neutrality,

character-type aesthetics, awarded innovativeness, and popularity and availability on

Amazon USA, namely the educational toys CogniToys Dino, Fisher-Price Smart Toy

Bear, Dash from Wonder Workshop, and the non-educational Hatchimal toy, which

includes a sophisticated mechanism enabling the Hatchimal to “unbox itself” (i.e., to

peck its way out of the egg in which it is sold).40 Moreover, an additional criterion

for selecting the toys was the assumption that their play value stems from interaction

beyond communication through a screen. In the following, each toy is described

briefly in the following by highlighting its key features:

• The connectedness of CogniToys Dino results from syncing with a

smartphone. CogniToys Dino has speech-enabled technology that allows

players to speak directly to the toy and ask questions to receive age-

appropriate answers. In this way, the toy resembles voice-operated assistants

like Siri and Alexa.

• According to Fisher-Price, the Smart Toy Bear is an interactive learning

friend with the brains of a computer but without the screen. The toy

promotes socio-emotional growth through play with updated content, an

app, and voice recognition. Socio-emotional learning points to skills such

as sharing, communicating, and managing emotions (Plowman & Stephen

2014, 28).

40 In all cases in which the toys “talked,” they spoke in English, which may have produced

some limitations in terms of interaction.

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• The Dash robot, intended for 5-year-olds and up, provides educational

entertainment (or, edutainment) that can practice coding and make the toy

move through the app through simple coding exercises. Dash from Wonder

Workshop acts as if it is “alive” by moving and talking. According to its

maker, the toy supports open-ended play by using a remote-control app to

make the toy move around and play sound effects.

• When Hatchimals peck their way out of a plastic egg, the toy goes through

three stages of development, and players can teach it to walk, dance, and

play games.

In our study, we set out to value child-friendly explanations of their interaction

with the toys: Yamada-Rice (2017) claims that design elements and social science

approaches to understanding children’s interactions with the toys should be taken

into consideration to adequately understand them. Qualitative methodology was

employed using observations of preschool-aged children interacting and test-playing

a set of IoToys as part of early education in Finnish kindergarten. In our analysis,

we focused on the persuasion strategies used in four contemporary character toys

described above (which take the forms of fantasy figures, cutified dolls, robotic toys,

animal-like creatures, and so on).

“When preschoolers are offered a toy to play with that has an ambiguous causal

mechanism, the first thing they do, without being told, is figure out how the toy

works through exploratory play” (Fisher et al. 2008, 306). In our study, we sought to

capture children’s first responses to the IoToys under inspection and to understand

how the toys invite their players to intrapersonal interaction between a toy and a

player and how the Internet-connected toy friends suggest player participation in

interpersonal interaction, meaning social play with others. Instead of being overly

focused on the learning aspect, my co-researcher and I were curious about the play

ideas children would develop through interaction with the IoToys.

Technologies augment our everyday social interactions (Isbister 2016a). Fantozzi

et al. (2018) admit that technology use can be solitary, but it may become social as

others join in once they see others play. In this way, play develops into co-creative

and collaborative activities with the play machines. In a preschool environment, it

is obvious that playthings are shared among children and, thus, generate social play.

It is essential to see the dimensions that support technological toys’ movement,

mobility, and agility. Movement, lights, and sound are familiar features from many

historic toys, but when connected and networked, these features become even more

diverse.

Children can appropriately and creatively exploit the material possibilities of

objects more quickly than adults to convey their messages. Adults, again, are more

bound by familiar conventions (Kress 2003; cf. in Wohlwend 2008). Exploratory

Play means play to access factual information consisting of manipulative behaviors

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such as handling, throwing, banging, or mouthing objects, for example engaging

with an object or area and, either by manipulation or movement, assessing its

properties, possibilities, and content (Hughes 2002). Exploratory play as an activity

is investigative. Again, imaginative play is play where conventional rules that govern

the physical world do not apply (Ibid.).

According to Johnson and Christie (2009), the effects of digital toys on play are

most visible in dramatic and constructive play. Moreover, Palaiologou et al. (2021)

discovered that children create imaginary situations when using technology, which

leads to make-believe play. Considering the findings of our study, it is possible to

agree with Edith Ackermann, who writes: “Contrary to belief, animated toys do not

kill a child’s imagination. Rather, they capture it in novel ways” (Ackermann 2005).

To avoid misconceptions about children’s engagement with the IoToys, we allowed

them to inform us about what play ideas they associated with each toy after they had

been introduced to them and could interact with them without adult interference.

To avoid misinterpretations and misunderstandings in scrutinizing children’s

commentaries on how they would see themselves playing with the toys by themselves

and in the company of others, we asked them to draw the most memorable of the

four intelligent toys. Preschool teachers then assisted the children in answering this

question in words and writing their answers next to the drawn toy character. In this

way, we could be more certain about giving each child a genuine possibility to share

their ideas about the envisioned play.

In the guidelines section of the multinational study on digital play conducted by

Marsh and colleagues (2020, 41), the researchers observe how a vast amount of digital

content accessed by children is in English. Therefore, they note, “further exploration

is needed of the ways in which children’s digital play moves across languages.” The

English-speaking Junior Smart Bear, suitable for slightly younger people, contains

storytelling content with which you can practice simple everyday activities — good

manners, times of the day and days of the week, or even English.

The group interview data and observational data from the case study were

analyzed using thematic analysis (Braun & Clarke 2006). By analyzing the rich data,

we witnessed how children also created original texts in play (Bergen 2004; cf. in

Johnson & Christie 2009): Even though not all of the investigated IoToys afford

movement (the CogniToys Dino does not walk, or in fact move at all), we found that

children associated the toys with abilities not in reach of present IoToys, such as flying.

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KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

In reviewing the persuasion strategies of connectivity, nurturing, and social play

in association with Internet-connected playthings, we were able to answer the main

research question: “How has play moved human players of the Western world in

2010–2020 in terms of physical, cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?”

• IoToys cater to possibilities for both leisurely play and playful learning.

• Affordances of IoToys employed in our study can be categorized into

physical affordances (material dimensions and properties) and pre-

programmed (technological) affordances (sound, light, and movement,

interactivity, and connectivity), which may be conceptualized as educational

affordances (through the content the toys communicate, or invitations to

play with stories, mini-games like coding exercises, tasks related to learning

about good manners, etc.), and affordances for pretend play and personal

meaning-making.

• IoToys with a mobilizing tendency, such as Dash, support children’s physical

play by inviting children to bodily movement. The IoToys under scrutiny

urged the participating children to mobilize their imagination and advance

their cognitive skills through playing with sounds, learning English, and

reading. IoToys, according to the study, can move the players emotionally

by persuading them to form relationships with and nurture them.

• In reference to IoToys, connectivity refers to the toys’ abilities to access

content mediated by digital communication technology and connectivity

in terms of emotional responses to the toys, giving attention and nurturing

child-toy interaction and encouraging players to seek social interaction

with others.

Key findings to answer the sub-question “How are the acts of play realized

through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing have for the

players in the study?”

• IoToys are gender-neutral in their design and their proposed play patterns.

The Internet-connected toys under scrutiny invited the preschoolers to

play gender-neutral types of (physical) play, such as playing tag, hide-and-

seek, and imaginative role-play, as in playing house and school with the toy

friends.

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• Children-led insights on using IoToys highlight the affordances they would

desire in future playthings. Our study showed that preschoolers enjoyed

the open-ended (imaginative and creative) aspects of play with the IoToys

prompted by the sound, lights, and movement of the toys, despite their

structured invitations to play, such as rich educational content. Consequently,

the future design of this type of toy should encompass various possibilities

for open-ended play triggered by physical, technological, and educational

affordances.

• Based on our findings gathered and analyzed in our play-tests, the

complementing design values of connectivity, nurturing, and social play

were added to previously articulated ideas on the design of intelligent toys.41

Since conducting the research explained in our chapter, research and knowledge

on IoToys have expanded significantly. For example, following the observation

made by Palaiologou et al. (2021, 2115), “early childhood education needs to build

capacity in terms of staff pre-and in-service training and resources to integrate haptic

technology in their pedagogy.”

More precisely, future work in this field might ask: ‘‘How have technology

advances impacted IoToys, and how will they impact them now and in the future?’’

Additionally, how might these toys be considered in terms of their sustainability from

two perspectives, namely: In which ways do designers and the industries of play pay

respect to the longevity and play value of IoToys?

Finally, it is important to understand that children who play with new toys like

the IoToys highlighted in this study will become adults who are practiced in these

new connected environments (Thrift 2003, 390). Therefore, it is easy to agree with

the ideas presented in a blog post from 2019, which declares that “IoToys are here

to stay, and it’s time we moved beyond media panics and hype” (Mascheroni &

Holloway, July 3, 2019).

41 Further guidelines for the design of future technology toys are presented at the end of

the Discussion section of this thesis.

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5.3. Article III: Playing with the Smartphone

Article III — a book chapter titled “Toy tourism. From Travel Bugs to characters with

wanderlust” (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2020) explores how the idea of wanderlust includes

human travelers and extends to human-created objects — mainly toys and souvenirs

— through exploring toy mobility. The toy tourism (or, toyrism) practiced in the

2010s illustrates the ongoing tradition of mobilizing toys in parallel with a move from

digital cameras to smartphones with high-quality digital cameras, making a case for

Playing with the Smartphone, as illustrative of leisurely play with the play machines.

***

As shown in the previous studies articulated in publications I and II of the

thesis, mobility in terms of play relates to mobile affordances of toys, playthings as

portable and connected devices — the play machines — and the physical and mental

movement of and within the players.

Essentially, mobile media are used on the move (Pink et al. 2018). Marsh et al.

(2020) found that children’s digital play spans many places and spaces. In the context

of this thesis, it becomes clear that so does the digital play of adults. Article I described

how “play itself first takes place in the intimacy of homes in the name of solitary play

Figure D.

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and then moves to online playscapes through documented play.42 Once shared, the

playful interaction continues on the digital platforms of social media” (Heljakka &

Harviainen 2019, 362).

Mobile devices and social platforms are objects and techno-social interfaces

(Moore 2011) that afford playful impulses (Raessens 2010). Sicart (2014, 19) writes

how “the case of smart phones illustrates not only the malleable nature of toys as

playthings, but also the capacity for some objects to afford playful behaviors.” The uses

of smartphones in play are many. In more concrete terms, Berriman and Mascheroni

describe the mobile phone as an excellent example of a digital material object that is

a portable device used on the move. Mobile devices allow players to both record and

share the playing. In Moore’s (2011, 379) philosophical view, the mobile phone is

perceived as “a metaphor for the mobility of play,” which Bogost (2016, 134) sees as a

microcosm for which many uses and behaviors are possible:

A smartphone is a source of connection, of companionship, of information, of leisure,

but also distraction, of compulsion, of disconnection, of obsession – a whole microcosm

is contained amidst its glass and aluminium and silicon and software.

Cain (2019) goes as far as calling the smartphone “the most compelling toy ever

created,” and this for adults in particular.43 It is also for this reason that it becomes

easy to see the smartphone as a play machine.

According to Berry and Schleser (2014), the rise of smartphones happened in

2007, but their uses in play emerged earlier. For example, mobile phones have been

game-enabled since 1997. However, mobile phone games mainly took off in the 2010s.

By the end of 2021,5.3 billionpeople subscribed to mobile services, representing

67% of the global population. 44

Vincent (2006) sees mobile phones as representative of affective technologies.

Furthermore, Berry and Schleser (2014, 3) claim that smartphones “have had a

profound impact on our understandings and interactions with space and place.”

Consequently, and potentially, playing with smartphones may move us both physically

42 Here, the documentation of play manifests in photoplay, or toy photography.

43 Dossey (2016, 80) writes how “Our electronic appendages now go with us everywhere.

Our personal digital devices have become sensory transplants,” and notes that because

of their ability to connect us, at the same time, these devices disturb our solitude.

44 As reported by the GSM Association, in a growing number of markets, most adults now

own a mobile phone, meaning that future growth will come from younger populations

taking out a mobile subscription for the first time. Over the period to 2025, there will be

an additional 400 million new mobile subscribers, most of them from Asia Pacific and

Sub-Saharan Africa, taking the total number of subscribers to 5.7 billion (70% of the

global population) (GSMA, The Mobile Economy 2022, 4).

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and emotionally. One of these interactions with the digital play of 2010–2020 is

photoplay, as described in Article I.

“There is a close relationship between mobile phones — currently

smartphones — and their users, as they are always turned on and at hand” (Brito et

al. 2019, 113). “Personal and almost always available, a contemporary mobile phone

can potentially foster developments of new user cultures, including ones involving

casual creation and sharing of contents related to digital photography” (Mäyrä 2011,

1). As explained in the case study reported in Article III, smartphones extend the

possibilities of hybrid play (Heljakka 2012b; Tyni et al. 2016; Heljakka & Harviainen

2019), as they allow for simultaneous exploration of the affordances of traditional

toys, physical space, and the capabilities of mobile (digital) technology.

Berry and Schleser (2014) say that mobile media shape storytelling. As discovered

in Article I, on photoplay, the camera becomes a necessary play machine for the

event, and the location chosen becomes a playing field. As demonstrated earlier, the

photograph provides a particularly suitable communicative platform for creative and

imaginative toy stories. In addition to the toy, the momentary encounter with the

material world and the imaginative story, in which the playing photographer acts as

the story’s narrator, are at the center of photoplay. Further, “stories always literally

take place somewhere: Stories do not occur in a vacuum but in particular areas,

whether these are identifiable or not” (Reijnders et al. 2020, 9). As shown, these areas

can be staged in the case of displays and dioramas, but they may also inhabit public,

even famous places as locations for play.

“Through the imagination, human consciousness is extended in time and place

[…] the imagination is coupled with an urge to locate” (Reijnders et al. 2020, 6).

Location has been an essential aspect in mobile game research, specifically in games

played in an urban environment. Location has formed an inevitable perspective in

research on location-based technology and media. Previous research shows how

spatial information and the media influence people’s experiences by reinforcing

attachment to a place (Goggin 2017, 31–33).

The geographies of play have expanded from domestic environments to include

hybrid environments, which require navigation in physically and mentally operated

playscapes. In these spaces, mobility occurs as physical movement in the “real” world

and as the flexibility of the mind in terms of using one’s imagination as part of the

digitally enhanced play.

According to Gordon Burghardt, a scholar interested in ethology, or animal

forms of play, “imaginative play may underlie creativity, innovation, and new ways

of operating within the physical, organic, and social worlds in which all creatures are

embedded” (Burghardt 2015, 35). “Imaginative play is a celebration of our personal

originality” (Sutton-Smith cf. in Bockler 2004). Sutton-Smith claims that imagination

as a form of play is mobile, not the instrument of any single motivation (Sutton-

Smith 2017, 215).

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It is possible to see how physical objects such as toys trigger and set the imagination

in motion. At the same time, they inspire movement. “In the beginning of this century,

the automobile, like the bicycle, was a toy, a plaything for those who could afford to

buy one. It was initially used mainly for recreation and sport, representing a new

concept of personal mobility and taste for independent travel” (Pantzar 1997, 51).

Toys have been given movement since the early beginning of mechanical toys:

Moving toys developed from the 1800s onwards, side-by-side with advances in

clockwork construction and the technology of metal plate punching (Of Toys and

Men, exhibition press materials). Toy mobility has since expanded into play practices

related to toy tourism, a type of play focusing on toy mobility and storytelling, the

topic of study for the third case study of this thesis, namely Article III discussed here.

As written by Boehm, “toys travel well”:

Regardless of the method of transportation, appropriate toys can be excellent traveling

companions for children and help to make travel a more enjoyable experience. There are

several toys that have been designed especially for use in transit. Others are simply good

toys that also happen to travel well. In general, the best toys for travel are those that are

compact, simple to operate from a sitting position, and contain few, if any, detachable or

small loose pieces. (Boehm 1986, 111)

The industries of play and producers of toys have inspired the mobility of toys

from the mid-20th century onwards. To exemplify, Mattel urged Barbie players to at

least travel in their imagination to famous travel destinations in the 1960s:

Barbie went to visit Amsterdam, celebrating its flower market, the countryside’s

windmills, meadows rife with roaming cows, and clean rows of flower bulbs: “Imagine

Barbie skating, with an elegant, red shawl trailing her, hand in hand with Ken and

Skipper.” In concert with its international strategy, Mattel launched a Travel Costume

Series in 1964. (Oldenziehl & Hård 2013, 285)

Wilson (2012; cf. in Ash 2013) suggests that mobile technology leads to a

new form of “conspicuous mobility.” Technology enabling this kind of movement

“weaves a narrative about the specifics of one’s presence in space — enabling users

to broadcast that curated a narrative of the places they frequent, the neighborhoods

they travel within, and the kinds of consumptive activities they afford” (Wilson 2012,

5). Lauwaert (2009) has stated that portable devices dislocate play from the interior

locality. Devices as play machines mobilize play on our behalf (Moore 2011), but

at the same time, players mobilize the devices and other artifacts used for play and

combine their possibilities to enjoy and pursue play. As illustrated in Article III, these

ideas challenge common concerns regarding digital play, mostly believed to take

place indoors.

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According to commonly expressed concerns from news media and public

opinion, outdoor play has decreased. For example, in recent years, free, unstructured

outdoor play has declined markedly, and according to Mintz, interviewed by the

American Journal of Play (2010, 145), has been replaced “to a striking extent” with

solitary play and, for children, with adult-supervised activities.

Often competitive, goal-oriented, and regularity-based gaming (i.e., Caillois’s

concept of ludus, 1961) and play that relies heavily on digital devices have been seen

to differentiate human players from social interaction in the everyday environment,

pushing them indoors as a contrast to “historical play” and, more traditionally,

Sutton-Smith writes: “Many of us grew up close to forests and farms, and our play

included animals, harvests, mountains, secluded beach landscapes or city roads (even

suburban promenades), and endless ball games” (Sutton-Smith 2017, 182).

The benefits of outdoor play in terms of children’s play have been listed by Louv

(2015), who states that the variety of structures, textures, and loose parts found

outdoors affords various physical, creative, and social play opportunities. To remedy

this, initiatives on how to increase the outdoor mobile play of children have been

created, for example, by Britain’s National Trust, like their Bucket list for children/

pre-teens, or “50 things to do before you’re 11,” featuring activities such as climbing

trees, stone skimming, mud-pie making, flying a kite, running down a hill and

hunting for bugs (Davey 2012, 116).

Location-based games (Benford 2005) offer one approach to seeing the

connections between technology-invited movement as part of the play. Enabled by

mobile technology, location-based games require physical mobility from their players

and some even physical and social activity. These games aim to provide the user with

a more diverse gaming experience for players of many ages. They are based on three

technologies: mobile devices, wireless networking, and location recognition.

Due to their versatility, location-aware games can produce rich gaming

experiences in their tendency to move their players in many ways, both in physical

sports and mentally, in educational and emotional terms, unlike critical speech public

discourse that often opposes this form of play. Central to modern play, this feature

is often overlooked in media discourse as more interest is given to “screen time” and

other aspects of digital gaming that are generally perceived as harmful. Still, there

is evidence of how the mobilizing effect of digital technology positively influences

human movement; for example, in the study conducted by Marsh et al. (2020), the

children as informants discussed, among other things, the positive impact that digital

technology has had on their physical mobility.

Given that even young children are literate and competent to manipulate digital

devices from a relatively young age, device-based innovations in play that urge the

players outdoors to play more socially are too few to mention, with Pokémon GO as

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an exception.45 Another example of hybrid play that occurs outdoors is geocaching.

Notably, both Pokémon GO and geocaching are played by both children and adults.

Mobile play is in no way limited to the playing of digital games: Camera phone

apps, together with location-based services, are providing “new social, creative, and

emotional cartographies” (Berry & Schleser 2014), which invite their users to engage

in many kinds of movement. These possibilities focusing on the various movement

of players, playthings, and devices such as play machines, are of interest to players of

many ages.

With help from the imagination, a playful mind may move anywhere. Again, with

a mobile, smart device, a player can document and digitalize her narratives of play

everywhere. Reijnders et al. (2020, 3) see the imagination connect the consumption

of mediated landscapes and the act of visiting actual places in physical reality, which

are essential facets of toyrism and toys’ adventures.

Together with the tools made possible by digital technology, such as smartphones

with camera functions and new types of playgrounds (social media with various

applications), toy tourism is based on the encounter between the player and the

location of travel, the playthings, and the play device that the smartphone is.

In toy tourism, character toys travel through many forms of mobility to places

near and far. Nowadays, there are travel agencies specializing in toy travel, allowing

anyone to send their toy character to well-known tourist destinations and receive

photos from them as souvenirs.

Whereas (human) personal mobility is burdened with ever-greater scrutiny and

supervision, “nowadays it is things that travel most easily” (Morley 2020, 55). The

study on toy tourism was conducted in a pre-pandemic time when human mobility

was less limited by travel restrictions.

“While repetition is certainly an important aspect of play, it is far from

being a sufficient criterion for deciding whether or not something is play”

(Kücklich 2004, 9). Nevertheless, the mimetic (repetitive and re-played) quality of

play with things and technologies made visible on social media makes it possible

to understand contemporary play as a form of human-object-(digital) technology

relation that influences and invites play to spread as a social phenomenon. Instances

of photoplay related to toyrism allow spectating of play on platforms like Instagram,

where toy enthusiasts and fans of character toys follow the adventures of “toy

personalities,” which sometimes come to resemble the continuous doll dramas

explained in Article I.

Toy tourism unfolds as an individual and social practice shared and showcased

on social media applications. Toy play is dependent on the use of personal

imagination. Still, when it comes to social media, it is also an activity colored by

45 On the official website, Niantic, the creator of Pokémon GO, gives a “Common Sense”

rating of 13+ of the game. See https://nianticlabs.com/parents.

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the collective imagination, in which the personalities and stories developed for the

toy begin to refine as a result of interactive collaboration. It is precisely because of

their technological and social media connections that toy play has acquired more

game-like features, such as interaction between players, which emerges through

goal-driven challenges implanted in play. Indeed, at least four factors associated with

the playing of games and game cultures are noticeable in toy tourism: a) regularity,

b) creativity, c) purposefulness, and d) performance, which, together with the social

media feedback system, allows for a more diverse understanding of adult play and

its linkages with location-based play. At the same time, toy tourism has serial and

repetitive features following the ideas of mimetic play and re-playing.

KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

Key findings to answer the main research question, “How has play moved

human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 in terms of physical, cognitive,

and emotional mobility/movement?” are summarized as follows:

• The trajectory of the toy’s own historical nature as a souvenir has expanded

in the 21st century into toy tourism, which is, through photoplay, shared on

social media service platforms. Recently, toy tourism as a term has evolved

into a neologism, namely toyrism (Heljakka & Räikkönen 2021).

• According to Gutnick et al. (2011), portability is a popular feature of play

machines, and in toy tourism, it is essential for both the device and the

traveling toys. In toy tourism, toys are given mobility as portable objects in

activities of the mobile human and, alternatively, by sending the toys out to

travel through toy travel agencies or geocaching.

• The relations of toy tourism to movement are manifold: Toy tourism

(or toyrism) implies the physical mobility of toys, mobility of the imagination

of players, and long-term emotional attachment to the traveling toy characters.

• Smartphones with camera features play a fundamental part in toy tourism,

which may also be conceptually understood as a multilocation-based “game.”

In paidic toy tourism, the activity forms freely without the boundaries of

apre-structured game (such as an app) and is supported by the communities

of toy enthusiasts, while instead, in the context of geocaching, a ludic form

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of toy tourism, the traveling toys as Travel Bugs move from geocache to

geocache within the limits of a pre-structured, goal-driven (and sometimes

even competitive) game. Smartphone technology enables photoplay

and a connection to social media, which turn a solitary play activity into

asocialone.

The following key findings answer the sub-question “How are the acts of play

realized in play through digital technology use, and what functions does the

playing have for the players in this study?”

• Toy tourism, to a large extent, is a voluntarily co-created and collectively

supported play form and represents social play firstly due to its connection

to sharing photoplay on social media and secondly in place of its linkage

with the well-established game of geocaching. As a result, toy tourism is

dependent on factors like human motivation to bring toys along on travels,

to move them around in interesting locations (tourist sights or geocaches)

during those travels, to narrate the toys’ stories of their adventures and

make these stories public on social media where they offer material for

spectating play for like-minded toy enthusiasts with aspirations to see the

world through the toy’s eyes.

• Toy tourism as a mobile and location-based activity manifests as both

paidic and ludic activities, illustrating evidence for multifaceted toy play at

a mature age.

• The notions of imaginative and creative play are vital facets of toy tourism.

Play — in this case — narrativization of the toys’ adventures involves

using the imagination as toy characters act as protagonists with their own

personalities, appearances, and motivations for their wanderlust.

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5.4. Article IV: Playing with Screens with/through Social

Media

The purpose of this study, titled “Liberated through teddy bears: Resistance,

Resourcefulness, and Resilience in toy play during the COVID-19 Pandemic” in

Article IV (Heljakka 2021), was to examine, describe, and increase the understanding

of remote digital play burdened by player isolation during the beginning of the

COVID-19 pandemic. By focusing on play patterns with soft toys, or plush as

these toy characters are sometimes referred to in the North American context, the

author strives to understand the relevance of soft toys and social media sharing for

“pandemic toy play,” conducted by an intergenerational audience. The movement

in the case study refers to the movements that occurred in play between the realms

of physical environments (physical toys in the locus of the home with its window

screens) and digital environments (digital “playgrounds” of social media consumed

through screens), indoor and outdoor space, and different generations between

players — children and adults.

***

Figure E.

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“While modernist technologies were viewed basically as machines of production

and in instrumental terms, postmodern technologies are viewed as communication

tools that permit movement in cyberspaces, virtual realities, and computer-mediated

environments” (Firat & Venkatesh 1995, 253). What is of interest in this thesis is

how the play machines together with communicative aspects of contemporary media

technologies prompt movement between people, enable communality, and ultimately

establish initiatives also related to playing for the common good (Heljakka 2020).

Ellen Seiter coined the Internet as a kind of playground (2005). Indeed, social

media is established as a site for play, where the hybridity of play between physical

and digital realms becomes perceivable. Social media platforms also function as

windows to player cultures: many of the players are already content producers, as the

same technology can easily be used to send and receive (Livingstone 2004). Cronin

says that instead of being perceived as victims of new media, young people actively

contribute to the new media landscape by creating content, for example on Flickr

and YouTube (Cronin 2011, 88). Besides these well-known and popular platforms,

movement occurs between communication environments such as Facebook,

Instagram, and TikTok, depending on the player’s age, motivation, and wish to

connect with a specific audience.

Pink and colleagues (2018) have noted the leisure and playfulness of using social

media. While society is influenced by the powers of technological systems, and the

potential toxicity of social media behavior is a pejorative facet of digital culture,

play lives, thrives, and moves on each platform it finds. Although doll dramas and

toyrism, as discussed in Articles I and III as play phenomena enriched by the use of

play machines, emerged before social media platforms, social online sharing toy play

is at the core of adult play with contemporary character toys.

Sociality is vital for playing, but play may take solitary forms: “play is social

interaction as much as it is private action” (Henricks 2015b, 101). Solitary play (silent

dialogues with the self, self-reflective play, play of the mind, imagination, and creative

thinking) and social play (interaction with play materials and communication with

other players, social environments, and contexts) are present in contemporary play.

As illustrated in Article I, play happens because of human motivation to explore

and embrace playfulness, which means that interpersonal play, or solitary play

happens. In contrast, intrapersonal or social play demands that playing manifests as

communication. The case study described here, Article IV, focuses on playing with

screens and playing on social media. The publication, a journal article titled “Liberated

through teddy bears: Resistance, resourcefulness, and resilience in toy play during

the COVID-19 Pandemic,” illustrates how a new form of hybrid play, co-existing

simultaneously in offline and online contexts, emerged at the beginning of the pandemic.

Any study undertaken represents a particular moment in time, and this is the case of

research conducted during the COVID-19 pandemic beginning in 2020. However,

online realms began to form three decades ago: The World Wide Web was introduced

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in 1991. Research by the Global WebIndex shows that 59%of the world’s population

uses social media globally. The average daily usage is2 hours and 31 minutes (Global

WebIndex, January 2023 in Chaffey 2023). The outbreak of COVID-19 resulted in a

monumental increase in online and digital activities. For example, according to some

statistics, the volume of playing digital games increased by 35% (Wave 2020). Despite

the fact that similar statistics have not been created for playing with toys, the case

study at hand attempts to capture how toys were used alongside digital devices and

social media platforms to convey a message of hope that traversed the limits of age

groups, nationalities, and united physical and digital environments of play.

Play has been described as “any activity that is engaged in for fun, rather than

survival” (Lillard 1993). However, as the fourth case study undertaken for this thesis

demonstrates (Article IV), play may sometimes contribute to surviving the firsthand

mental shock of a global (health) crisis despite its joyous associations with leisurely

pl ay. According to Bogost’s (2016, 233) idea, we don’t play to distract ourselves from

the world but to partake in it. Dramatically, play has functioned as a contributor to

human survival at concentration camps, during the Holocaust, in times of war, and

during the pandemic — not exclusively as a form of behavior of children but as a life-

long and life-wide phenomenon. In fact, the play of adults is critical to maintaining a

good society (Henricks 2015c, 386–387).

Article I states that “creative toy play as a form of object play can take serious forms

besides the self-expressive, recreational, and escapist” (Heljakka & Harviainen 2019,

360). Researchers Back et al. (2017) conceptualize conformant play as the “normal”

engagement model and transgressive play as violating the structures framing play,

such as cheating. Although the latter idea does not directly translate to toy play, it

is clear that players sometimes use toys in ways that their designers may never have

considered, as in the teddy challenge investigated in Article IV. This form of play

demonstrates progression instead of transgression, further away from its roles in

leisure, learning, and productive play, and closer to play as a political force through a

collective movement.

The roots of communal play (Huizinga 1938) are grounded in rituals and

communitas. Pandemic toy play, in the context of the teddy challenge scrutinized

in this case study, represents a communal form of play involving manipulation and

displaying of toys (object play) and storytelling with them (narrative play), shared on

social media (digital play) between generations (intergenerational play).

The teddy challenge, as a signifier of play during the COVID-19 pandemic, can also

be theoretically structured as a form of play with physical, functional, fictional, and

affective dimensions: Contemporary toys as three-dimensional, material playthings

may, in other words, be considered asphysical entities that can be manipulated in

terms of object play. Usually, the toys arefunctional in terms of their (re)playability;

they are intended for play of some kind and afford, for example, possibilities to pose

and display them in different ways. Toys of the contemporary kind often also include

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afictionalaspect; they may, due to their personality as character toys, have a backstory

of some sort. In the simplest sense, they may have a name and personality described in

a few sentences. On the other hand, they can be tied to transmedia franchises or story

worlds. Toys are also objects and vehicles that communicate emotions (Shillito 2011).

Therefore, the toy play experience usually includes anaffective component, meaning

the player forms an emotional bond with the plaything. The study presented in the

article demonstrates how all of the above-mentioned dimensions of toy experiences

— physical, functional, fictional, and affective (Heljakka 2018b) — are relevant when

considering uses in the context of the pandemic.

In 1998, the teddy bear was elected to The Strong National Museum of Play’s

National Toy Hall of Fame. The year 2002 was celebrated in North America, Europe,

and Asia as the 100th birthday of the origin of the teddy bear (Varga 2009). When

writing this summary, the teddy bear celebrates its 120th birthday as one of the oldest

transmedial toy phenomena.

As discussed in the article, teddy bears and other “cutified” plush toys present a

persuasion to be cuddled and nurtured, but as proposed in the article at hand, they

can also “give back” by providing their human counterparts crucial support and a

playful communicative means in times of crises. The teddy bear, as a prominent toy

activist, shows how plush toys are not only brought to places of mourning (Varga

2009) as signs of sorrow and grief but also treated as powerful entities with the

agency, shielding human beings from the adverse effects of social isolation caused by

quarantines during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Sutton-Smith thinks of toy play as a solitary manipulation of objects and toys

as objects of knowledge (Sutton-Smith 1986, 237). Recent research on play during

the pandemic positions toys like plush (i.e., teddy bears) as objects of resilience (see

Heljakka 2023).

In addition to their meanings as personal protectors with capacities to comfort

and empower their players, toys, according to the study, are objects onto which shared

meanings may be projected. This means that besides being material for interpersonal

play, toys can be employed as part of intrapersonal activities and communication, in

which storytelling is essential. Moreover, as this research illustrates, intergenerational

players can share toys.

Intergenerational play — even transgenerational or cross-generational play —

“covers a wide range of possibilities” (Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky 2012, 78). What are

the benefits of intergenerational play practices?

In addition to the contributions that intergenerational play may make to children’s

creative development, it may also sustain the creative spirits of those adults who

remain open to and involved in these experiences with the younger generations.

(Bergen1989,237)

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Learning and social engagement are also important as part of healthy aging. According

to the European Map of Intergenerational Learning, people of all ages can learn

together and from each other. Generations work together to gain skills, values, and

knowledge. Intergenerational learning fosters reciprocal learning relationships between

different generations, develops social capital and social cohesion, addresses significant

demographic changes in Europe, and enhances intergenerational solidarity. (EMIL

Network Europe)

In intergenerational play, the play worlds of (seemingly) innocent childhood and

of worldly adults collide and converge. Thomas Henricks formulates a continuing

challenge for students of play to demonstrate the similarities and differences in play

activity between children and adults across the entire lifespan (Henricks 2015c, 386).

Shared play experiences across the lifespan can improve cognitive development,

social development, physical development, and healthy emotional development

(Davis, Larkin, & Graves, 2002; c.f. Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky 2012, 62). According

to Bengtson (2001), multigenerational relationships will be more critical in the 21st

century for three reasons: (a) demographic changes of people aging, (b) the importance

of grandparents fulfilling family functions, and (c) the strength of intergenerational

solidarity over time (c.f. in Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky 2012).

One example of intergenerational relationships is the one between grandparents

and grandchildren: grandparents and grandchildren often support each other as

play companions (Davis et al. 2012). “Grandchildren view grandparents as positive

role models and mentors and a source of emotional security” (Kornhaber 1996).

Grandparents, on the other hand, “gain a sense of joy and pride by being part of their

grandchildren’s lives” (Kemp 2005).

Davis et al. (2012) have noted the paucity of research in intergenerational

play practices. In particular, they observe that more academic research needs to

be conducted to examine intergenerational play or technologies to support it. It is

somewhat surprising that in the Western context, there is a notable gap in studies

with an interest in the joint and shared practices of players of different ages, especially

those involving similar playthings, and in the context of technology-oriented play as

part of the use of the same play machines. As suggested here, such research would

increase and broaden the understanding of how players of different generations could

participate in the transmittance of play knowledge, i.e., valuable information about

the multifaceted play patterns related to object play rooted in the use of physical

playthings but with a possible connection to other tools and playscapes beyond

the physical manipulation and interactions between the player and the plaything

(Heljakka 2016; 2022).

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Intergenerational play practices have significance for learning about technologies:

As children become increasingly adapted to technological devices in their everyday lives,

the play they engage with their elders is bound to change and adapt, bringing the older

generations along. For example, using interactive video and audio communications

allows children and grandparents the opportunity to communicate — and play — across

distances in real time. (EMIL Network Europe)

As Cohen and Waite-Stupiansky (2012, 78) suggest, “researching the possibilities

provided by technology would be an important next step for studies of intergenerational

play.” The researchers address the relevance of letting players of different generations

engage with each other: “Providing the opportunity to bridge older and younger

generations highlights the importance of tapping into the potentialities of using play

in interdisciplinary programs to understand play theory and research across the life

span” (Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky 2012, 61).

As demonstrated in the case studies of this thesis, today’s toys are played with

in both physical and online environments. Therefore, they can be considered tools

for play that encourage creative activity. As discovered in Articles I and III of this

thesis, the toy and the camera (or other mobile device that includes the camera) work

together to challenge the player’s creativity in photoplay. Like camera technologies,

social media sharing has become integral to toy play. Online playscapes now provide

windows to rich, multifaceted play surrounding contemporary toys (e.g., Heljakka

2016). “When toys are photoplayed and shared on social media, intrapersonal toy play

becomes socially shared interplay in which the imaginations of many toy enthusiasts

come to play together” (Heljakka & Harviainen 2019, 374).

Gutnick et al. (2011, 37), who discussed co-viewing in their research report,

suggested that media producers design “content that actively involves parents

and children.” In their description, the researchers also mention co-participation.

In pandemic toy play — the topic of interest for the study discussed here — both

dimensions of consuming screen-mediated material were concretized with the

emergence of (co-playing) the teddy challenge.

Following an idea suggested by Marsh et al. (2020), parents would benefit from

advice on encouraging movement between the digital and non-digital. In 2004,

Doris Bergen noted how “only a few studies have combined computers with toys”

(Bergen 2004, 196). The teddy challenge offers a perfect example of how movement

between the realms of physical-digital, children-adults, and indoor-outdoor play was

generated in times of crisis.

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The general idea of the teddy challenge is simple: Teddy bears or other plush (soft)

animal toys are displayed on the window screens of private homes for passers-by to

spot and enjoy.46 The challenging aspect integrates a gamified goal answering the call

of how many teddies can be spotted on a walking tour, for example, the neighborhood

context. But the gameful aspect of the teddy challenge represents one motivator to

spot the toy displays only — according to the research conducted, the teddy displays

were also enjoyed thanks to the rich storytelling they conveyed.

“Mixing competition with collaboration in a single game allows players to share

positive emotion with their own team, and also enjoy the powerful buzz of group

competition” (Isbister 2016b, 93). Although the teddy challenge manifested as a

game that would potentially steal the participants’ focus off their pandemic concerns

for a while and offer a brief occasion to receive enjoyment from the teddy displays,

the challenge may be understood in terms of dealing with deeper issues than pure

enjoyment. The serious forms play have been part of game research for a long time.

In 2004, Julian Kücklich wrote that it is time for games to deal with more serious

matters (Kücklich 2004, 3–4). Casual or competitive gaming and creative play aside, a

much more serious function of the teddy displays could be seen in their emotionally

moving capacity to spread a message of hope in the form of ludounity — “by playing

together, we will survive this together” (Heljakka 2020).

“Social playability can be implemented into the game itself (as in the case of multi-

player games) but often arises spontaneously out of the interplay between players and

observers,” says Kücklich (2004, 23). The study by Hayes (2003) found that the most

meaningful encounters between generations occurred during non-structured, open-

ended play activities. This is what the teddy challenge was about — a spontaneous

and playful reaction to a global health crisis in the firsthand moments of uncertainty

when a cure for the COVID-19 virus was unknown and the future of humanity was

at risk.

Sutton-Smith (1993) has described toys as “emotional crutches.” The study on the

teddy challenge is an example of playing with window screens of the physical world

as well as the screens of the camera. Mobile devices and social media have revealed

that toys — soft plush creatures in particular — are symbols of loss and sorrow, but

precisely because of that, they are also bearers of optimism and hope. Without the

assistance of the technologies mentioned above, toys alone could not have sparked a

globally viral phenomenon. But through the displaying, photoplaying, sharing, and

communicating between generations, the teddy challenge grew into a phenomenon

of play previously unseen.

46 Parallel to domestic spaces, teddy bears and other toys were also displayed in public

space, such as in store windows and even in vehicles, like ambulances. Even high-profile

governmental agencies joined the teddy challenge, as prime ministers and ambassadors

had toys placed in the windows of public buildings.

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While “play alone is unlikely to be a simple solution for complex social issues”

(Cowan 2020, 27), the emergence of the teddy challenge as a collective expression

of ludounity demonstrated how play has the tendency to lift the spirits during times

of uncertainty and, to some extent, spread the message of resilience and survival.

Consequently, play moves our beliefs and trust toward better times ahead.

KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

The following key findings answer the main research question, “How has play

moved human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 regarding physical,

cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?”

• The study exemplified that there are still uses for physical play with

non-technological playthings such as traditional soft toys (or plush)

like teddy bears. This play may represent play between generations, or

intergenerational play, like the teddy challenge play phenomenon, which

moved players mostly in imaginative and emotional ways by employing

various screens — physical window screens, computer screens, and social

media platforms. This required imaginative and creative abilities as part of

object play practices manifest in the toy play of players of different ages.

• To spread the message of ludounity and playing for the common good

(inviting the players to interact in the name of togetherness), the playing

requests assistance from screen-based technologies and, once reinforced by

social sharing, may become a global and viral phenomenon.

• The study showed how players are resourceful and innovative in creating

novel play scenarios in uncertain times combining indoor and outdoor

space, physical and digital resources for play, and young and old players.

Through their remote play performed in times of social isolation, players

presented resistance to mentally challenging situations and promoted

playful resilience.

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The following are key findings to answer the sub-question, “How are the acts of

play realized through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing

have for the players in this study?”

• Intermixing physical play based on a popular plaything with screen-based

technologies and social media sharing may lead to a global and viral play

phenomenon relevant to an audience of intergenerational players.

• The teddy challenge started with creative and narrative object play by

displaying the toys in windows. During the first phase of the COVID-19

pandemic, players were urged to spot teddies in the windows, photograph

their favorite displays, and participate in the challenge through social media

sharing. The play phenomenon thus included a game-like structure and

invitation to play associated with displays, photoplay, and social media

sharing.

• Toys used as part of pandemic toy play can act as both emotional crutches

and objects of resilience. Therefore, it is possible to think that the functions of

collective toy play during pandemic times may have long-term consequences,

which may also contribute to mental well-being on an individual and a

social level, fighting adverse health concerns, such as depression.

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5.5. Article V: Playing with Social Robots

Article V, a conference paper presented at CHI Play’20 titled “Playing with the Opposite

of Uncanny: Empathic Responses to Learning with a Companion-Technology

Robot Dog vs. Real Dog” (Heljakka, Ihamäki, & Lamminen 2020), describes a study

conducted together with a technological “pet” and a natural dog with preschoolers

of the Finnish early education context and makes an example of end-of-decade play.

The Joy for All Golden Pup used in the study is a battery-operated consumer-level

robotic dog (Jones & Deeming 2008) and a “synthetic creature” (Pesce 2000). Due to

its aesthetic, the Golden Pup is conceptualized as “the opposite of uncanny” — part of

the title for our conference paper and the fifth publication of this thesis. This concept

hints at the cuteness of the robotic dog, which makes it a valuable play machine in an

investigation interested in researching the learning of pro-social skills.

***

In the 2010s, play materials interested in empathy development emerged in

the toy market. “New toys have become one of the chief test-beds for the new ways

of emotions” (Thrift 2003, 390). Physical and thus analog toys and games such as

Kimochis (2023), “The Failure Toy,” and “Empathy Toy” (Twenty One Toys 2023)

Figure F.

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found their way to the marketplace, promoting opportunities for social-emotional

learning from an intrapersonal and interpersonal perspective. Pro-social movement

of emotions is not foreign to digital games either — for example, Will Wright (2007)

has said of The SIMS that the simulation or sandbox game evokes empathy in players.

As shown in Article II of this thesis, novel, technologically supported toys persuade

emotional responses not only through their aesthetics of cuteness, like the teddy

bears explored as part of the teddy challenge in Article IV, but through their in-built

interaction.

Bartlett and colleagues (2004, n.p.) have envisioned that “in the not-too-distant

future, Intelligent Creatures (robots, smart devices, smart vehicles, smart buildings,

etc.) will share the everyday living environment of human beings.” During the

same year, Lydia Plowman noted in a chapter on talking toys how the Alliance for

Childhood (2000) had described robotic dolls as the “worst toy idea of the year”:

The pressure group believes that programmed toys distract children from “real play,” fool

children into thinking the toys are alive, manipulate their thoughts and reactions, and

prompt unhealthy emotional attachments. Such toys are described as a straitjacket on

play. (Plowman 2004, 211)

Nevertheless, according to Mark Pesce (2000, 220), “robots have become our

indispensable mechanical companions.” As a consequence of this development,

we are invited and persuaded to become friends with digital technologies and to

become attached to the devices in which digitality is embedded. The domestication

of technological devices, taming and normalizing digital technology within domestic

space and everyday practices assisted by easy-to-use technologies are all persuasion

strategies channeled through multimodal affordances. Being persuasive is an integral

feature of IoToys scrutinized in Article II and other types of toy technologies, such as

robotic dogs as a type of social companion robots.

Robots capable of communication are termed social robots. Lionel et al. (2020)

believe that robots are becoming more vital to society. Machines are becoming more

like multimodal play partners. In their research report, Kaleidoscope on the Internet

of Toys, to capture this development, Chaudron and colleagues (2017) discuss an

ongoing robotification of childhood. Social robots represent the direction of this

development. Social robots may be entities that “can autonomously interact with

humans in a socially meaningful way” (Chaudron et al. 2017).

According to Mascheroni and Holloway (2019, 9), social robots can be embodied

and sociable. Following Dautenhahn (2004) and Breazeal (2003a), Melson et al.

(2005, 1615) conceptualize social robots as computational artifacts that “have some

constellation of the following characteristics: they are personified, embodied, adaptive,

and autonomous, and they can learn, communicate, use natural cues, respond to

emotions in humans, self-organize, and pull on people in psychological rather

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than artifactual ways.” These play machines enable playful, embodied interaction,

as defined by Dourish (2001) in the following way: “Embodied interaction is the

creation, manipulation, and sharing of meaning through engaged interaction with

artifacts.”

Embodiment and representation of embodied behaviors are two characteristics

that make robots different from other technologies (Dautenhahn, 2007; Kramer,

von der Putten, & Eimler, 2012; Thrun, 2004; cf. in You 2018) as they are capable of

embodied physical action. These are kinds of (EPA) robots (Lionel et al. 2020). In

this way, robots can be perceived as computational objects and embodied intelligent

agents (Druga et al. 2019).

In the fifth case study presented here, namely Article V of the thesis with the title

Playing with the Opposite of Uncanny: Playful Learning with a Companion Technology

Robot Dog vs. A Real Dog, deals with a social robot in the form of a robotic dog,

which represents a sub-branch of EPA robots. This robot companion, in essence, is

conceptualized as an entity that opposes the notion of uncanniness or un-homeliness.

The term uncanny originates from Sigmund Freud but was popularized by Masahito

Mori in the context of human-robot-interaction research, or HRI.

As suggested elsewhere, the “uncanniness” of playthings depends on where

it falls on the axis between the simulation of nature, the fantastic, and some of

themorbid (Heljakka 2013, 346). This aesthetic is discussed here with the notion

of “uncanny.” Nelson formulizes the “uncanny” as something that literally cannot be

“kenned” or known by the five senses. She writes that Freud’s famous definition of the

uncanny (un-homely (un-human), or unheimlich) relates primarily to a resurgence

of primitive “discarded beliefs” — the omnipotence of thought, fulfillment of secret

wishes, return of the dead, and so on (Nelson, 2001, 17).

Lionel et al. (2020) believe that robots are becoming more vital to society.

Machines are becoming more like multimodal play partners. In Japan, there are

“robot-assisted activities” (RAA) and “robot-assisted therapy” (RAT) (Melson et

al. 2008). While robot assistants are becoming more common in various industries

and healthcare, they are still relatively uncommon in the educational space and even

more so in the domestic environment. Nevertheless, some toy robots marketed as

social companions have already found their way to the toy market in the form of

robotic pets, which this study investigates.

Writing on toys as part of literary fiction, Rebecca Gorman O’Neill (2017)

observes that toys are more or less immortal in toy-related tropes. With the newest

technology to characters positioned now as toys, this capability becomes literate:

toys are not only animated and movable machines but an artificial life-form that,

with the help of electricity, may have a ‘heartbeat’. What makes these play machines

intriguing (and complex) artifacts to study is their perceived “liveness.” This perceived

liveness results in one part of their physical structure without a screen. “Child-robot

interaction does not depend on classic interfaces, such as keyboard or screen, but is

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increasingly ‘natural’: it operates through speech, gestures, and vision, rather than

through text or symbols” (Fong et al. 2003; cf. in Peter 2017). Humanoid (or human-

like) robots are preferred to robots that appear mechanoid (Lionel et al. 2020), but

what if the robot is zoomorphized, referring to the robot taking an animal form?47

According to Fernaeus et al. (2010), there is increasing interest in robotic toys,

particularly in Interaction Design and Children (IDC). They define these “play

partners” in the following way:

Robots are intended for basic leisure activities such as play, creativity, playful learning,

entertainment, and relaxation. Importantly, robotic toys are interactive and have

a software component, which distinguishes them from other mechanical or low-tech

artefacts, e.g., those resembling the appearance of robots from fiction.

Robotic toys, such as robotic pets investigated here, resemble a “living” object

to be played with and cared for (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019), like the persuasive

IoToys investigated in Article II. The fifth publication in the thesis demonstrates play

with social robots, namely a robotic dog.

Human–dog relationships function as a working framework for exploring

robotic pets. In Western societies, over half of people share their daily lives with

pets. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary, pets are domestic animals

kept for pleasure rather than utility. At the same time, pets are known to influence

human behavior. For example, they facilitate human social interactions (Rault 2015).

Interaction with animals contributes to children’s health, social competence, and

learning (Beck & Katcher 1996; Melson 2001; cf. in Melson et al. 2005).

Robots available for children are primarily zoomorphic (animal-like) or humanoid

(human-like) in appearance (Mascheroni & Holloway 2019, 10). Children, especially,

form emotional bonds with robotic dogs (e.g., Weiss et al. 2009). At the same time, it

is possible to perceive social robots as a resource for play with a creature-like quality

(Ackermann 2005). Social robots, such as robotic dogs, are “designed to interact

with humans on an emotional level” (Zhao 2006, 408). Through play, robots gain

accentuated meaning as “others.”

Multiple social cues can lead to a more persuasive robot (Ham et al. 2015; cf. in

Conti et al. 2020). Central aspects of robotic pets are their aesthetic and ontology

as entities between live animals and artificial life, bringing toy animals to the next

level with their gestural interfaces, sensor technology, and responsiveness. These play

machines call for companionship but also convey a vulnerability due to their physical

fragility.

47 Robots are classified as “zoomorphs” if they mimic live, current, or imaginary animals

(Krueger et al. 2021).

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The face of the doll makes children react to it emotionally (Smirnova 2011).

Soft toys function similarly. Suh and colleagues (2011) discovered that individuals

can become emotionally attached to technology. Indeed, robotic toys that represent

“post-human (children’s) techno-culture” (Giddings 2019, 76) can be emotionally

expressive. Yet, in Smirnova’s (2011) view, interactive toys drive children further

away from play, almost functioning like “anti-toys.” According to the researcher, the

movements and sounds dumb down children’s imagination: “The in-built mechanism

enforces a certain way of play with the toy and prevents real play, i.e., it blocks any

initiative from children” (Smirnova 2011, 42–43).

Alongside interactive capabilities, aesthetics play a role in human relationships

with robots: Cute has been labeled the dominant aesthetic of digital content (Wittkover

2012) and cuteness (Harris 2000; Allison 2003; Cross 2004; Sherman & Haidt 2011;

Ngai 2012; Dale 2017; May 2019), alongside kawaii engineering as suggestive design

tactics. “There may be a perceived inhuman or dehumanizing aspect to digital

technologies in general that we instinctively attempt to mitigate by transforming

digital technologies into exemplifications of the cute, sleek, or cool” (Wittkover 2012,

215). As Daniel Harris (2000, J4; in Wittkover 2012) put it, “something becomes cute

not necessarily because of a quality it has but because of a quality it lacks. A certain

neediness and inability to stand alone as if it were an indigent starveling, lonely and

rejected because of a hideousness we find more touching than unsightly.” Humans

are susceptible to perceived motion, and as Hoffman and Ju (2014) point out, this

capability is used by designers such as robots. Both motion and emotional responses

are important for social robots like robotic dogs. Movement in such entities means

perceived “liveness”:

When interviewing children in the 1920s, Swiss psychologist Jean Piaget found that

they took up the question of an object’s life status by considering its physical movement.

For the youngest children, everything that could move was alive, then only things that

could move without an outside push or pull. (Turkle 2011, 27, orig. in Piaget, Jean,

The Child’s Conception of the World, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1928) [La

Représentation du monde chez l’enfant (1926, orig. pub. as an article, 1925)]

One example of using animatronic technology in a toy expressing the

aforementioned “liveness” is Furby: “The true breakthrough was to be the Furby,

a virtual electronic pet aimed at children of 4 and up developed in 1998 by Tiger

Toys, now a division of Hasbro, which consisted of a body, a motor, various sensors

and a large amount of software” (Thrift 2003, 397). Thrift (2003, 396) questions the

categorization of these entities as toys and instead sees them as “something between

a personal organizer, an adult companion, and a status symbol.”

The naissance of robotic dogs goes beyond Furby, as in the case of “SCAMP (Self-

Contained Automotive Mobile with Personality), a 16-inch-high furry puppy first

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produced in the 1980s which came complete with 300 different whines, bleeps, and

grunts and was programmed to have twelve different ‘moods’” (Thrift 2003, 396).

Perhaps the most known robotic pets are Sony’s AIBO — a mobile robot (Bartlett

2004), a robotic dog, and the seal robot Paro. However, Paro is not considered a toy.

In fact, Paro is classified as a medical device in the USA (Rault 2015).

Being pure entertainment (and also play) machines, robots like AIBO and Paro

have a purpose beyond play, namely companionship and therapy. Sutton-Smith

(1992, 5) notes how “therapeutic toy usage is one of the most striking developments

in the institutionalization of play in this [20th] century.”

Jones and Deeming (2008) have noted that emotionally responsive technologies

are still uncommon in the home environment. Paro is mainly used as part of

healthcare, but AIBO can be perceived as a domestic technological entity, providing

entertainment and companionship for some.

Seen from the perspective of social companion robots like the robotic dog

investigated in our research, these play machines cater possibilities to contribute to

the areas of human health and leisure.

In our study, focus shifts from HCI (human-computer interaction) to CRI (child-

robot interaction) and playful learning in the context of children. Jones (2017) notes

how the fascination with toys has led us to breathe life into them in many different

media. It is possible to argue that life is also breathed into toys via digital technology.

Berriman and Mascheroni (2019) formulate how the perceived “liveliness” can be

seen as co-realized by child and toy — children treat robots as more than mere

artifacts (e.g., Melson et al. 2009). Sherry Turkle (2015) describes these devices as

relational artifacts that allow children to explore “matter, life, and mind.” The child

engages in play practices that test the robot’s liveliness (Berriman & Mascheroni 2019).

According to earlier research, “a surprising majority of children conceptualized and

interacted with AIBO in ways like a live dog” (Melson et al. 2005).

“As robotic pets become more highly interactive and ‘lifelike,’ they may blur

categorical distinctions between technological artifact on the one hand and biological

being and psychological agent on the other” (Melson et al. 2008, 93). “In their pretend

play, children endow things with life all the time, blurring the boundaries between

animate and inanimate” (Ackermann 2005).

Ackermann (2005) thinks that the manner of animated or smart toys is not to

please or forgive but to reveal their “otherness,” which they accomplish through three

strategies, namely artificiality, believability, and conviviality. Artificiality points to

the “thingness” of the toy, believability to its acts as believable, and conviviality to

letting the “child” in but maintaining its integrity. Intriguingly, “animal-shaped toys

may prompt children’s moral of caring and cognitive development through pretend

play” (Sung 2018, 250).

Earlier research shows how children respond to a social robot as a minded social

being (Melson et al. 2008, 101). About AIBO, Bartlett et al. (2004) note that “unless

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AIBO does something unacceptable for a dog (like speak with a human voice), it

remains essentially a dog.”

During 2010–2020 research was conducted more broadly on child-robot

interactions and their implications as part of children’s lives (see, e.g., Belpaeme et

al. 2013; van Straten et al. 2020). To exemplify, Conti et al. (2020) see robots in the

learning context to function as extensions of old storytelling methods, including

playful tools such as puppets, dolls, or pets.

“Creating playful environments requires us to consider children’s views about

their experiences” (Howard & McInnes 2012, 739). Palaiologou et al. (2021) suggest

“a poly-pronged approach to pedagogy”, including the digital, virtual, visual, and

physical, which enhance children’s multimodal playscapes. For this reason, I teamed

up with research colleagues to investigate the capacity of Joy for All Golden Pup

robotic dog and social companion, to work as part of preschool-aged children’s

playful learning.

“Children directly explore the material world through multimodal play”

(Wohlwend 2008, 128). Traditional toys have a quality that makes them more alluring

in one sense, compared to many robotic toys of the present: Their soft “interface.”

Softer, more cuddly, and more “lifelike” were qualities asked for AIBO in the future

(Melson 2009, 562–563) — the participants wished for a fur-covered robot. This

wish has been responded to by other toy companies like Hasbro, which produced the

Golden Pup robotic dog under the Joy for All brand: Today, it is no longer relevant

to distinguish between the low threshold of traditional toys with, for example, their

cuddly interface and the highly technologically advanced smart toys (Fontijn &

Mendels, 2005) as both dimensions may exist in the same toy — a welcoming surface

and interactive features. Here the materiality of the plaything really matters, as it may

have consequences for player reactions. For example, in a previous study (Aguiar &

Taylor 2015), children were found to associate a plush toy dog with friendship and

a virtual dog with entertainment. In our research, we position the Golden Pup not

only as the opposite of uncanny, but with capabilities that function as a resource for

learning about (human) emotions.

The Joy for All robotic dog is similar to AIBO in that it requires power, carries

a battery, and has motors and sensors. However, it has a significant difference in its

soft surface, which AIBO lacks. New technologies are “haptic in the sense that they

are kinesthetic, stimulate senses of touch and motion” (Palaiologou et al. 2021, 2101).

Our study acknowledges that the multimodality of the robot dog, Golden Pup, may

have consequences for both playing and learning: The Golden Pup comes with a soft

and cuddly exterior and “hidden affordances” (i.e., affordances that do not convey its

existence through perception, Gaver 1991) such as sensors. Furthermore, “the cuddly

interface can offer an advantage and the potential for fun interfaces that might address

both the affective and the effective dimensions of learners’ interactions” (Luckin et

al. 2003).

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The Joy For All companion robot is a robotic dog miming aspects of the biological

animal (Melson et al. 2009). Nigel Thrift claims that the close resemblance to a live

animal does not present problems for children. He states:

Now children are comfortable with the idea that inanimate objects think and have a

personality. But they no longer worry if the machine is alive. They know it’s not. The

issue of aliveness has moved into the background as though it is settled.48 But the notion

of the machine has been expanded to include psychology. (Thrift 2003, 398)

Play machines with sophisticated interactive capabilities that emulate biological

entities, like the robotic dog under scrutiny here, may propose challenges (Melson

et al. 2009, 549, 554). For example, they provoke questions about the distinction

between animals and machines and invite us to ask questions such as: Is the robotic

animal “not really a real dog” but at the same time not merely “a pretend dog”?

Live dogs are the “masters of domestication” and because dogs have

excellent social skills with humans, current research applies human–dog

relationships as a workable template to understand HRA (human-robot activities)

(Krueger et al. 2021). For this reason, our study also involved a live dog.

Continuing the exploration of how toys, digital technologies, and mobility are

encapsulated in the use of play machines, the interest in this study guided the question

of what potential a robotic dog, in parallel to a live dog, offers for playful learning of

pro-social skills in early education.

While planning the study, an opportunity arose to join forces with a practitioner

of early education, particularly animal-assisted early education. To find the capacities

of the robotic dog versus a “real” dog, our team, consisting of the author as a researcher

of toys and play, joined researchers with backgrounds in evolving technologies and

early childhood animal-assisted learning to embark on a pilot study. To combine a live

agent in the equation, this study focused on comparing playful learning conducted

with a robot dog with playful learning situations carried out in the presence of a live

dog, who each acted as learning companions in the two groups.

According to Belpaeme et al. (2013), interactions between robots and children

differ from those between adults and robots. For example, presenting robots as

autonomous agents may help promote children’s social-emotional development

(Chernyak & Gary 2016). In our study, both “dogs,” used in separate groups (one

group with the toy robot and another with the live dog) of preschoolers with the same

tasks related to SEL (socio-emotional learning), were not differentiated in referring

to their “liveness” vs. artificiality.

48 Simultaneously, the liveness of the play machine proposes ideas regarding its capability

of keeping this forever: “The robotic dog would never die,” one child pondered (Melson

et al. 2009, 556).

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This study investigated play as part of children’s prosocial and animal-assisted

activities in the preschool context. By researching the impact of the presence of a robot

dog in parallel to a live dog, we aimed to understand the possibilities of including

digital technology vs. a live entity on preschoolers’ apprehension of prosocial skills. To

explore the firsthand responses of preschoolers to the robot dog versus a natural dog,

the three learning sessions were recorded as audiovisual recordings supplemented

with field notes.

We produced the study in the educational domain in the context and learning

environment of early education in Finland. The research is based on materials

generated with (n=15) preschoolers during (n=3) playful learning sessions. The

primary data collected consisted of field notes and audiovisual recordings of the

playful learning sessions. We set out to investigate similar questions to Belpaeme

et al. (2018) by asking: What is the contribution of the robot dog’s appearance and

behavior to playful learning situations? And what are the potential roles of a robot

dog in an educational setting? Learning through play is a vehicle for socio-emotional

development (LEGO Foundation course), so we aimed to answer how a play machine

of this kind could contribute to the learning process. Our primary research question

addressed the capability of the robotic dog to function as part of socio-emotional

learning (SEL) as part of guided play scenarios.

Guided play entails adult-supported play: “Guided play crucially incorporates

an element of adult structuring of the play environment, but the child maintains

control within that environment” (Skolnick Weisberg et al. 2015, 10). Following this

idea, together with the preschool teachers, we set up a playful learning situation in

which children were granted room for exploration and adults could ask open-ended

questions while the children were playing.

Belpaeme et al. (2018) point to the physical presence of social robots, which

makes them different from traditional learning technologies, such as laptops, tablets,

or smartphones. Social robots may function as tutors or peer learners and be engaging

and enjoyable. In this way, they can be understood as learning companions. Our

research illustrates that they can also support learning by functioning as facilitators

of playful learning.

Based on their research, Farneaus et al. (2010) formulate that robotic artifacts

might trigger more complex expectations than mundane technology. Resnick

(2006, 6) reminds us that “[r]egardless of how innovative or evocative they are, new

technologies cannot, on their own, ensure playful-learning experiences.”

Nevertheless, Conti et al. (2020, 3) state that robots can be powerful tools in

the teacher’s hands. Hence, an educator’s lens is beneficial in studies interested in

learning. Rather than measuring the outcomes of actual learning with the robot dog,

our study took an interest in the potentiality of using a social companion of this kind

in association with SEL undertaken in a context suited for playful learning, meaning

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the preschool environment welcoming playful behavior and enhanced with new toy

technology.

SEL is a learning process to manage emotions, feel and show empathy for others,

establish positive relationships, and make responsible decisions (Collaborative

for Academic, Social, and Emotional Learning CASEL, 2019). Breazeal (2003b)

addresses how emotions are critically meaningful in understanding the capacity of

social robots. Despite the goal of facilitating the learning of pro-social skills through

exercises of guided play, the preschool children’s interaction with the Joy For All

Golden Pup involved petting and scratching the robotic dog — manipulations that

are familiar not only with live animals, like pets, but also in association with object

play with plush animals.49 Still, there are differences between soft toys, animals, and

technological pets, like social robots: Inert toys like traditional teddy bears, says

Ackermann (2005), are both malleable and stable. Giddings (2019, 75) writes that

they “imbued life and intelligence only by the imaginative and manual action of the

child him or herself.”

This meant for our study to investigate how social robots may become play partners,

not replacing human contact but enhancing human-to-human communication. The

key findings of the pilot study illustrate that the children anthropomorphized the

Golden Pup by attributing it with life-like qualities and treating the robot dog more

as if it were human-like rather than attributing human-like behaviors to the living

dog.

Questions that remain unanswered are whether or not it is a good thing to use

animal substitutes replacing real animals and, like Turkle (2006), question the capacity

of “deceitful intercharge” that follows the persuasive strategy of the play machines,

reinforcing the belief that the machine really cares for us in our interaction:

Do plans to provide relational robots to children and the elderly make us less likely to

look for other solutions for their care? If our experience with relational artifacts is based

on a fundamentally deceitful intercharge (artifacts’ ability to persuade us that they

know and care about our existence) can it be good for us? Or might it be good for us in

the “feel good” sense, but bad for us in our lives as moral being? […] These questions ask

what we will be like, what kind of people are we becoming, as we develop increasingly

intimate relationships with machines. (Turkle 2006, 3, emphasis in original; cf. in

Varga 2009, 83)

49 Melson and colleagues (2008, 100) make an important observation: “Children who are

more deeply attached to their dogs respond to a robotic pet differently than children

who are not dog owners.” In this study, we did not ask the participating children about

the live pets in their families. However, it is possible that earlier experiences with live

animals, and dogs in particular, have consequences for interaction with robotic pets like

the Joy For All robotic dog used in our study.

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Following Krueger and colleagues, it is also necessary to explore the social

implication of artificial companion animals by asking, for instance, whether they

teach children to nurture or waste empathy on robotic animals that should be invested

in human beings (Krueger et al. 2021). These are essential but difficult questions, yet

they must be considered in future research. It may be a question for future research

to apply the emerging area of robotic pets to the list of play machines that require

advanced digital (toy) literacies emphasized with the expertise of the robotification

of play.

KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

The following key findings answer the main research question: “How has play

moved human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 regarding physical,

cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?”

• Digital media extend the possibilities for children’s (playful) learning. This

applies to social robotics: Play machines like robotic dogs can be part of

early education that moves the players cognitively and emotionally. This

promotes possibilities for the learning of socio-emotional skills or SEL.

• There has been an emergence of natural user interfaces (NUI) and their

approachability in challenging the plastic and metal in commonly known

machines: The use of life-like coatings of robotic pets instead of sleek

shells will lead to a move away from oculocentrism to more multisensorial

approaches in play, including the use of tactile means, hence moving the

focus from visuality of play to what can be sensed through interaction

through touch.

• Simultaneously, we should remember that while technology as an instrument

may help advance mental, physical, emotional, and linguistic abilities, it can’t

replace human interaction, especially when considering children (Saracho

2015). This observation should be extended to the capacities of live animals

to contribute to playful learning scenarios to distinguish between dogs and

robots.

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Key findings to answer the sub-question “How are the acts of play realized

through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing have for the

players in this study” follow:

• The aesthetics of robotic dogs (as the “opposite of uncanny”) are key

considering their use as part of playful learning of SEL. In our study, the

robotic dog, perceived as cute by the players, invited the preschool children

to form relations with the robotic dog through playful encounters guided

by the learning sessions. By nurturing the robotic dog, the children learned

about emotions through discussions within the preschool group.

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5.6. Article VI: Playing with Speculative Toy Fiction

“Let the future tell the truth,” said the futuristic scientist Nikola Tesla (Cheney

2001, 230). The sixth and final case study produced for this thesis — Article VI:

“Reading Ron Right: Speculative Toy Fiction, Friendship, and Design of Future

IoToys” (Heljakka 2022) — focuses on future visions in the area of technologically

oriented research on toys and play by presenting a case of speculative toy fiction,

considering the future evolution of Internet-connected toy technology. The

publication — a conference paper published in November 2022 — illustrates how the

play machines designed and developed in the 2010s may influence the further design

of more elaborate versions of this genre of playthings when speculative accounts are

taken into consideration in envisioning affordances of future toys.

***

As detailed in Article VI, the investigation of speculative toy fiction includes

robotic agents of many kinds. Krueger and colleagues (2021) consider the importance

of relations between humans and robots, in any form, and whether they manifest as

short-term or long-term relationships:

Figure G.

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Robotic agents will be life-long companions of humans in the foreseeable future.

To achieve such successful relationships, people will likely attribute emotions and

personality, assign social competencies, and develop a long-lasting attachment to robots.

However, without a clear theoretical framework — building on biological, psychological,

and technological knowledge — current societal demands for establishing successful

human–robot attachment (HRA) as a new form of inter-species interactions might fail.

(Krueger et al. 2021)

In his influential essay, Nigel Thrift predicts that the role of toys will be important

as trendsetters. He writes: “In the past, new technologies were born in the workplace

and ended up in toys. In the future, toys will be the trendsetters” (Thrift 2003, 389).

Again, design theorists Kudrowitz and Follett (2014, 241) suggest that “toy designers

need to imagine how technology that’s emerging today might be incorporated into

future playthings when the technology becomes affordable for mass production.”

By analyzing the transcript of dialogue of the film Ron’s Gone Wrong (Smith

& Vine 2021) and conducting a content analysis of media articles (reviews and

interviews) of the film, the aim of this study is to illustrate the critical affordances of

the Internet-connected toy, an encapsulation of speculative toy fiction. In this way, the

study excavates the (possible, if not probabilistic) future terrain of toy development

without taking a stance on its quality as a utopian or dystopian view of times coming,

but rather the dimensions of the toys’ affordances as compared with the features of

existing toys.

The term “speculative fiction” was coined by Robert A. Heinlein in1941. According

to Oziewicz (2017), speculative fiction is a subgenre of science fiction that deals with

human rather than technological problems, focusing exclusively on possible futures.

Baumer and colleagues (2020) point out how “fictional narratives have played a role

in interaction design through scenarios and personas since the emergence of HCI as

a field.” Nevertheless, studies specifically concentrating on technological toy fiction

remain few. With the study presented here, the author wanted to contribute to this

emerging field.

While the analysis of the movie Ron’s Gone Wrong functions as a speculative toy

fiction case study, the genre is not entirely new. Narratives of toys are a standard

in literary fiction dating back hundreds of years and have probably inspired iconic

cinematic storytelling and films like the Toy Story series. However, speculative fiction

showcasing future robots is scarce. One example, such as a story featuring a future

robot, is WALL-E.

Children’s films allow viewers to “escape from an everyday reality that is not

always pleasurable and fun and may post challenging dilemmas” (Tranter & Sharpe

2011, 37). In their analysis of the famous movie WALL-E (2008), Tranter and Sharpe

(2011, 34) wrote that the feature film “reveals societal and cultural anxieties so that

several messages are identifiable.” Similarly, Ron’s Gone Wrong reveals societal and

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Findings

cultural anxieties related to a childhood explained by technologically oriented play

and social media cultures. The film critiques social media logic by confronting the

ethos of “likes” and attempts to show how genuine relationships are built on knowing

your friends throughout and appreciating them despite their faults.

A robot can be caricatured and resemble animated figures (Fong et al. 2003).

Ron, one of the film’s two main characters, is a B*Bot, which can be conceptualized as

a child-orientated technology (Stephen et al. 2013). The official movie novelization

tells the tale of the day when B*Bots were launched:

Everyone could remember where they were the day the B*Bots arrived. It was broadcast

across TV stations, live feeds, streaming services, and phone screens to an audience of

billions. Bubble, the coolest high-tech company on planet Earth, had done it again. But

this time what they were promising was a product smarter than the smartest phone and

more social than any social media app. They were promising a new kind of friend for

everyone. (Phegley 2021, 1)

“Ron” is the robotic innovative toy, a “B*Bot” who becomes close friends (and

a substitute for human friendship!) with its owner and player, “Barney,” a young

boy of 11 years who does not have many human friends before his adventures with

Ron. Barney, the story’s main human lead character, wants a B*Botto make friends

(Goggler 2021). Despite its faults — or because of them — Ron becomes a hero by

guiding his human owner to make friends.

Although cutified50 and innocent-looking, Ron represents radical innovation

(Kudrowitz & Follett 2014). Essentially, Ron is a future example of IoToys, able to

connect to the Internet, just like the actual (existing and marketed) toys investigated

in Article II of this thesis. However, as a fictional entity, Ron belongs to the future

landscape of speculated fiction, with a sophisticated 360-degree projective surface

and the ability to move effortlessly on any terrain. In other words, its body makes a

three-dimensional screen, customizing itself to its owner’s liking. Players can even

switch up the colorful skins of their B*Bots from bunny rabbits to Mexican wrestlers,

in a nod to interactive games like Roblox” (Lemire 2021).

Ron is a plastic, “embodied and physically instantiated” robot (Lee et al. 2006; c.f.

in Peter 2017) with a natural interface representing haptic technology that operates

through speech, gestures, and vision. At the same time, Ron is limited in terms of

electricity, as it is powered by solar energy. Besides its shiny appearance, the toy is not

meant as a status symbol only but as a “toy friend” to connect with, who aims to learn

all about its owner. In the movie, B*Bots are not “playthings on the child elite, selling

to just a few well-off households” (Thrift 2003, 397) but instead are depicted as a toy

50 Cutification has been identified as a sub-branch of toyification (see Thibault & Heljakka

2019).

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Katriina Heljakka

that everyone (at school) has. “Classrooms of the future will likely feature robots that

assist a human teacher” (Belpaeme et al. 2018), but in Ron’s Gone Wrong, the B*Bots

function as entertainment, not education. In the school environment depicted in the

movie, humans still carry the responsibility for teaching, and B*Bots are displayed in

the school corridor during classes.

In their study, Lionel et al. (2020) found that robots working as assistants, who

presented a playful personality, were perceived as more socially attractive and

intelligent. Like WALL-E, Ron is a misfit robot that, despite its malfunctioning, sets

out on a mission to “learn” his owner’s personality, manners, and likings as thoroughly

as possible.

New technologies create new opportunities for meaning-making (Yelland 2011).

In the context of Ron’s Gone Wrong, futuristic and simultaneously speculative fiction

offers a pathway to consider the evolution of Internet-connected toys and food for

thought for future technology-oriented toy design. Based on the analysis of Ron’s

affordances and comparing them with earlier suggestions on how to design child-

oriented technologies such as toys, the conference paper, Article VI of this thesis,

presents a set of guidelines that is of potential interest to design practitioners and

researchers focusing on playthings, most of all the play machines that are of particular

interest for this thesis.

Pantzar claims (1997, 64) that “technologies have transforming potential which

could be identified possibly only retrospectively.” In my view, speculative fiction

proves otherwise — for example, through speculative toy fiction (Heljakka 2022),

itis possible to catch a glimpse of what the future might hold.

KEY FINDINGS OF THE STUDY SUMMARIZED:

The following key findings answer the main research question: “How has play

moved human players of the Western world in 2010–2020 regarding physical,

cognitive, and emotional mobility/movement?”

• Animated toys, like the fictitious social robot companion Ron the B*bot, or

a representative of the future of IoToys open possibilities for reflection and

exploration of relationships outside of human presence (Ackermann 2005).

In this sense, speculative toy fiction serves anyone involved in designing

interactive and Internet-connected future toys.

• Ron’s Gone Wrong offers ample examples of affordances that envision how

play moves us physically and emotionally through possible play machines-

with a completely new kind of body, consisting entirely of a screen, Ron

has a ‘360 degrees projection’ and ability to connect online: Physically, Ron

the B*bot represents an effortlessly moving robotic friend who can become

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Findings

mobilized in several ways. At the same time, the toy beautifully depicts the

emotional investment of an artificial toy friend, with altruistic tendencies

opening conversations on how play moves us regarding the fruits of the toy

design of the future.

Key findings to answer the sub-question “How are the acts of play realized

through digital technology use, and what functions does the playing have for the

players in this study” are as follows:

• In this instance of speculative toy fiction, play between the lead characters

Barney and Ron happen in many ways: Ron is a physical toy as much as an

Internet-connected and robotic social companion. Through its affordances,

which are physical, functional, fictional, and affective in nature, Ron as a

B*Bot affords many kinds of play ranging from dressing up the robot (object

play and role play enabled by its physical dimensions), interacting with the

toy through its technologically enhanced functions, digital connectedness-

enabeling the ability to connect to online environments, such as social media

platforms (sound, light, and movement, which will allow for taking the robot

on walks and adventures or even to use it as a ride-on toy, i.e., functional

dimensions), narrativizing and anthropomorphizing the toy through,

e.g., naming the robot (fictional dimension), and building an emotional

relationship with the toy through its emotionally inviting characteristics,

e.g., cute aesthetics, friendly gestures, and behavior (affective dimensions).

• In the movie, the toy friend befriends Barney and points to the significance

of future toys’ ability to recognize the importance of counteracting undesired

human phenomena such as loneliness, a topical issue in today’s society,

which presents a challenging, yet intriguing theme for research interested in

future toys as play machines for the years ahead.

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Katriina Heljakka

Publication Main findings Scholarly contribution Ideas for future research

Article I

“From Displays and

Dioramas to Doll

Dramas. Adult World

Building and World

Playing with Toys,”

American Journal

of Play, volume 11,

number 3, 351–378.

Adult world -play with

toys entails movement

of the imagination and

fantasy, photoplayed

stories of spatial

arrangements

with character

toys as physical or

manipulative actions,

and screen-based

digital actions, i.e.,

hybrid world-play.

Conceptualizing adult

world-building and

world-playing as

imaginative, spatial,

and hybrid world-play

Further studies may address

the propensity of displays,

dioramas, and doll dramas as

a form of identity play that

may or may not connect to

unreal fantasies or to the

players’ actual lives.

Another avenue for future

work would be to map out

world-playing practices of

children and youth who

narrativize character toys.

Article II

“Persuasive Toy Friends

and Preschoolers:

Play test in g IoToy s. ”

In Giovanna

Mascheroni & Donell

Holloway (Eds.) The

Internet of Toys:

Practices, Af fordances

and the Political

Economy of Children’s

Play. Palgrave

Macmillan, 159–176.

The affordances

detected were

three-fold: 1) physical

play affordances, 2)

pre-programmed

play affordances

(including educational

affordances), and

3) affordances

for pretend play

and personal

meaning-making.

Based on the f indings

gathered and analyzed

in our play-tests, the

complementing design

values of connectivity,

nurturing, and social

play were added to

previously articulated

ideas.

Highlighting the play

affordances, children’s

perceptions of toy play

patterns, and design

values fo r I oToy s

as tabulated in the

chapter

In future studies of IoToys,

further agency must be given

to the educators and parents,

but most of all, the playing

children. An essential part

of this is to ask them about

their ideas related to physic al,

cognitive, and emotional

movement on playing with

the play machines understood

in the contex t of the study as

hybrid toy friends.

Article III

“Toy tourism.

From Travel Bugs

to characters with

wanderlust.”

In Nicky van Es, Stijn

Reijnders, Leonieke

Bolderman & Abby

Waysdorf (Eds.)

Locating Imagination.

Popular Culture,

Tourism & Belonging.

Routledge, 183–199.

Toy tourism as a mobile

and location-based

activity manifests as

both paidic and ludic

activities illustrating

evidence for

multifaceted toy play

at a mature age.

Toy tourism (or

toyrism) implies the

physical mobility

of toys, mobility of

the imagination of

players, and long-term

emotional attachment

to the traveling toy

characters.

Detecting, analyzing,

and articulating the

sub-categories of toy

tourism, namely

a) free-form traveling

of players with their

toys

b) semi-professional

toy hosting programs

c) Travel Bugs within

geocaching

d) professional toy

tourism agencies

To study the toy travels in

more detail by focusing on

long-term journeys and

reporting them.

Sending out toys to travel

through a professional

agency and s tudying the

management of this toyrism

experience from the

viewpoint of professional

(non-human) tourism

management. Investigating

toy tourism from an

intergenerational perspective.

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Findings

Publication Main findings Scholarly contribution Ideas for future research

Article IV

“Liberated

through teddy

bears: Resistance,

resourcefulness and

resilience in toy play

during the COVID-19

pandemic.”

International Journal of

Play, December 2021,

387–4 04.

There are still uses for

physical toys in play,

like teddy bear s in

intergenerational play.

Players are resourceful

and innovative in

creating novel play

scenarios in uncertain

times and, by doing so,

present resistance to

mentally challenging

situations and promote

playful resilience.

Intermixing physical

play based on a

popular plaything

with screen-based

technologies and social

media sharing may lead

to a global and viral

play phenomenon.

Conceptualizing the

term ludounity and

the concept playing

for the common good,

and showing their

relevance for play

during the COVID-19

health crises

Toys, as employed in

association with pandemic

toy play, can act as both

emotional crutches and

objects of resilience — more

research could be conducted

on the role of these toys, e.g.,

in times of war.

Article V

“Playing with the

Opposite of Uncanny:

Playful Learning with a

Companion Technology

Robot Dog vs. A Real

Dog.” Proceedings of

CHI Play’2020, Virtual

event, 2–4.11.2020,

262–266.

Natural user interfaces

(NUI), such as life-like

coatings of robotic

pets, will s teer a

movement from

oculocentrism to

more multi-sensorial

approaches in HRI and

CRI.

The interaction

capabilities and

aesthetics of robotic

dogs are essential,

considering their use

as part of the playful

learning of SEL.

Conceptualizing the

robotic dog as the

“opposite of uncanny”

by referring to its cute

and approachable

character

Exemplifying how

robotic dogs can be

used in research in

parallel to a live dog

to make comparisons

between robot-

assisted learning

vs. animal-assisted

learning

Adding to the

understanding that a

robotic dog more than

a living dog may assist

in simulating human

interaction more

than human-animal

interaction

Continuing the explorations of

the capacities of robotic dogs

to enhance SEL by designing

even more opportunities and

scenarios for guided play as

part of early education.

Implementing the idea

of using a robotic dog in

different contexts, such

as adult and senior play

environments, to understand

the potential of the play

machine to enhance well-

being attained through play.

Article VI

“Reading Ron Right:

Speculative Toy Fiction,

Friendship and Design

of Future IoToys.”

In Proceedings of the

25th International

Academic Mindtrek

Conference

16-18.11.2022,

334–338.

Speculative toy

fiction serves anyone

involved in the design

of interactive and

Internet-connected

toys of the future.

Ron’s Gone Wrong

offers ample examples

of affordances that

serve to envision how

play moves us with

future play machines in

multiple ways.

Coining the term

speculative toy f iction

and addressing its

usefulness in analyzing

possible future

directions for design

Synthesizing a set of

design guidelines for

IoToys of the future

Using the study as a starting

point for explorations in

mapping out human-robot

friendship in fictional

narratives as well as part of

design fiction, which aims to

solve societal challenges such

as loneliness and bullying.

Table 2. A summary of the main findings, scholarly contributions, and future research ideas

per publication.

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Katriina Heljakka

6. Discussion

Human beings have always toyed and played with things. Object play as a form of play

behavior that involves various props has intrigued players from the early beginnings

of toy history. In the thesis, I began to discuss play by giving an example of a(n) (art)

historical perspective on children’s play, namely Pieter Bruegel’s painting from the

1500s. As illustrated by this painting, Children’s Games, historically perceived playing

involved other players and physical objects. Already in the 1500s, many playthings

existed and were used in Bruegel’s art — play could manifest in physical and material

ways and, perhaps most notably, as a mobile activity that takes place outdoors. If a

similar painting was made of the playing children of today, an artist would probably

include indoor space in the representation, depict significantly more toys and games

in the artwork, and would most definitely make use of the technologies used by the

players to illustrate how play is ever more often accompanied by devices or machines

operated both indoors and outdoors, as envisioned in the AI-enhanced replaying of

the painting (Figures A-G).

Due to technological development, play is more perceivable and more perceived

than ever before. It is observed, followed, presented, documented, spectated, and

evaluated. Children’s play and games have been analyzed from the late 18th century

onwards (Sutton-Smith & Rosenberg 1971). In the past decade, studies on digital play

have evolved rapidly. This thesis draws on earlier research that illustrates how play

and creativity can be fostered through the use of technologies (Marsh et al. 2018).

The background literature comes mainly from early childhood (education) studies,

interaction design studies, and play studies.

“The human mind seeks to categorize many aspects of the world” (Melson et al.

2009, 547). This thesis took an interest in the evolution and effects of technologization

and, mainly, digitalization of play over ten years. The thesis has aimed to provide

a glance at play in 2010–2020 by focusing on toys, technologies, and mobility in a

digital world. The main objective of this thesis was to increase understanding of

how play moves us physically, cognitively, and emotionally in terms of digitalization

and connectedness of device-based play, also categorized as digital play. The focus

of the thesis has been to answer the question of how movement occurs in digital

and Internet-connected play. The guiding sub-questions pursued were the following:

How does play happen with various devices, and how has play with play machines

evolved over the past decade?

As early as 2009, Johnson and Christie already called for more research on

technologically enhanced toys. Earlier research recognizes that as children become

more and more adapted to technological devices in their everyday lives, the play they

engage with is bound to change and adapt (Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky 2012). Still,

the public discourse on technologically enhanced play seems imbalanced in favor of

the negative aspects that playing with devices (and often through screens) entails.

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Discussion

Even though technologically driven or technologically enhanced play is being

widely domesticized, networked play, however perceivable for those interested

in technologically oriented play, may still need to be made more prominent and

understandable for the general public. This becomes evident in the discourses

surrounding play, in which the activities grounded in using devices are often

understood as something apart from play. But what is casual, curious, and creative

human interaction with machines if not play?

As highlighted earlier, in Henricks’s (2006) words, to “play with” an object is to

experience the satisfaction of trying to control it. In terms of this thesis, this idea

could be extended by replacing the word “object” with “technology.” Because we

familiarize ourselves in play and domesticate technologies, they become part (and

partners) of everyday life. As the thesis has demonstrated, play evolves around physical

(and phygital) resources and established and emerging and already-established

technologies. (Phygital results from the integration of physical and virtual world. See

e.g., Del Vecchio et al. 2023) The data reviewed in the articles present evidence of the

multidimensional nature of digital play as part of leisure, learning, and productive

endeavors, even playbor.

There is a fear often articulated and made visible in news media — the question

of the decrease of play time and contemporary children’s supposed restricted ability

to play, which are often proposed as threats to contemporary childhood. At the same

time, scholars such as Brian Sutton-Smith have envisioned that the 21st century will

be the Century of Play, i.e., what he calls the ludic era (Sutton-Smith 1997). For this

reason, my attention in the context of this work was steered toward the devices and

things that contribute to the formation of play, discussed here as play machines and

digital toys, and their meaning for what is termed here as digital play.

The thesis at hand shows how an understanding of the nature of toys has expanded

during the 2010s, driven by digital technology: Some see mobile devices themselves

as new types of toys, with smartphone and tablet screens channeling content and

possibilities for digital play and fantasy worlds as well as edutainment. For example,

smart toys, which entered the mass market more widely in the 2010s, are increasingly

connected to digital technology and information networks drawing on “material”

that invites, inspires, and encourages play of people of various ages.

Digital games stand as the most prominent example of play “material” as

content for playing audiences since their beginnings at the end of the last century;

however, this thesis attempts to lay out broader perspectives on digital play, which

emerges through player interaction with physical (tangible) play material, physical

surroundings, and consists, to a large extent, of activities still determined (and

limited) by the fact that the human player is a physical, organic, and living entity.

While the non-human agent is slowly becoming a more relevant actor in digitalizing

and networked play as IoToys and robotic pets have entered the playscapes of leisure,

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Katriina Heljakka

edutainment, and the occupational sphere of work-life contexts, the human being

plays with play machines separate from herself.

The introductory part of this thesis sought to answer questions such as: Which

societal transitions have led to the strengthening of these beliefs, and which lines of

development have contributed to the fears and hopes associated with the evolution

of play? How have the things made for play come to have a close relationship with

digital technology and media? And what really has changed in play during the past

decade?

To understand how play moves us at the dawn of a new century has required

an open and courageous mind of the researcher, one with a background in art and

design, cultural research essentially connected with visuality and materiality, and

more recently, with some flirtation with the areas of game studies and HCI, or

human-computer interaction.

The thesis represents a humble thread in the research tradition focusing on the

relationship between digital technology and multidimensional movement in play.

The merits of the research are the mosaic of case studies that represent various facets

of new branches of technologically oriented play, namely digitalization and digital

connectedness.

The research reported here, which aims to be both descriptive and evaluative,

makes interdisciplinary contributions to toy research, play (and game) studies,

research on human-computer interaction (HCI, with a particular focus on

interaction design interested in play-based interactions), and early education.

While play is primarily about behavior related to our participation with the world,

other players, and our inner lives, play with technologies is also about cultures of

production, spectatorship, and consumption. Therefore, digital culture functions as

an umbrella term and theoretical framework for the conducted research, allowing

the author to traverse the boundaries of academic realms such as early education

and game research. As a multidisciplinary scholarly contribution, it aims to illustrate

the existence and vibrancy of play beyond the childhood years, unlimited by the

possibilities of traditional playthings only. The findings and suggestions for future

work summarized in Table 2 may be of use to those interested in the possibilities

digital technologies bring to leisure, learning, and productive endeavors undertaken

with toys and technologies that provide possibilities for movement.

According to Kücklich, play as a form of behavior functions as a workable

“language” through which to speak about “new media,” interpreted here as play

machines::

[n]ew media are simultaneously limiting and liberating, open and closed, controlling and

controllable. This ambiguity might be addressed in other terms. Still, the terminology of

play seems to offer a unique opportunity to speak of it in a language that acknowledges

this ambiguity as an asset rather than an annoyance. (Kücklich 2004, 40)

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Discussion

Mobile devices, social media, and networked objects and Internet-connected

environments create new manifestations and dimensions for play by, for example,

augmenting traditional play with the use of digital technology. Mobile devices offer

“unprecedented mobility to the affordances of previously static technologies and

experiences” (Moore 2011, 381). How does contemporary play using these resources

move the players?

This thesis has addressed how contemporary play often manifests as play with

devices; most notably, play is carried out in the presence and utilization of screens

and seductive spectacles in terms of content created for play.

In sum, the research conducted for this thesis found that:

• Adult world-play with toys entails movement of the imagination and fantasy,

photoplayed stories of spatial arrangements with character toys as physical

or manipulative actions, and screen-based digital actions, i.e., hybrid world-

play. Movement in these instances happens cognitively within toy players’

imaginations and creativity in photoplay; physically within the intimacy of

the home as part of toy displays and dioramas; and digitally through socially

shared doll dramas online. Emotional movement is generated as players

form player relations with the toy characters. (Article I)

• The affordances detected in preschoolers play with IoToys were threefold: 1)

physical play affordances, 2) pre-programmed play affordances (including

educational affordances), and 3) affordances for pretend play and personal

meaning-making. Based on the findings gathered and analyzed in our play-

tests, the complementing design values of connectivity, nurturing, and social

play were added to previously articulated ideas. Movement with IoToys

results from the players’ physical (and social) interaction, from cognitive

and imaginative engagement by employing the toys’ affordances (physical,

pre-programmed, and educational affordances), and from emotional

bonding invited by the “toy friends’” persuasion strategies for nurture and

care. (Article II)

• Toy tourism as a mobile and location-based activity manifests as both paidic

and ludic activities, illustrating evidence for multifaceted toy play at a mature

age. Toy tourism (or toyrism) implies the physical mobility of toys, mobility

of the imagination of players, and long-term emotional attachment to the

traveling toy characters. Movement results from physical (and geographical)

mobility of the toys as part of the cognitive and imaginative engagement

with the character toys’ travels offline and online, and emotionally, from

the (often long-term) relationships established between players and the toy

personalities with wanderlust. (Article III)

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Katriina Heljakka

• There are still uses for physical toys in play, like teddy bears in intergenerational

play. In pandemic toy play, players are resourceful and innovative in creating

novel play scenarios in uncertain times and, by doing so, present resistance

to mentally challenging situations and promote resilience. Movement results

emotionally and imaginatively in the players’ minds by engaging with the

teddy bears and their stories displayed in windows, and physically as part of

making the toy displays, or on players’ walking tours with the (game-like)

goals of the teddy challenge in mind. (Article IV)

• Natural user interfaces (NUI), such as life-like coatings of robotic pets, will

steer a movement from oculocentrism to more multi-sensorial approaches

in HRI and CRI. The interaction capabilities and aesthetics of robotic

dogs is essential, considering their use as part of the playful learning of

SEL. Movement with a robotic dog results from the players’ physical (and

social) interactions with the robotic dog; from cognitive and imaginative

engagement by employing the toys’ affordances and support from early

education experts guiding the playful learning situation aiming at prosocial

skill-building; and from emotional bonding invited by the “dog’s” cute

appearance as the “opposite of uncanny.” (Article V)

• Speculative toy fiction serves anyone involved in the design of

interactive and Internet-connected toys of the future. Ron’s Gone Wrong

offers ample examples of affordances that serve to envision how play

moves us with future play machines in multiple ways. (Article VI)

Riede et al. (2018, 49) observed that from an archeological perspective, “much of

children’s object-centered activity leaves no traces.” The use of digital technologies

in association with play has challenged the ephemeral nature of play. While play

in physical environments leaves marks on these environments and on material

playthings, digital play tends to leave its mark in digital environments. So does the

hybrid play carried out with toys in combination with play machines. The case studies

presented in this thesis are illustrative examples in this perspective.

Adults’ views on digital play vary from its being a reward (for children) or a

distraction from work (for adults) (Marsh et al. 2020). Nevertheless, in the studies

carried out for this thesis, it becomes possible to see that digital and Internet-

connected play has functions across leisure and learning, extending all the way to the

productive playbor often associated with the work lives of adults.

Following Berry and Schleser (2014), mobile media adds up to the possibilities

of self-expression and self-presentation in online worlds. In essence, play is, besides

self-actualization, an expressive activity. For this reason, contrary to previous

understandings of play as a non-productive activity, ‘techno play’ must be understood

as productive.

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Discussion

Marsh et al. (2020) have observed how playing with digital technologies involves

content creation. Thanks to creations like the fruits of photoplay, proof of human

play can be found in the realm of digital culture. Documentation and shared play

content circulate on social media platforms. The mimetic quality of play combined

with technologies and media makes the tracing of play possible and the acts of play

perceivable. Consequently, the researcher of play no longer needs to be a digital

archeologist but rather a digital archivist and analyst. Material on and about digital

play — recordings and documentation of players and research papers — is vast and

seemingly ever-growing.51

The digital footprints (and thus, our entire digital legacy, see Maxwell 2020) we

leave in virtual environments grow exponentially in the virtual realm, which on

the one hand, proposes challenges to research, but on the other, these traces offer

tremendous potential for those interested in the human use of technology and

behavior related to this use. Thus, play knowledge becomes a crucial informative

resource for future research.

The richness of (audio)visual documentation and descriptions of both adult’s

and children’s play separately and together as intergenerational play presented in this

thesis serves as fragments of play knowledge linked to the developments of digital

and Internet-connected play, which researchers and experts of play cultures can

return to analyze the features of play in even more ways that have been detailed in

the featured publications.

Players are central informants in delivering information about how play exists in

each period and how it emerges in various contexts. As the individual case studies

of this thesis suggest, players tend to move fluently between their physical play

environment, digitally mediated content, and online platforms for play, depending

on the instances of play. This hybridity of play is a result of mobile and Internet-

connected technology and, to an ever-larger extent of players’ capabilities to navigate

the playful world with its possibilities and communities despite the limitations cast

on play by societal realities: Play belongs to all age groups and, if allowed, thrives

across leisure, learning, and productive endeavors. Moreover, play contributes to

health and fights isolation, loneliness, and depression.

Marsh and colleagues (2020) suggest that the children’s media industry,

including makers of games, could give more attention to making products (games

and apps) that encourage the crossover between digital play and physical skills.

On the one hand, based on the research conducted for this thesis, it is possible to

51 Due to the limitations of working on a Ph.D. thesis, decisions on how to limit the

research need to be taken sooner than later. For this reason, the newest background

literature gathered for this summary part of the doctoral work was published in 2022,

and some references that stem from 2023 were added as a final touch.

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see that three-dimensional physical toy characters fulfill such needs of coupling

digital technology use — camera technologies in particular — to enhance creative

handicrafts in players of all ages. On the other hand, according to the findings of

research on contemporary, Internet-connected toys, IoToys that can move also

invite their players to physical movement. As demonstrated in the case studies, the

mobilizing tendency of technologically supported play includes physical mobility

related to an “off the couch” mentality (Cumbo et al. 2014) and a flexible mindset

ensuring mobility of the mind. This is why the role of imagination for play can never

be overtly stressed; even in the company of physical playthings and technological

play machines, the imagination, creativity, or application of self-directed goals of

homo ludens is unlimited.

Playthings evolve with the developments of media and related technologies —

technologies that enable access to (social) media influence play — and finally, the

merging areas of playthings and media technology, as in connected toys, affect the

overarching cultures of play.

Technologically oriented play has long been viewed to include potential risks

for human well-being through negative consequences on health through addiction,

encapsulation, and passitivity. In connected and networked media ecologies

and cultures, privacy and safety questions and data protection arise in children

and all players, young and old. Concerns about passivity, even stagnation in both

body and mind, are associated with screen use and screen time. The limitations of

devices on physical lethargy, in the worst case, cause obesity in children and youth.

Communication fatigue caused by a constant stream of information and content

mediated through devices and screens is believed to result in mental passivity,

stagnation, defects in emotional regulation, and offline human interaction.

Alternate views on the digital leap of play investigate it beyond concerns linking

to the use of digital devices and media consumption: Seen in a more positive light,

the variability in hybrid play offering digital or otherwise technologically enhanced

play activities balances the experiential space of play widening our understanding

of how non-digital and digital play co-exist in a harmonious relationship. Play with

devices involves technologic voluntarism, if not technological determinism, meaning

that there is a belief in the positive influence of technology use on human behavior

— playful use of digital devices not only enslaves but, at best, enables, extends, and

enriches human play.

This thesis has taken a broad interest in play that happens with (digital) cameras,

Internet-connected toys, smartphones, social media screens, social robots, and

speculative toy fiction. In this way, digital technology factors as a significant influence

on play in all sub-studies.

Following the idea presented by Nigel Thrift (2003), author of the insightful essay

“Closer to the Machine? Intelligent Environments, New Forms of Possession and the

Rise of the Super Toy,” one of the aims of this thesis has been to answer the call to

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investigate play with these new kinds of playthings, as Thrift challenges: “Clearly an

important step in the research of this kind is to look at how children (and adults) use

these toys.”

The advantages of digital and connected play are numerous, as shown by the case

studies taken for this thesis. Digital play involving digital toys enhances and improves

the technological agency of players. From the perspective of the studies presented in

this thesis, this play technology offered the first possibility for players to be mobilized

through play, suggesting the movement of the plaything and the players.

Marsh (2017) has noted the critical transformation of the spatiality of play, meaning

fluid movement across previously understood boundaries between the physical and

the virtual. Indeed, the playgrounds of today encompass much broader realms than

before. Play expands to digital worlds, but digital worlds mediated through mobile

devices also seem to extend the playing psychologically — imaginatively, cognitively,

and physically — location-wise. How play with machines moves us today is mainly

in similar terms — players are driven not only by the innate thingness, aesthetics,

narrativity (and — aliveness!) of the playthings but also by the play patterns dreamed

up by the players themselves. Much of solitary play manifests as an imaginative

practice or play of the mind. In contrast, in social play, the players come up with

activities and engage with common understandings of how the playthings are used

as focal points of movement of the social imagination as well as the movement of

our physical bodies and movement within virtual contexts of social media platforms.

With the possibility to move our attention to envision the future, the playful mind

can go anywhere.

Healey and Mendelsohn (2019, 4) state: “Technology has played a vital role in

supporting the use of toys, and it is anticipated that the role of technology in addressing

developmental interventions will increase over time with the guidance of research.”

In early education, finding a balance between playthings that provide open-ended

play and, for example, ensuring that smart toys cater to more structured, game-like

forms of play is a matter for educators to consider. It is important to realize that toys

of this kind may enhance learning through the mobilization of body and mind. Many

technologically driven playthings, such as smart toys of the present, including the

Internet of Toys scrutinized in Article II, the robotic dog investigated in Article V, or

the speculative toy robot B*Bot presented in Article VI of this thesis, are essentially

moving machines that equally demand some movement from the player — either

dexterity of the body or one of the mind. Materiality and immateriality intersect in

these elaborate play machines, meaning a combination of non-digital (here, physical)

and digital, and linkages between inanimate and animate.

As the data suggest, digital technology seems to function as a prompt for play:

Technology has manifold meanings for playing, for what constitutes a plaything, how

players engage creatively with devices as the assistants, enablers, and enhancers of

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play, and for how technologically driven play inspires new play patterns — and in due

course, moves us physically, cognitively, and even emotionally.

The featured articles present evidence on how play moves us, enabled and assisted

by digital technology. Active mental movement achieved through imagination and

creativity contributes to learning, creativity, and self-expression (Deterding 2016).

Play makes both children and adults creative: “Play is vital for child development,

especially creative growth” (Gude 2010). To exemplify, digital play is greatly influenced

by human creativity like photoplay (Article I) and active modes of doing by creating

and producing, not only in knowing the skills to employ digital technologies but also

understanding how they can serve us as part of creative play. Therefore, examining

the diversity of play forms and creative outputs tells us about the realization of the

intended (and unexpected, or peripheral) uses of toys and digital technology, such as

children’s ideas on the affordances of Internet-connected toys or the teddy challenge

that manifested as an intergenerational form of play. Sutton-Smith claims that toy

marketers’ preschool toys will improve their cognition, visual discrimination, motor

skills, tactile skills, creativity, pre-academic learning, cooperative play with empathy,

individuality, and self-confidence (Sutton-Smith 2017, 183). This observation of play

of the 2010s is in line with perceptions about, for example, the IoToys that were play-

tested in the study highlighted in this thesis (Article II).

On the other hand, as the case studies described in the thesis have illustrated,

device use may lead to active bodily movement in different environments and

contexts: Playing with Internet-connected toys, such as coding robots, enables

vigorous physical activity by setting children’s bodies in motion indoors (Article II).

Playing with smartphones allows for documenting toy tourism or toyrism practices

that occur outdoors in adjacent or faraway locations (Article III).

In unusual circumstances, play in physical and social isolation can thrive in a

digital social context. The playing conducted between 2010–2020 also captures the

peculiarities of pandemic toy play exemplified by the teddy challenge, in which a

heterogeneous global group of players invited each other to play the teddy challenge

and simultaneously spread the message of ludounity and play for the common

good (Article IV). This instance of play proved the resistance, resourcefulness, and

resilience of a set of intergenerational players who expressed their creativity through

physical toy displays, storytelling, and social media sharing.

Curiosity and creativity are fundamental when considering digital play’s

possibilities for learning. While Sutton-Smith envisions that by playing, one may

learn to play better (1995, 281), it is helpful to think that playing entitles better

learning experiences and supports cognitive and intellectual growth. This thesis aims

to orientate in a direction that offers ideas on how digital technology use as part of

play-based, toy-based, or otherwise playful learning may increase our understanding

of how technologically enhanced play advances us besides physical and emotional

movement, as well as cognitive enhancement.

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Discussion

In many cases, play and technology can coexist and work in tandem to support

learning. Bird and Edwards (2015) call for a clearer understanding of how children

learn to use technologies through play to help teachers realize the learning potential of

technologies within play-based approaches to pedagogy. The key to this integration is

the thoughtful selection of technology (Fantozzi et al. 2018, 89), and this contributes

to purposeful play in integrating skills, knowledge, and technological literacy,

sometimes using multiple modalities and devices (even screens!) simultaneously.

Communication through play is often mediated through play — artifacts, devices,

and shareware. Referring to Marc Scott (2013), Jayemanne and Nansen (2016) point

to the concerns around children’s use of gestural devices: Children only learn about

the shallow layer of apps and interfaces by engaging with these technologies. Instead,

as Yelland (2018) claims, research should focus on the multimodality of resources,

places, and spaces for children’s play. “The multimodality of digital media (i.e., using

different forms, such as image, text, audio or touch, to present content) can enhance

learning” (Plowman et al. 2012).

As long as the screens on smartphones, tablets, computers, and toys dominate to

form the primary interface for steering the interaction between the human being and

her play machines, and before sensor-based or audio-controlled devices with hidden

technologies become the most relevant entities for human-computer interaction, we

must rely on an oculocentric, or vision-based, perspective on play at the cost of other

modalities and allow more tactile actions to take place than just pushing, tapping,

sliding, and so on.52

So far, playful learning is not entirely a matter of learning with machines and

Artificial Intelligence; it is a pedagogy guided by educators and employs technology

and devices as tools and instruments in human-led learning situations. The master

and servant logic is still relevant. In this way, it is not the technology that teaches.

Instead, it helps to learn, as shown in the studies dealing with IoToys (Article II)

and a social companion robot — the robotic dog alongside a living dog (Article

V). As accentuated in the studies presented in this thesis, the learning outcomes of

edutainment such as technologically enriched toys may differ depending on their

employment — or whether they are used in unstructured or more guided forms

ofplay.

52 Screen use is not altogether a bad thing — the COVID-19 health crisis has demonstrated

how (distant) e-learning increased the use of screen-based technologies for both children

and adults. Screen-based devices also enabled players to interact and communicate in

new and creative ways, as shown in Article IV of this thesis.

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In 2016, Jackie Marsh and colleagues claimed that “what changes in digital

contexts is not so much the types of play possible, but the nature of that play” (Marsh

et al. 2016, 250). The motivation for the thesis has not been to argue for the existence

of digital play but to exemplify its various manifestations. As the West is moving

toward a post-digital world, and considering the interest of the thesis at hand, a

post-digital play world, it becomes more and more unnecessary to try to distinguish

“traditional” forms of play from the digital and hybrid instances of it. Play is play.

It is universal but materializes (and digitalizes) in different ways depending on the

players, playthings, devices, environments, and contexts it moves with and in, and

the motivations it seeks to fulfill, whether for the sake of leisure, learning, or playbor.

This becomes especially prominent in futuristic visions of the developments around

play involving toys as social companions — a realm of research I have conceptualized

as speculative toy fiction. Even highly developed toys of the future carry with them

invitations to play that are, to some extent, universal and sustainable, seeking to invite

play that moves our bodies, minds, and hearts.

For a moment, let us go back to Children’s Games. A significant amount of play

illustrated in Bruegel’s painting involves physical movement as part of a repertoire

of actions. If mobile devices and Internet-connected toys were added to the picture,

some of this movement could present itself in other ways. Nevertheless, it would not

cease to exist. The mobilizing tendency always exists in play in one way or another.

Even screen-based technologies contribute to players’ mental, cognitive, and physical

movement. Better yet, it moves players closer to each other, even if this closeness does

not manifest as physical closeness between players. Technology enables social play:

As demonstrated by the research on play during pandemic times, it is possible to see

how play thrives and survives even in challenging times.

While play is guided by interpersonal imagination and as a mode of creative

self-expression, participating in play makes it an intrapersonal matter. Play is always

social in the sense that it is communication: It arises from gestural interaction, non-

verbal or verbal dialogue, and the interpretation of visual and multimodal referents

conceptualized in this thesis as affordances.

Like toys and technology constantly evolve in parallel, inspiring and feeding each

other’s development, play enters new areas through new tools and environments.

Understanding the nature of contemporary play requires involvement in playing

and interaction with its many traditional and mechanical devices as well as digital,

connected, and technological ones.

One thesis finding is how new, utilitarian technologies become play machines.

In their article, Ho and colleagues (2018, 13) predict that “the ubiquitous nature of

technology will likely mean that tablets and other mobile devices will become more

prevalent toys and learning tools for children in the future” (also see Kabali et al. 2015;

Rideout, 2014). How technological play manifests starts from the play machine, the

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Discussion

plaything itself, an intelligent toy, or an extension thereof, most often a mobile device

including a camera or smartphone. Kudrowitz and Follett (2014) observe the role of

emerging technology as an accessory for the toy (for example, using a smartphone to

control a toy car). This hints at digital technology being an extension of play.

In forms of more amplified technological play, the solitary activity is shared

through a social platform, and communication with other players happens visually

and verbally through the platform (Instagram, YouTube) in the interaction between

human and human, human and toy, toy and toy, etc. Sometimes, this communication

results in mimicry, meaning repetitive and imitative behavior of the play content (for

example, through photoplay).53 Moreover, technology is used to develop serious toys

(such as social companion robots and robotic pets; see Ihamäki & Heljakka 2021),

and networked technology produces content for play through Internet-connected

playthings (such as IoToys).

The affordances of play are material, visual, tactile, and digital — and as

demonstrated in this thesis, they are psychologically mobilizing as play moves our

affections, and they are physically mobilizing due to the functional properties of play

materials. All these affordances can merge into contemporary playthings, systems,

and environments. According to the studies undertaken for this thesis, the affordances

for play in the digital era represent three forms summarized in the following:

1) non-connected (i.e., traditional with no relationship to digital technology)

2) connecting (used in combination with mobile technology such as

smartphones, as second-level toys and play machines in themselves)

3) connected (connected technology integrated into the play machine)

Sherry Turkle reminds us that “we make our technologies, and they, in turn, shape

us” (Turkle 2004). Given that, to a certain extent, we have agency over the features

of future play machines, we should communicate some closing ideas on the design

and evaluation of interactive technologies considered in the thesis as play machines.

53 In his writing Toys and Play, Walter Benjamin observes that “doing the same thing over

and over again,” the transformation of a shattering experience into habit — that is the

essence of play” (Benjamin 1999, 120).

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Article II laid out a set of guidelines developed based on “ground rules” presented

in 2001 by Smart Toy Lab’s D’Hooge and Goldstein and conceptualized as design

values for technology toys. According to the ideas presented in the original study by

D’Hooge and Goldstein (2001, 1–2), interactive toys should:

1) be fun

2) open-ended

3) enable the child to be in control

4) offer a challenging and creative experience

5) be educational

6) grow with the child

7) involve a personal computer

8) be considered high technology

9) represent innovation

10) include at least one genuinely magical feature

Based on the study presented in this thesis as Article II, these design values

must be complemented with connectivity, nurturing, and social play. Furthermore,

as demonstrated in Article VI, these design values were further advanced in

association with research on speculative toy fiction and the fictitious B*bot Ron, an

Internet-connected “toy friend of the future,” and other recommendations given in

the developing area of research on IoToys. I consider these to be valuable aspects of

potentiality to consider for researchers, designers, and adults who supervise, guide,

and control the use of any play machines in the domestic or educational context

and suggest that play machines of the future and research interested in them should

consider the following viewpoints:

Fabregat, Costa, and Romero (2004) have claimed that much work must be done

in order for toy design to consider the end user. Recommendations for stakeholders

involved in the design, use, and governance of play with near-future Internet-

connected toys and robots (Heljakka 2022) are listed in the following.

I challenge anyone who interacts with play machines of the future to consider

their value in terms of digital play, and consider their design from the following

perspectives:

• Maximize natural interface.

• Consider play as a life-wide and life-long phenomenon, and accordingly,

encourage age-appropriateness.

• Enable possibilities for playful learning.

• Design for adaptable, multifaceted educational value.

• Provide fun, excitement, portability, and the ability to pose the plaything.

• Facilitate social interaction in physical, digital, and hybrid play environments.

• Encourage collaborative engagement.

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• Enable personalized experiences.

• Consider cultural diversity.

• Ensure safety and sustainability.

• Enable open-mindedness and freedom to play.

• Consider SEL and pro-social skills, and promote social sustainability.

• Play-test with players of different backgrounds and ages prior to and after

release.

Finally, to close the discussion on the desired qualities of tomorrow’s “super toys,”

there is one elemental dimension to be added based on the consecutive findings of

the studies presented in this part of the thesis — the recommendation and guideline

for design regarding affording movement of the physical, cognitive, imaginative, and

emotional kinds.

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7. Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of

Play in the Post-Digital Era

“The 21st century will be the Century of Play,” Brian Sutton-Smith has envisioned.

Indeed, in 2023, the play seems to have gained a more perceivable status in

culture. Referring to the work of Daniel Miller, Sutton-Smith diagnoses the state of

contemporary play as follows:

As more and more people value their lives in terms of their opportunities for adequate

play and entertainment, he says, the work ethic becomes displaced by the play ethic,

which is more equipped to evaluate life according to these standards. This new form

of human consciousness, Miller contends, is nonascetic. It highly values novel and

pleasurable experiences, creativity in or out of work, and change and flexibility in all

activities. (Sutton-Smith 2017, 235)

This thesis aims to examine, describe, and increase the understanding of

how technologically oriented play moves us in contemporary society. I set out to

investigate the role of digital technology as an agent and accelerator of play and

therefore participate in the discussions surrounding technological transformations

of cultural phenomena in the digital and Internet-connected age.

I embarked on a four-year research journey between 2018–2022, zooming in on a

spectrum of perspectives investigating technology-driven play. I was no technologist

at heart, let alone a technophile. But I do not consider myself a technophobic person

either, but rather a humanist driven by tremendous curiosity toward the new paths

play has taken over the second decade of the 21st century.

As digital play has been broadly viewed as a competitor of traditional play (see,

e.g., Mustola et al. 2016), I took the challenge of studying the lighter side of digitalizing

and Internet-connected play, focusing on the positive dimensions, benefits, and

advantages of digital play.

Smith (2010) critiques a “play ethos” in which relentlessly positive assertions

are made about the nature of play (particularly from a Western perspective) (cf.

in Cowan 2020, 12). It would probably have been more fashionable to take a more

critical stance on the influence that digital technology has on play. Still, an optimist

and playfully resilient mind always gravitates toward finding positive aspects of

phenomena, while moving toward new frontiers in academic knowledge. For these

reasons, it is fair to say that a specific techno-enthusiasm colors the reporting of the

case studies conducted for this thesis, also conceptualized as my “toy problems.”

The guiding questions pursued were: How has play moved us during the past

decade? And more precisely, “How has play moved human players of the Western

world in 2010–2020 in terms of physical, cognitive, and emotional mobility/

movement?” The sub-question inquires what kinds of digital play are encountered

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Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the Post-Digital Era

in interactions of people of different ages as part of technologically enhanced leisure,

learning, and environments, where play is increasingly happening remotely with

and through machines and social media platforms by asking: “How are the acts of

play realized in each instance of play through digital technology use, and what

functions does the playing have for the players in each study?”

Digital play has emerged as a prevalent play type (Erdogan et al. 2019). Even

though digital play may be most associated with the playing undertaken in digital

games, this category of play media should be the focus of only some research.

Understanding the digital leap play has taken during the past decade necessitates

a broader view than the one encompassing gameplay. Popular as gaming is among

different generations, it is not the only aspect of play worth studying at the beginning

of the 21st century. I reiterate: All play is not about playing (pre-structured) games.

Simultaneously, all gaming, from the perspective of this thesis, is play. To be fair,

however, it is possible to see similarities between toy play and gameplay.

Still, games and the research dealing with various matters around gaming make

a strong case when it comes to finding touchpoints between studies and interaction

with toys and other play machines.

Playing infiltrates human behavior in the contexts of leisure and pleasure and,

predominantly, education and working life. Whereas games carry vast potential in

driving human curiosity toward learning and productive professional pursuits, what

feeds creative individuals even more are the open-ended realms of play. Indeed, this

area demands more from the players than the aim of fulfilling pre-determined tasks.

At the same time, though, play is also fed by constraints. Therefore, one key argument

of the thesis is that certain limits are always needed for play to flourish. From the

perspective of this thesis, these limits are set up by the capacities of play machines.

“Play is a way of operating a constrained system in a gratifying way” (Bogost

2016, xi). As the thesis has suggested, these “constraints” may come from devices,

environments, and toys. Actual toys, besides other technological devices called

play machines in this thesis, are a powerful medium that should not be neglected

in future research. “For they may well herald the first steps into new kinds of more

performative spaces in which the play of encounter is much more highly mediated”

(Thrift 2003, 400). “Toys must be engaging, intuitive, indestructible” (Thrift 2003,

389). And indeed, if they are, “Long after Windows 95 fades, toys and stories will

survive” (Ibid.).

The contributions of this thesis are manifold. The studies presented rely on

the interaction of contemporary play and players in a time when digitalization

and connectedness have extended to various playthings: toys, games, playful

environments, and to the cultures of digital play where these instruments are used.

Carroll and Tafoya (2000, 8) claim that a description of a phenomenon cannot

pretend to be exhaustive or definitive. Nevertheless, examining a phenomenon from

many angles adds to the believability and reliability of the efforts taken. The bulk of

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the evidence presented in this thesis shows how the play of 2010–2020 demonstrates

linkages to more significant cultural developments, such as the oculocentrism of

contemporary society and the digitalizing and connected age. Visuality is still a

critical aesthetic category of interest to players. The most significant feature of early

21st-century play is its relationship to visuality. The eye-catching nature of current

play is primarily influenced by the use of digital technology, i.e., smartphones and

other mobile devices that control play, such as tablets. Still, technology is not limited

to the use of the visual sense and screens alone. The concreteness and tactility of

the user interfaces used in play, such as the materiality and shape of the toys, are

also important for play. The portability and mobility of devices incorporating mobile

technology and traditional toys tend to mobilize the player’s body and imagination.

In this way, the play of the 2020s is exploratory tourism in both physical and virtual

environments. Contemporary play is also social, as the documentation and sharing

of play have greatly influenced the interest in today’s play and the expansion of its

playgroups. At the same time, affectivity is of more and more interest to play scholars,

meaning that human emotions and embodied experiences are given more weight in

analyses of play.

Again, the increasing presence of mobile digital technology as part of

contemporary play (and object play practices) is undeniable, according to the thesis at

hand. Technology use is not synonymous with play, but digital technologies stimulate

and enrich play, while play helps technologies evolve. Through accounts on player

behavior, we learn more about how the affordances of various systems, devices, and

platforms are put into play by their users and, as a result, gain insights into how

digital play emerges.

To the best of my knowledge, this is the first doctoral thesis examining and

combining the variety of playthings and digital technologies, or play machines, from

several perspectives regarding player age and the context where play takes place.

This is to say that the multidisciplinary research conducted for the thesis at hand

highlights the play of children, adults, and seniors in the contexts of early education,

leisure, and playbor in a unique way and demonstrates how they employ digital

cameras, smartphones, Internet-connected toys, screens of social media, and social

robotics in their play in the contexts of leisure, learning, and productive endeavors.

The multiple case studies have been instrumental in revealing some of the mobilizing

potential and tendencies of digitalizing and Internet-connected play. I hope the thesis

offers a smorgasbord of informative and interesting case studies to savor, enjoy, and

learn from.

Already in 1980, Sutton-Smith wrote: “It is my view that we are so completely

surrounded by, even immersed, in play that we cannot at present know its full

involvement in our lives.” The everywhereness of play in terms of digital technology

and connectedness might seem ungraspable. Still, for a researcher of toys and play, it

is evident that play moves as a phenomenon and reveals its presence for those ready

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Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the Post-Digital Era

to interpret creative and self-expressive actions as play. In other words, in the 21st

century, play is a ubiquitous phenomenon.

Malaby (2009; c.f. in Dippel & Fizek 2016) writes that “anthropology has

witnessed the omnipresence of playfulness independently from digitization

processes.” Similarly, play has a steady foothold in digital cultures. Examinations of

digital culture provide glances at “online” human behavior. Humans are driven to

play by many motivations — entertainment, humor, spectacle, and scandal. Under

the shallow digital surface, however, lies a deeper web of human networks driven by

play as a creative, productive, communal, and, when needed, even activist form of

behavior.

According to news media, parents, and educators, one of the greatest fears

about the impact of extant digital technology on play has been the concern that play

mediated by technologies will suppress traditional play, often considered the most

genuine form of play and, therefore, the most valuable.

Lawry and colleagues (1995), who studied conceptions about boys and electronic

games in the 1990s, found that it was not the technology of computer games

that reduced children’s play with other children, but rather the type of game that

impacted this (cf. in Bartlett et al. 2004). According to the knowledge gained from

the studies presented in this thesis, play is not vanishing from peoples’ lives, nor

should the evolvement of digitalization and connectedness be seen as threats to the

phenomenon of play and what many perceive as traditional play. In this light, it is no

longer appropriate to view classic play as the highest quality form (Edwards 2013; cf.

in Marsh et al. 2016). In fact, with their work on digital play, Marsh and colleagues

(2016) demonstrate that counteractive views on the dichotomizing of digital and

non-digital play can be proved inaccurate. An example of the irrelevance of drawing

a hard line between digital and non-digital ways of playing is an observation made by

Jeffrey Goldstein, who has noted how digitally enhanced toys may also be played in

traditional ways (Goldstein 2012, 3). Another way to increase understanding of the

unnecessary division between digitality and non-digitality, already pointing toward

what has been said about post-digital play, is to look at the findings presented in this

thesis. To exemplify, as stated in Article II, “we confirm that connected toy friends are

multidimensional playthings that afford connections between the player and the toy

beyond digitality” (Heljakka & Ihamäki 2019, 176). Perhaps, then, it is more fruitful

to consider the possibility that we have entered an era of post-digital play in which

digital and hybrid forms of play dissolve into what has been regarded as traditional

pl ay.

To support this idea, in a multinational study published in 2020, Marsh and

colleagues found that technology plays an integral part in children’s varied play lives

and, according to their findings, does not exclude other forms of play.

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In the 1990s, Sutton-Smith wrote that “most modern parents still prefer children

to work with playful tools (e.g., computers) rather than play with working toys

(e.g., Teddy Ruckspin [sic]).” According to the studies at hand, in the contemporary

world, interactive toys have raised their status to the level of computers and other

technological tools, which in reverse, are considered a category of toys of their own.

Bird’s (2020) research on children’s play with imaginative technologies such as

games, contributes to ideas around technological behavior and digital citizenship. The

findings presented in the thesis at hand give a reason to consider that digital forms

of play and the use of digital toys contribute significantly to the digital citizenship of

players of all ages.

Technologies do not paralyze children but instead empower and move them:

Jayemanne and Nansen (2016) discuss the mobilizations between mobile devices and

children across domestic, virtual, and publicly networked spaces. Sutton-Smith has

noted how children often seek to have a separate play culture of their own (Sutton-

Smith 1997, 125). This urge to retreat to realms of play not frequently visited by the

mature certainly applies to the playscapes of contemporary digital environments.

The centrality of play in the lives of young children is apparent. Play has been

described as a “forgotten right” (Hughes 1990) of the child. In the future, this right

should be extended as a right for all players regardless of age. What if this finding

would be applied to digital toys and other play machines as well?

Sutton-Smith (1997) has stated that the complexity of play correlates with age.

For many, play means a form of entertainment. However, the meaning of play is

much deeper than amusement, even though playing is still mostly happening during

leisure time. Van Leeuwen & Westwood (2008) highlight a need for mature players

to engage in toy play, referring to “the advent of The SIMS and the resultant clear

demonstration that there is a demand for toy play — for freeform, non-goal-oriented

play activities” (cf. Bateman & Boon 2006, 27).

To continue, intergenerational play as a realm connecting children and adults in

the name of joint play covers a wide range of possibilities: “There is little doubt that

play is the unifying factor in allowing participants the opportunity to communicate

and share the joys and wonders that play provides” (Cohen & Waite-Stupiansky

2012, 69; 78). Sutton-Smith was early to realize the intergenerational quality of

contemporary play by writing how “it is another feature of the modern world that we

are not as separate from our children as our grandparents were from theirs. We spend

more time at the same entertainment, even if it’s only television; we play with our

children more, and we do not hesitate to keep some of our old toys about the house;

certainly, the Teddy Bears” (Sutton-Smith 1986, xi Boehm The Right Toys). Although

Sutton-Smith passed away before the COVID-19 pandemic with its specific forms of

toy play such as the teddy challenge studied in Article IV, he was right in perceiving

the classic toy (the teddy bear) to encompass intergenerational appeal and value.

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Play may involve spectators (Heljakka 2016; Heljakka & Harviainen 2019;

Marsh et al. 2020). What was realized in the teddy challenge was technologically

enhanced, intergenerational play in which grandparents (and other adults) often

adopted a supportive role, and the children took part in playing as spectators and an

audience. Moreover, digital communication platforms such as YouTube and TikTok

or location-based games like Pokémon GO attract players of different ages. In this

way, even digital terrains of play become shared spaces. Jon-Paul Dyson writes:

[…] even as this electronic play has removed participants from face-to-face encounters

in the neighborhood and playground, one effect of this growth in virtual play has

been to reconnect the play worlds of adults and children. The joint play of adults and

children, commonplace in agricultural societies but separated in industrial economies,

has reemerged in the digital age, on Farmville if not the farm. (Dyson 2015, 48)

Nonetheless, the past decade has witnessed an upsurge in the interest in play as

a form of edutainment and a generative form of playbor. This means that playful

attitudes and activities are acknowledged more intentionally in education, work life,

and life-long learning.

Understanding technologically driven play requires a variety of literacies, ranging

from digital literacy to media literacies: “The use of new technologies is an integral

part of becoming multiliterate in the twenty-first century” (Yelland 2011, 10). Mäyrä

(2017a) approaches this from the conceptual angle of ludic literacy. Wohlwend (2008)

characterizes “play as a literacy of possibilities.” According to Wohlwend’s thought,

play is embodied literacy.

Play assists in taming technology and, in this way, contributes to technological

multiliteracy. For example, in their research, Druga et al. (2019) extend the concept

of literacy to include AI literacy, referring to literacy skills gained with embodied

cognitive agents like robots.

The contributions of these studies included an observation of the ubiquity of

the technologies of digital cameras, Internet-connected toys, smartphones, screens

of social media, social robots, and finally, play machines as fantastic products of

speculative toy fiction. Understandings of how these play machines are employed as

part of play patterns, contribute to contemporary toy literacy.

Apart from social media — which I understand as a platform rather than as

a “device” — handheld play machines literally come close to the players’ bodies.

They are, indeed, black mirrors when not in proper use, but our visual identities

are reflected through them when in operation through screens and the playthings

controlled through the screens. They are extensions of the players, just like playthings

in traditional thought. They have, in fact, become playthings of their own, and the

“technology” gradually disappears in them; they take the form of characters, pets,

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and humanoid “dolls.” They become harder to distinguish from the “toy friends” as

we knew playthings before the digital era.

In the context of this thesis, we can see that play with devices slowly transforms

into interaction with play machines that mimic living entities and are no longer

bound by the boxy, monochrome appearances of anonymous technical equipment —

they are given names, faces, and movement to accentuate their growing closeness to

living entities, and at the same time, are genuinely toyified.54

Personal devices enable individualized media practices (Turkle 2011). Look

closely; the image in the end of this thesis shows me with my digital camera — a

graceful, white device I have nicknamed “Stormtrooper.” A similar development I

see with smartphones, laptops, tablets, and so on is that people seek to hide and

erase their “machine-ness” by softening and covering them up with padded cases and

colors.55 As a toy researcher, I find it funny that in Sweden, mobile phones have been

referred to by calling them nalle — teddy bears. No matter how shiny and futuristic

our mobile communication devices appear, there seems to be a strong tendency to

make them more soft and friendly (approachable and perhaps, anthropomorphizable)

to the eyes and to touch.

The content delivered and channeled through play machines also deserves a

few words: Many games are about overcoming goals and competing against one’s

own skills or others. Contests still thrive in ever-increasing abundance, particularly

nowadays in video and computer games (Sutton-Smith 2017, 156). Earlier

observations point to findings that games influence current play to the extent that

players start to, consciously or without realizing, apply game-like goals even to their

open-ended play. This pattern of behavior also connects to theories of play in which

the evolution of play in human beings starts from exploration at the infant age and

proceeds to more rule-bound forms as we mature. But as we have seen in the thesis,

play is not exclusively about playing digital games or sustaining the gameful mindset.

Contrary to common belief, play of the 21st century is not only about competitive

(digital) gameplay but also about (sometimes, seemingly chaotic or even anarchistic)

creativity expressed in association with play of the imagination and play with objects,

known in Caillois’ (1961) theory as paidia, the opposite of ludus.

Rather than competition and goal-driven motivations to engage with game worlds,

play is also about free roaming in sandbox-style environments and experimental

54 For the processes of toyification, see Thibault and Heljakka (2019).

55 In the Hybridex Project, Tyni et al. (2016, 54) discovered “slip-in” plush toys available

that come alive when a smart device is placed inside them. Dossey (2016, 81) has

similarly observed how teddybears and smartphones have “converged and hybridized.”

He sees this development of ‘plushophilia’ (or “the devoted appreciation of and love

for stuffed animals or plushies”) as a consequence of the isolation that digital devices

sometimes seem to produce: “Teddies provide comfort and unconditional emotional

support to kids, a replacement for the emotional warmth smartphones fail to deliver.”

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states of mind familiar in Caillois’ paidia — the open-ended, creative, and chaotic.

Following Back et al. (2017), creative play is the primary play activity supported by

sandbox games, including physical toys, such as actual sandboxes and LEGO (Wolf

2014). Creative play also seems to be a fundamental motivation for engagement with

the play machines.

What needs further attention is not only how we play but why we play.

Therefore — although not having asked this question in the studies per se, this thesis

aims to discuss the underlying motivations of interacting with play machines — the

technological tools and instruments of play examined in the featured studies.

Sutton-Smith has stated how the modern movement toward play is an item of

primarily individual subjectivity rather than an item of group life (Sutton-Smith

2017, 234). Had the renowned scholar lived to this day, he would probably have

changed this thought — first, due to the ever-growing use of mobile and social media,

and second because of the digital leap play had evidently taken during the ongoing

pandemic.

The technological landscape changes and advances rapidly. Play is more individual

and personal thanks to the personal devices used. Still, it is precisely because of these

devices that play is simultaneously increasingly social through sharing: “Play is

naturally cooperative” (Goldstein 2012, 15). Digitalization of play also means more

connectedness: Undoubtedly, the emergence of the social web has made sharing

experiences more perceivable than ever. But what does this mean for the evolution

and significance of play in the contemporary world?

Play is no longer (entirely) ephemeral; it is about interaction with documented,

delivered, encountered, and produced content. Finally, it is shared as mobile devices

and social media enable instances of play to take visual, auditive, and audiovisual

forms and, in this way, to show people’s engagement in play.

Spectating and consuming the play of others represents one form of play. Besides

consummatory acts, play is always curious and creative in one way or another —

play moves our minds through our imagination and creativity. I have detected the

mimetic potential and quality of play — shared play invites more play, e.g., in the

photoplay illustrated in the studies focusing on adult play and toy tourism.

Although play has persistently been associated with leisure, entertainment, and

(perhaps) escapism, especially in the 20th century, it is time to acknowledge how

there is no room for regression in play but instead to embrace the fact that play is a

robust and global unifier, as demonstrated in the case of the teddy challenge as a form

of pandemic toy play.

The COVID-19 pandemic marks a watershed for the evolution of cultural

phenomena. If the period between 1990–2010 is understood in terms of ludification

(Raessens 2006) and the ludic era, perhaps 2010 onwards is best described as a time

when the paidification of culture has thrived. From 2020 onwards, we live in a post-

pandemic world that entails a more serious relationship to play and an interest in

turning attention to the seriousness of toys and play. Then again, play has always

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carried a severity to it, being fundamentally crucial for our growth and well-being.

While this is the case, the “ethos of fun” often connected with play is somewhat

problematic when considering the meanings and value of play to the human world

and societies.

“At its most elemental, play always promises fun” (Eberle 2014, 214). Play is

about spontaneous enjoyment, but more increasingly about enjoyment through

commitment and devotion that lasts than through momentary fun. The idea of play

merely as a promoter of fun activities seems dated, insufficient, and therefore untrue.

But the promise play holds is an important idea, especially during challenging times

in human history. In this way, Isbister (2016b) sees games as having the potential to

“transform our social interactions.” She writes:

Rather than immobilizing and devaluating their body or isolating players from other

people, games in the future have the potential to embrace and enhance the role of the

body and movement in play. They may recouple the physical and emotional, gracefully

augment and transform our social interactions, and support our performance on who

we are, or who we want to be. (Isbister 2016b, 107)

During the pandemic, play provided possibilities for escapism but more

substantially directed behavior into survival mode and contributed to affective

behaviors. Therefore, restrictions on physical mobility have increased digital mobility

and re-enforced the digital leap of the early 2020s.

When Sutton-Smith wrote his last work, published post-mortem by The Strong

National Museum of Play, he observed how adult play finally became recognized.

Nevertheless, he also pointed out how its discussion has largely been couched in the

individualistic terms of the modern economic world rather than in the collective

representations of, for example, ancient sporting practices (Sutton-Smith 2017,

233). The study addressing pandemic play of intergenerational players functions as

evidence for the return of communal play and, consequently, a conceptual approach

to this phenomenon, for which I have chosen to use the term ludounity.

In play, we have the license to explore ourselves and our society (Silverstone 1999,

64; cf. in van Leeuwen & Westwood 2008). In contemporary times and perhaps more

than ever in the 21st century, it is possible to see how “[p]lay is part of everyday

life, just as it is separate from it”; boundaries between play and seriousness are more

permeable and less distinct these days (Silverstone 1999, 60; cf. in Kücklich 2004).

Play mirrors societal contradictions (Eichberg 2015), and not only technology

but also social and spatial aspects influence the play activity (Márquez-Segura et al.

2013). Herbert Ginti said, “We did not get where we are as a species because we are

especially greater competitors but because we are especially great cooperators” (cf. in

Sutton-Smith 2017, 193).

While the teddy challenge may present a particular moment in time when play

was desperately needed to contribute to our well-being because of the grim first

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phase of the global pandemic, in the future, perhaps and hopefully, ludounity will

take forms other than displaying toys in window-screens. Nevertheless, the challenge

turned our attention to how play sustains emphatic care and hope and supports faith

but does so especially when a health crisis dictates the demand for physical and social

distancing. To be playful in challenging times is to express one’s sisu (something akin

to guts) with grace, not gritted teeth, as I have learned from positive psychologist

Emilia Lahti. I have come to call this playful resilience — the ability to see possibility

in the unbearable, to creatively think of ways to carve oneself out of the labyrinth

life throws our way and into the light of more understanding, empathy, and even

compassion.

To play with others is to increase togetherness and decrease alienation. For some, it

may come as a surprise how powerful the agency provided by play is. We can discover

more about the possibilities of play as interaction through digital technologies.

As a concluding example, the pandemic play article highlighted the fact that

players are resourceful when using digital technology in reference to play. The

(remote) play of the community at an exceptional time and drawing on both material

and digital culture has been described as expressing the creativity and positive

interaction of players of different ages, thus increasing playful resilience.

Here is an answer to a question you did not ask (yet): What is the relevance of the

synthesized findings of the studies undertaken in this thesis?

First, a synthesis of the findings communicates ideas on the implications and

applications of the thesis. The summary of findings provides food for thought

for academics interested in possible directions of current play. Second, for early

education experts, it is illuminating to understand the possibilities that play and the

play machines provide for education, in this case, early education: For educators, this

means subtle suggestions on integrating digital media into pedagogical practice.

Belpaeme et al. (2018) note that introducing novel technologies into learning

situations also means that some changes in educational practice are needed. Teachers

and parents need to become more knowledgeable about digital toys (Johnson &

Christie 2009, 288) as they, besides a capacity to entertain and cater to possibilities of

open-ended play during leisure, offer technology-based support (Jones & Deeming

2008) to learning. Child engagement with computers and digital toys can be a solid

positive complement to other forms of play (Johnson & Christie 2009, 288).

Third, for designers, it is essential to remember what Kudrowitz and Follett

(2014, 252) stated: “Make the toy about the play, not about the technology” by

considering that play detests optimization. Therefore, it is beneficial to consider

possibilities for open-ended play.

To achieve this, Boon et al. (2020, n.p.) have a valuable suggestion: “Designers can

leave things open for interpretation, leave room for multiple courses of action, make

things unstable or erratic, provide many variables, allow things to be manipulated or

rearranged, and avoid pre-defined goals and rules.”

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Fourth, and ultimately, there are ideas for the wider public to consider — and

finally admit that interaction with digital and connected technologies — really — is

ab out play.

Centrally, a key takeaway of this thesis’s findings is that digitality influences,

enables, or enriches many forms of play. Technology invites, attracts, and stimulates

play. Invitations to play must be subtle, welcoming, and, if persuasively constructed

— elegantly designed, encouraging the player to have a certain freedom to explore

the materials, systems, and environments. In one way, devices concretize engagement

with the imagination, resulting in hybrid play — play of the mind combined with the

possibilities offered by digital technologies.

“What can be done to preserve one’s humanity and sanity in an increasingly

digital world?” Michelle Weil and Larry Rosen asked in the late 1990s (1997, 358).

Alongside the much-promoted, balanced, and healthy diet between analog and

digital forms of recreational leisure and work, one way to preserve one’s sanity is to

engage with digital technology through play.

In essence, play has long driven humans toward technology — and vice versa. In

the 21st century, play has gained a steady foothold as part of interaction with smart

and connected devices and social media. Through play, technologies become part of

the lives of very young children not only in the domestic sphere but also increasingly

as part of early childhood education, where the technologically driven educational

space is being reinforced by the newest interaction and communication technologies,

including those tools with the particular set of affordances intended to invite players

of different ages to engage with them. Children’s digital media habits are under

constant discussion. Clearly, there is a need for balance in children’s activities with

the play machines, “as well as a balance between the real world (3D) toys and the new

digital ones” (Yelland 1999, 220). Adults have a supporting role in this:

Parents have often expressed the concern that if they let their children play with

computers and other new technologies this will take away from their ‘real’ world

experiences. It is up to them to ensure that this does not occur. (Yelland 2011, 11)

A balancing act is required not only from parents but from everyone engaged

with play in the name of leisure and learning with technology. Indeed, play as a life-

long and life-wide phenomenon proposes exciting questions about how play will

move us in the future regarding technology, one of them being the toy play habits

across the lifespan.

Players across age groups demonstrate a high level of engagement with devices,

namely touchscreen and mobile technologies, but even natural interfaces that

revolutionize ideas about togetherness experienced with and through machines.

Intergenerational play means joint media engagement through play. The moment

when co-viewing (see, e.g., Takeuchi & Stevens 2011) becomes co-playing, turning

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consummatory acts into interactive dialogues marks a shift in engagement with the

play machines. This reciprocal, fruitful, and productive relationship alters the minds

and bodies of the players as technologies become freed from their standard forms of

devices.

The digital leap has become an everyday standard — as long as digitality is not

embedded in our physically mobile and mentally affective bodies, we must take that

leap every day to stay connected with the networked world.

Movement challenges monotony; as shown in this thesis, movement is integral

to play. Bjorklund et al. (1998) suggest that future research on physical play should

examine types of physical play. de Vries (2021, 247) claims that “physical play as a

unique and separate experience throughout the human lifespan has not been defined.”

Perhaps additional and more fine-tuned definitions of physical play are needed as we

fully grasp the idea of the mobilizing tendency of digitalizing and connected play and

the movement enabled by play patterns associated with hybrid play.

What playing with (the play) machines has brought to our lives are concerns

about decreased well-being due to poor ergonomics, passivity, restrictions on proper

and meaningful time with physically adjacent friends and family members, threats

to our privacy, the fear of a crippled imagination too much guided and controlled

by media content, and so on. However, as this thesis demonstrates, due to the

automation of tedious and labor-intensive tasks, more time and space to use digital

technology for other, far more intriguing and motivating engagements are becoming

possible through play. For what else could digital cameras, Internet-connected

things, smartphones, social media, and companion robots have offered us but more

time to ease up for playing — exploring, tinkering, and socially sharing experiences

mediated with and through the software and hardware of play machines, offering

more possibilities in capturing, molding and experimenting with digital content,

making it more entertaining, more open for reactions, responses, re-playing in the

course, and presenting us with opportunities for rewarding interactions even with

non-human companions.

Based on information distilled from the studies presented in this thesis, digital

technology does not detach us from the world, but when combined with other

elements such as human interaction, physical entities, and environments, it connects

us in ways that allow mobilization of the body and mind and, as a result, activate

emotional responses. The affective turn points to an intensification of interest in

‘emotions, feelings, and affect (and their differences)’ as objects of scholarly inquiry

(Cvetkovich 2012, 133). The affective turn coincides with other turns, such as the

visual, material, and playful turns: Affection, care, and companionship are recognized

virtues of a post-pandemic world.

Emotional responses are a vital ingredient in human communication and player

experiences. Therefore, they are of great interest for the area of interaction design

with a particular interest in the possibilities of playfulness. Prosocial behavior, also

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of interest in this thesis, is a significant area of human behavior, especially from

the perspective of early education — the perspective of the “know-how” of SEL

competencies developed in play is more interesting than the flow and immersion

often associated with play. Facilitating the growth of SEL-related skills gained in

playful learning with robotic pets may promote the development of kindness. In fact,

empathy, in particular, has already gained attention from the designers and industries

of play, where social companion robots are created for players of different ages, and

other toys (and games) are designed to support empathy development and pro-social

skills.

As the thesis illustrates, play is valuable, and I am adamant that play with

technologies be seen as valuable. The “taming” and domesticating of technology

happens to a certain extent through play. Play can also be perceived as a distinct

relationship to technology. Play is progressive — it is about dealing with the unknown,

what we do not yet know about, and the progressive and productive nature of play

can be observed by studying digital culture that happens through actions of play.

In other words, digital play is productive as well as about intrinsic motivation and

process.56

Marshall (2004, 25) noted that in “new media cultures, people are involved in the

production of the text and images that become part of the reception and pleasure.”

When play is motivated by external factors such as playful learning or semi-

occupational activities like playbor, it must be designed subtly, for play can never

be an obligation. In these ways, I refer to the persuasion strategies of different tools,

environments, and techniques for play, with which the interaction should always be

voluntary.

In each of the studies presented in this thesis, digital technology shaped play in

specific ways. The data show that digital technology use is of fundamental importance

for each of the instances of play to have happened. To summarize, the shifts in play

that have taken place can, according to the findings of the studies presented as part

of this thesis, be synthesized into the following arguments: The cornerstones of

digitalizing play are the use of digital devices and digital (social) media alongside

physical toys or play environments. Digital play of this kind is always documentative

and thus productive. Technologically enhanced play connects closely to imagination,

creative storytelling, and social sharing. Digitalizing play tends to connect and unify

generations, although the different skills of players may lead to separated realms of

play. Digitalized and connected play is linked to fantasy worlds as much as it relates

to real lives, player identities, and actual world happenings.

Finally, there are some key points to list regarding technological play based on the

findings made in this thesis, which are addressed in the following:

56 Prior to digital technologies, toys and books have been understood as “tools of progress”

(Kline 2004).

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Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the Post-Digital Era

SOME KEY POINTS AS TAKEAWAYS OF THIS THESIS:

• Digital and connected play starts with the utilization of various technological

affordances (interaction with screens/screenless technology that is either

leisurely or educational).

• Digital and connected play involves devices for play (primary role as play

machines on which playing is enabled through games and apps) as part of

play machines.

• Digital and connected play emerges as an extension for play (secondary role

as play machines on which playing is captured by photographing, videoing,

audio-recording, and digitally manipulating personalized playthings or

other forms of content — physical or digital).

• Digital and connected play is often documented play.

• Digital and connected play can be solitary, but it also involves using social

media platforms that allow content sharing and, therefore, networked and

social play.

• Digital and connected play evolves into connected play once connected

(“smart”) devices, such as IoToys, are used.

• Digital and connected play also uses robotics, and the most recent tools in

this area are robotic companion animals with natural user interfaces (NUI).

A SUMMARY OF ARGUMENTS:

• Digital technology acts as an extension of the player.

• Digital technology acts as a play enabler: It manifests through players’

creativity through affordances of hardware (devices) and software (apps).

• Digital technology, more than an additional element to play, is an empowerer

and enricher of play: It makes play-related content distribution possible

through networks (e.g., IoToys). The connectedness of the playthings means

that they provide players with updated content, which can be entertainment,

education, or a combination thereof.

• Digital technology functions as a socializer of play: It allows communication

through social media platforms.

• Play with toys and digital technology (and technology toys) moves us toward

our inner selves — and each other.

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7.1. Future Paths for Research

“Life, it seems, always becomes more exciting when the hope of play exists.” (Sutton-

Smith 2017, 241)

“Western society is beginning to take play more seriously as an important form of

culture” (Sutton-Smith 1997, 125). Contrary to belief, play is not diminishing nor

vanishing from the world, but mainly due to developments, it is transforming and

taking new directions in the form of a digital leap. Technology invites and supports

the cultures of play. At the same time, the timeless quality and appeal of play with

physical materials, equipment, and environments live on.

While it is contended that this study makes a timely contribution to research on

play, it is also necessary to turn the attention to possible future paths for research.

Skolnick Weisberg et al. (2015, 9) claim that “play has value for the development

of well-adjusted, creative individuals who will be prepared to solve challenging

problems.” However, Garry Chick writes that “with respect to both child and adult

play, emerging perspectives that unite evolution, culture, and the environment

as complementary rather than competing explanatory variables appear to hold

substantial promise for future research” (Chick 2015, 81). In the following final part

of the thesis, I will sketch some possible pathways as ideas for future analyses of

play, including three broad perspectives, namely players, playthings, and play(ful)

environments and assemblages.57

7.1.1. Players

Maxwell (2020, 7–8) claims that a digital footprint (the trail one leaves behind when

one scours the internet) ties directly to our digital legacy. The footprint is not a

thoroughly negative thing: “It can be a portfolio of your life” (Ibid.). While playing

with digital and Internet-connected technologies, our play inevitably becomes

recorded.

Social sharing is essential when considering the historically relevant nature of

the documentation of play and, today, how distribution happens in the digital realm.

Documentation of play, such as the results of photoplay or toy photography and

related play knowledge, will likely, in the future, be considered traces of information

leading to interpretations of the play culture of a particular time. In the future, we

can trace down complete biographies of play activities, showing our play preferences

in terms of play partners, playthings, and play spaces and the documentation we

57 As illustrated in Figure 2, what also presents possibilities for future research is to

investigate play with technologies more within the areas of structured work and

education, namely playful learning (of adults) and as part of productive play, i.e.,

playbor.

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have voluntarily left behind during and as the acts of play. This speculative idea

proposes suggestions for further research on digital and connected play and long-

term investigations of movement within and across physical and virtual space, which

leave behind our digital footprints as players, telling the tale of our playful legacy.

7.1.2. Playthings

Yelland (1999) cites Papert (1996, 188), who suggested that “our concern must be to

ensure that what is good about play is at least preserved (and hopefully enhanced)

as the concept of ‘toy’ inevitably changes.” However, neither play nor playthings as

phenomena of the world are changing by themselves, but we change them. This

constant and ongoing change that forms evolution is guided by the meanings and

values attributed to play and the resources employed in play. As discussed in this

thesis, playthings and play machines have affordances that steer play in many

directions. As shown, the dimensions of toy and play experiences can, for example,

be grasped through their physical, functional, fictional, and affective dimensions.

This thesis has taken an interest in the affordances of toys and play machines.

While it has been essential to increase knowledge on the affordances of toys and

how they influence play, following a proposition made by Sutton-Smith, I consider

this a fruitful observation: “We must now also ask what the toy does not let you do”

(Sutton-Smith 1992, 9). In other words, alongside investigations on toys’ afforded

potential, critical accounts of the limitations of toys present an intriguing avenue for

research, especially considering toy design.

Importantly, Ackermann (2005) notes how “digital per se is not synonymous

with an artifact’s ability to be an enjoyable and rewarding relational partner.” On the

contrary, what is known is that three-dimensional toys like the character toys as “toy

friends” are liked for many reasons: their tactility, aesthetics, and weight, to name

some of their physical qualities. I assume that tactile and tangible play will not vanish

— the materiality and visuality of playthings will, in some ways, remain.

The vast category of toys will offer ample material for research for years to

come. To begin with physical toys, Bird (2020) claims that children’s play with what

she describes as imaginative technologies is underresearched. I interpret this as a

possibility to study some more of the mass-produced and handmade miniatures

made in 1:6 and 1:12 scale, appropriate for use with doll, figurine, and action figure

play in combination with the play machines — digital cameras, smartphones, and

the screens of social media; these are most likely even forms of media that do not yet

exist, that complement play with physical toys to continue the research initiated in

this thesis.

Another perspective of playthings and play machines concerns their current and

future functions. Brennan (2018) cites (Galloway 2011) to describe how some forms

of technology have already become redundant. “Children need to balance between

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screenplay and actual play,” Johnson and Christie (2009, 288) noted years ago. This

leads to another question: What if the squabbles on “screen time” limitations that

many children face with their parents were rephrased as “playtime”? Would the result

be more positive?

While tangible playthings are not under siege, the screens as we know them from

actual playthings and the play machines will be replaced with more sophisticated

technologies. Furthermore, what constitutes a screen now and what it will be like in

the future may be very different: To exemplify a case of speculative toy fiction, the

movie Ron’s Gone Wrong depicts a malfunctioning IoToy of the future — a B*Bot

named Ron — where the complete toy is the screen.

“Our world grows increasingly saturated with sensors and alternate feedback

systems beyond big screens” (Isbister 2016b, 96). Little by little, screens as we know

them are shrinking and perhaps vanishing from the horizon of the landscape of play

giving room to play machines in which the body and the screen become inseparable.

This will probably have consequences for technology without screens, such as voice

assistants and smart toys (Plowman & Stephen 2014, 16). Marsh and colleagues state

that voice-activated devices and speaker assistants, such as Alexa, Google Home, and

Siri (Marsh et al. 2020, 19), could be used more in technologically oriented play.

The promises and limits of robotic pets as interactive partners have been noted

by Melson et al. (2009). Further, Westlund Kory et al. (2018) have addressed the need

to deeply understand how children think about robots through time. Relevant paths

for future research could be to continue exploring the affective side of interaction

with robotic toys and social companions and ask: To what extent will the use of

robotic pets replace relationships with live animals as play partners? And even more

interestingly, will they genuinely serve us as friends in future relationships?

The public concerns over AI, such as the possibility of Artificial Intelligence

developing consciousness (addressed in research as “singularity”; see, e.g., Giddings

2019), have been noted in recent literary work: In an interview with Kazuo Ishiguro,

the Nobel prize winner and author, said: “At the moment artificial intelligence

accomplishes to understand emotions, it can also manipulate them” (Ahola 2021, C2).

Ishiguro’s novel Klara and the Sun (2021) speculates on the possibility of human-like

Artificial Friends (AFs) being able to continue their owners’ (and players’?) lives in

passing by learning and memorizing their personalities, movements, and behavioral

patterns. In this chilling account of the utopian/dystopian views of artificial life

embodied by robots, Ishiguro toys with the possibility of letting a robot not extend

or replace a potentially dying child but continue their life through a replica of the

child’s gestures, manners, and likings, carefully studied during the years of friend-like

companionship with her.

The many possibilities for further research continue with the question pondering

the role of the machine in future human play. Nonetheless, the human being is a

physical entity who, according to some lines of thinking, is increasingly becoming a

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cyborg — merging with intelligent technologies and robotic aids (Jaques 2015). Isit

possible for the machine to make the human into a toy for its own play purposes?

“Cyber-toys,” as Ackermann (2005) names them, enable relationships outside

of human presence. Will their evolution lead to post-human play, meaning play

beyond the involvement of humans? At the verge of post-human play, a longing for

naturalness and organicity as commonly understood sources of human authenticity

are values at risk of becoming forever lost. The machine as an independent player is

about mechanisms, systems, control, structure, metrics, competition, optimization,

and achievement. However, play must be allowed to flow freely and voluntarily

and cannot be about regression and enslavement dictated by the play machines.

The human player still distances herself from the machine through trial, error,

unpredictability, and mistakes. What follows is growth born out of serendipitous

moments, encounters, and relations within the world, advancing us in ways not

foreseen.

“Animated toys ‘grow’ with us, and within our culture, because we don’t cease

to re-invent ourselves” (Ackermann 2005). Bartlett et al. (2004) have predicted that

“people may develop strong attachments and even affectionate relationships with

artificial information systems.” This requires advanced toy literacy skills, such as AI

literacy (Druga et al. 2019).

Longevity as a facet of sustainability brings up another potentially relevant

question for future research: Despite our relationships with the play machines and

sophisticated toy friends, it is worth asking: How long until the novelty effect of

technologically enhanced toys wears off — or does it ever? Longitudinal studies on

digital toys would be needed to answer this question.

7.1.3. Play(ful) environments and assemblages58

In traditional thought, physical environments have provided places of play for playful

learning, leisure, and work. The terrains of play have widened in a physical sense

due to player-facilitated practices around toyrism and digitally, thanks to innovations

around location-based games, such as geocaching. The playgrounds extend because

of non-human toyrism: For example, a Yoda toy of Star Wars fame has already traveled

to space with humans (Heljakka & Räikkönen 2021).

The realms of play will expand territorially and digitally, offering simulations and

other immersive experiences, augmented reality experiences, and such. The advent

of digital technologies that invite play to move into new environments presents

vast possibilities for future scholarly work. In a news release dated 1988, Brian

58 Nigel Thrift (2003, 395) describes a shift from toys as “solitary objects” to toys as

“assemblages” that are “linked elements of little fantasy worlds”; cf. in Berriman and

Mascheroni 2019, who discuss the co-existence of media technologies.

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Sutton-Smith envisioned the following. He said he can imagine that “in the future

there may be electronic simulators, such as the World War II Link trainers, that allow

children to engage in adventures without getting hurt” (Sutton-Smith 1988). Since

Sutton-Smith’s prediction, simulators beyond entertainment are known to be widely

employed across professions and in learning.

What comes next in technologically enhanced play within space — the auditive

turn? While this thesis does not explore the soundscapes of contemporary play per

se, it is possible that with audio-based services such as Alexa, Siri, ASMR videos, and

audiobooks et cetera, auditive play experiences will thrive in future play environments

connecting sound-based toys with new technologies.

Another area of interest for future play research is the virtual realm. Navigating

the virtual space in present times is enabled by play machines associated VR

technologies. Domains such as the metaverse highlight another complex phenomenon

to study in the future. The metaverse and movement toward and in this futuristic

but approaching play space present additional opportunities for research on play.

“The ‘metaverse’ represents the next generation internet, promising richer, more

immersive 3D experience and more seamless conversion of physical and digital

realities” (Livingstone & Pothong 2023).

The emerging metaverse as a “3D Internet” is building up rapidly. As suggested

by the Digital Futures Commission, it should be built by considering children’s

imagination and offering inclusivity, diversity, agency, and an environment where

safety and privacy issues are valued (Ibid.). If a mosaic of play studies were created

focusing on the evolving landscape of play between 2020–2030, we would probably

be more informed on what forms play takes in this yet-emerging environment.

Lastly, on a metaphysical level, what intrigues me beyond virtual space is play in

the unknown terrains of human afterlife, such as speculative accounts on questions

like “Are there toys in heaven?” This question remains for the speculative fiction of

future play (and perhaps religious studies) to answer.

7.2. Finally…

“To play is to take on the world, to take it apart, and frequently build it anew,”

says Thomas Henricks (2006, 185). The role of play in human progress needs

to be acknowledged and appreciated much more than has been the case so far.

Johan Huizinga (1938/1950, 195) asked in Homo Ludens: “To what extent does the

civilization we live in still develop in play forms?” Play creates possibilities because

“in play, we explore possible pathways into the future” (Henricks 2008, 174). This

idea can now be extended to include digital and connected notions of play into the

progressive possibilities play presents.

It is the human who engineered the machine to automatize, digitalize, and

robotize — to make tasks fluent and connected and to surround and befriend us

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Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the Post-Digital Era

with the help of the machine. In everyday life, the machine has come to be replaced

with the notion of devices — a more domesticated approach to digital technology.

Therefore, machines are now perhaps more easily understood as resources, tools

that can be used to realize solutions and make dreams more tangible, digitally or

materially. Devices as play machines are enabling, extending, and enriching our play.

The affordances for play in the post-digital era move from the non-connected to the

connecting and, ultimately, to the connected.

Besides technological “toys” such as digital cameras, smartphones, and other

screen-based devices, it is also possible to see how these tools become a category

of playthings of their own. For example, previous research shows how mobile

devices—smartphones and tablets — are, by some parents, regarded as toys (Ihamäki

& Heljakka 2018). Consequently, it is possible to perceive a toyification of technology

(Thibault & Heljakka 2019) taking place, one not determined by engineers, but

instead by players who incorporate such technology as extensions of their play and

employ them as play machines.

What next turn will captivate the attention of those investigating play? Perhaps it is

the already ongoing era of Artificial Intelligence.

Play is a stance toward technology that is dialogical in our negotiations about

how much it is okay to give away our natural abilities to those enabled by machines.

Digital play keeps the human occupied and mobile, but there is a need for balance

between speed and slow motion, process, and productivity. Still, how play moves

us is largely about human willingness to be mobilized mentally, emotionally, and

physically. It was the human who made the machine. It is play that will keep the

human in ourselves and our technologically mediated social interactions alive.

Positive play moves human beings closer to each other, no matter which device,

digital platform, or environment they reside in. Play creates a sense of belonging in

communities, global and local. Technology helps build connections; play connects us

and makes us stay connected.

At the beginning of the 21st century, play is still very much an activity of humans

and animals of other mammalian orders. Humans recognize play when they see it

happening among themselves and in animal behavior, and they are conscious of

their playing, even though many adults distance themselves from the term. But play

should be more acknowledged and more highly valued. Parallel to love, health, and

communality, play keeps us moving because it tends to connect us with our inner

selves, other beings, and relevant environments.

The opposite of play is not boredom or depression (Sutton-Smith 1995) but

misanthropy. Playing is invigorating, and it is surviving — by being human. When

the human ceases to play (or is forced to do so), this will mark the end of humanity as

we currently understand it. But will this be the end of play altogether? Not entirely, if

accounts of speculative fiction are to be believed.

In Kazuo Ishiguro’s striking story on AFs (or Artificial Friends) presented in the

novel Klara and the Sun (2021), machines are on the threshold of studying what it

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Katriina Heljakka

means to be human to be able to continue them once they are gone, once they leave

the existential condition we recognize as life. But will the play machines of the future

start to play by themselves because of their boredom or anxiety, or for the fun of it,

for that matter? This question will require attention beyond what the thesis in front

of you can do. However, a burning need is to never stop posing questions like the one

above. Perhaps it is the death of curiosity that would mean the end of play. Poetically,

play casts light in a world filled with negativity, cynicism, intolerance, and rigidity.

Play has an innocence to it that is very human. Burghardt (2005, 405) writes:

Play can be all of these: neither inherently useful nor useless, neither good nor evil. Play

is — play endures — play may be something that creates a spark, lighting a candle where

there was darkness.

When we have unraveled the mystery of play by arriving at a rigid definition

of it, the movement of play will cease. In this unlikely event, we have arrived at a

point where being human has lost meaning, and ultimately, we have turned to fully

automated machines regarding our behavior. So far, there is still hope. We move

forward because we can’t go back. But play is the ultimate perpetuum mobile, an

engine that keeps us mobile, flexible, and in motion. Play raises questions (Eichberg

2015) continuously.

“If play does prepare for the future, then it seems to do so most obviously by

preparing the players to play more complexly in the future” (Sutton-Smith 1986, 104).

Play moves as a mode of experience (Moore 2011), and movement means life. Icould

add the hope of play to move us more playfully in(to) the future.

In closing my arguments of how play moves us, I recall reading Brian Sutton-

Smith’s statement of the 21st century as a Century of Play. We are there now, Brian.

Welcome to the paidic era. Serious and goal-driven as the play of the ludic turn might

be, the era of the paidic turn, as described in this thesis, conceptualizes play more

broadly and humanly. Because while the ludic most often is about putting the cyborg

machine in us in motion, it is the paidic, childlike, creative, and anarchic play that

makes us more human in our playful activities. It is the human who knows how to

make any machine a partner in play. Still, essentially, it is the human who recognizes

the role of the machine as an instrument for play, which can never replace the

imaginative and emotional capacities of the human as the playing other. Play begins

with that tiny sparkle in the eye, then makes us perspire while absorbing ourselves

entirely in the playing, and maybe squeezes a glimmering teardrop out from the

corner of our eye. Sometimes, play may give us goosebumps, even make the skin

crawl, because of excitement, immersion, and the flow. Maybe it sets everything in

motion and causes our organic bodies, imaginative minds, and human hearts to do

everything simultaneously, even when assisted by the machine.

Play is infinite. Play is ∞. That is how play moves us.

Let’s hold on to that sparkle.

205

Conclusions: Toward Paidic Understandings of Play in the Post-Digital Era

Figure 5. Portrait of the researcher by Studio 1851 / Tuomas Sinkkonen

206

Katriina Heljakka

List of Original Publications

Playing with the Camera

Heljakka, K. & Harviainen, J.T. (2019). From Displays and Dioramas to Doll Dramas: Adult

World Building and World Playing with Toys, American Journal of Play, 11(3), 351–378.

Playing with Connected Toys

Heljakka, K., & Ihamäki, P. (2019). Persuasive toy friends and preschoolers: Playtesting

IoToys. In Mascheroni, Giovanna, & Holloway, Donell (Eds.) The Internet of toys:

Practices, affordances and the political economy of children’s smart play. (pp. 159–178).

New York: Palgrave Macmillan. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-10898-4_8

Playing with the Smartphone

Heljakka, K., & Ihamäki, P. (2020). Toy tourism. From Travel Bugs to characters with wanderlust.

In Nicky van Es, Stijn Reijnders, Leonieke Bolderman & Abby Waysdorf (Eds.) Locating

Imagination. Popular Culture, Tourism & Belonging. Place, tourism and belonging. (pp.

183–199). Oxon & New York: Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003045359-15

Playing with Screens with/through Social media

Heljakka, K. (2021). Liberated through teddy bears: resistance, resourcefulness, and resilience

in toy play during the COVID-19 pandemic.International Journal of Play,10(4), 387–

404. https://doi.org/10.1080/21594937.2021.2005402

Playing with Social Robots

Heljakka, K., Ihamäki, P. & Lamminen, A. (2020). Playing with the Opposite of Uncanny:

Empathic Responses to Learning with a Companion-Technology Robot Dog vs. Real

Dog. In Proceedings of ACM CHI PLAY ’20 EA, November 2-4, 2020, Virtual Event,

Canada Association for Computing Machinery. A262-266, 2020 ACM, New York, NY,

USA, 262–266. https://doi.org/10.1145/3383668.3419900

Playing with Speculative Toy Fiction

Heljakka, K. I. (2022, November). Reading Ron Right: Speculative Toy Fiction, Friendship

and Design of Future IoToys. In Proceedings of the 25th International Academic

Mindtrek Conference, 16-18 November, Tampere, Finland (pp. 334–338). https://doi.

org/10.1145/3569219.3569386

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APPENDIX I

(RESEARCH PERMISSION/PERMISSION TO PUBLISH FORM for preschool children’s

caretakers, translated from Finnish to English by the author)

Internet of Toys Study with preschoolers with preschool group XXXX at XXXX (Fall 2017)

Researchers: Katriina Heljakka, University of Turku and Pirita Ihamäki, Prizztech Oy

Information about our research:

This study investigates a) preschool-aged children’s position towards and b) play with character toys

(dolls, action figures, soft toys, etc.) that have digital connections (such as toy robots or other character

toys). We are studying these toys associated with literacy, play, and learning. The study results will be

published in academic publications, such as scientific journals, conference papers, and presentations.

More information about our research may be obtained from Katriina Heljakka at

katriina.heljakka@utu.fi

RESEARCH PERMISSION

Name of preschool student _________________________________________

Caretaker’s name(s) _________________________________________

Permission from the preschool student and caretaker to participate in research:

Able to participate _________________________________________

Not able to participate _________________________________________

PERMISSION TO PUBLISH

This request concerns the use of photographs or videos taken of your child as part of our research to

be published in academic publications (such as research journals). We need the caretaker’s permission

to publish images of children under 18 years as part of our research, which may be shared in online

contexts.

I give my permission to publish photographs/videos on which my child is present

I do not give my permission to publish photographs/videos in which my child is present

______ / _______ /________ _________________________________________

Date/Month/Year Caretaker’s signature and name in block letters

240

Katriina Heljakka

APPENDIX II

(RESEARCH PERMISSION/PERMISSION TO PUBLISH FORM for preschool children’s

caretakers, translated from Finnish to English by the author)

Research permission for a study on dog-assisted activities on children’s mutual empathy and prosocial

behavior as part of the Rinnalla project.

The Preschool group X will have dog-assisted activities in the company of Milli once a week during

XX times between February-April 2020. Eight (8) randomly drawn children from group X will

participate in the dog-assisted activities [The Eight (8) other children included will work with a robot

dog]. The children are subjected to authentic collecting of research data by observation, video-filming,

photographing, and interviewing them. Parents and personnel join the research by filling out a

questionnaire on prosocial skills at the beginning and end of the study. The children will document

their work during the dog-assisted activities and produce material regarding pro-social skills (e.g.,

drawings), which will be stored as part of the research. The study may also include an interviewing

of the parents. The personal data of children, parents, the preschool, group, or participating

personnel will not be identifiable from the study. When children are interviewed, they are asked

for their consent. The children will also be asked for their views about joining the study so that the

voluntariness of their participation can be assured.

Milli, a Labrador of 2,5 years [at the time of research], has undergone socio-pedagogic training (25

credits). Milli is insured and has previously acted as a plenipotentiary member of a preschool group

focusing on learning prosocial skills.

Name of the child: _________________________________________

My child can participate in Milli-related activities:

Yes No.

My child has a sensitivity/allergy which should be considered in the Milli-related activities; how:

________________________________________________________________________________

My child may be photographed as part of this study.

My child’s work (drawings, videos, etc.) may be documented and preserved as part of this study.

My child may be filmed on video as part of this study.

My child may be interviewed as part of this study.

We, as parents, are ready to answer a questionnaire at the beginning and the end of the research

Parent’s signature: _________________________________________________________

Contact information: _________________________________________________________

Tel. _________________________ E-mail: ___________________________________________

Thank you for the cooperation, Milli and Anu Lamminen*,

Tel. _________________________ E-mail: ___________________________________________

* Research colleague and co-author Anu Lamminen was responsible for collecting permissions from

the parents of children, who joined the dog-assisted study presented in Article V. At the time of

conducting the research, she worked as part of the Rinnalla project.

ISBN 978-951-29-9610-0 (print)

ISBN 978-951-29-9611-7 (pdf)

ISSN 0082-6987 (print)

ISSN 2343-319 1 (online)

The 21st century has been described as the Century of Pay.

The change in current pay is particuarly noticeable when

looking at technological developments. This thesis deals with

the technologization, digitalization, and connectedness of pay

between 2010–2020. The research explores forms of contemporary

pay, paythings, and payers in a time when digitalization and

connectedness have extended to various tools and realms of pay

— devices, toys, games, apps, and mediated payful environments.

At the heart of the research are paythings and technologies

conceptualized here as pay machines, payers using these tools

within their communities and contexts, and, due to technological

evolution, pay research that increasingly, expands our knowledge

about

How Pay Moves Us

physically, cognitively, and emotionally.

Painosaama, Turku, Finand 2024

Internet of Musical Things for Children

Conference Paper

Full-text available

Sep 2024

What if we called screens Play Machines? Digital play with devices making peace with Jonathan Haidt’s The Anxious Generation. WiderScreen 27. First online 13.12.2024.

Article

Full-text available

Dec 2024

Katriina Heljakka

The Anxious Generation by Jonathan Haidt (2024) argues that the decline of traditonal play in childhood and the rise of smartphone usage are sources of increased mental distress in Generation Z. However, digital play offers a potential solution to make peace with the anxieties connected to phone-based childhoods and the belief in the disappearance of more traditional forms of play, particularly with innovative devices in mind that we could call Play Machines. As argued in this response to the claims made in Haidt’s book, based on the findings of recent doctoral work in digital play culture, these devices transcend traditional gameplay, opening new possibilities for creative and open-ended play, including the use of physical toys and outdoor environments. Digital cameras, smartphones, and social media platforms can all be considered Play Machines, offering new ways to resolve the misconception about traditional play’s perceived decline and associated mental distress.

A systematic literature review of playful learning in primary education: teachers’ pedagogical activities

Article

Oct 2024

Virtual Cockroaches? Envisioning Dimensions of VToys and Related Play Experiences

Chapter

Full-text available

Sep 2024

This exploratory paper seeks to combine findings from toy research with studies on digital object play with an interest in the toyification of the virtual realm, including VR, AR, and XR. The goal of the paper is to formulate ideas on the toyfulness of virtual objects and related toy experiences in virtual space and to give a definition of Virtual Toys. By giving examples of current VToys and speculating on the properties of VToys in the future, we participate in envisioning a post-digital play world, where questions related, for example, to the longevity and obsolescence of playthings, receive new meanings.

The Performance of Digital Play

Article

Full-text available

Aug 2008

Emma Westecott

To date, games studies (the academic field that analyses videogames from a humanities perspective) has drawn from the fields of play theory, psychology, sociology, film studies, cyber culture, literary and media theory as well as visual anthropology to map its roots. This paper adds the field of performance theory to this family of disciplines in order to better understand the emergent and interdisciplinary field of games studies. These disciplines have hinted at the connection between the discourses surrounding play and aspects of performance and performativity. However, scholars have been less forthcoming in acknowledging the role of performance in play as a subject in its own right, worthy of study.As a starting point to frame the phenomenology of digital play it is useful to look to core elements of a play experience. On the highest level these can be understood as the game object (which consists the game world and its rules), the player subject and the play act (the unifying action that creates a particular performance).

Multimodality of Children’s Artefacts: Towards a Toy Literacy

Article

Jul 2023

Danielle Barbosa Lins Almeida

Whether toys are made of metal, plastic, leather, fabric, wood or any soft material, they seem to reveal cultural references and evoke emotional reactions. The aim of this article is to expand the agenda of childhood studies from a linguistic perspective by constructing a multimodal framework – which I have called toy literacy – to analyse toys in their three-dimensional features, with a view to discussing some of the roles provided by toys’ multimodal messages and reflecting upon the kind of childhood that has been constructed through toys’ material representations. By means of a metalanguage, I have created a framework that may be of help to different social sectors – from the academic to the more general public – to show how toys end up communicating and reinforcing stereotypes and social behaviours through the verbal and visual choices behind their design, packages and campaigns. In providing a systematic language to talk about toy choices, I hope to promote reflection on the social structures pertaining to toys’ gender and cultural representations, which, for long, have been kept concealed.

Play World: The Emergence of the New Ludenic Age

Book

Jan 2000

James E. Combs

Should we take the idea of play seriously? Since the publication of Huizinga'sHomo Ludensin 1938, a provocative literature has developed in philosophy and social science that does. Combs argues that we should understand play both as a generic concept with considerable power to explain human activity, and as a contemporary procept that demystifies some of the puzzling trends and innovations emerging in the quickly developing new social world of the 21st century. Combs explores the thesis that play has a central role in our understanding of human activity and social and political organization in the new millennium. He argues that the human desire for play is strong and given the continuation of certain major historical innovations now shaping the world, it may well be that 21st-century people will increasingly exercise their desire for play and that the world will increasingly be organized around the principle and practice of play. It may now seem a truism that people prefer to have fun, but that has not always been the case. If, as Combs argues, the preference for fun is becoming central to human activity, we need to explore why that preference is becoming dominant and what kind of social organization and consequences such a change entails. A provocative look at social change in the 20th century that will be of interest to scholars, students, and researchers of sociology and anthropology.

Play Behaviors: Definition and Typology

Chapter

Jan 2020

Play is a normative child behavior with defining characteristics. Specific subtypes of play are present from infancy throughout childhood, and include sensorimotor or exploratory play, functional play, constructive play, pretend play, and rough‐and‐tumble play. Play can also be categorized on the basis of the social aspects of the interaction, from solitary play to cooperative play with peers. A definition and an overview of the developmental correlates are provided for each type of play.

Manifesto for a Ludic Century

Chapter

Jan 2015

Eric Zimmerman

What if every part of our everyday life was turned into a game? The implications of “gamification.” What if our whole life were turned into a game? What sounds like the premise of a science fiction novel is today becoming reality as “gamification.” As more and more organizations, practices, products, and services are infused with elements from games and play to make them more engaging, we are witnessing a veritable ludification of culture. Yet while some celebrate gamification as a possible answer to mankind's toughest challenges and others condemn it as a marketing ruse, the question remains: what are the ramifications of this “gameful world”? Can game design energize society and individuals, or will algorithmicincentive systems become our new robot overlords? In this book, more than fifty luminaries from academia and industry examine the key challenges of gamification and the ludification of culture—including Ian Bogost, John M. Carroll, Bernie DeKoven, Bill Gaver, Jane McGonigal, Frank Lantz, Jesse Schell, Kevin Slavin, McKenzie Wark, and Eric Zimmerman. They outline major disciplinary approaches, including rhetorics, economics, psychology, and aesthetics; tackle issues like exploitation or privacy; and survey main application domains such as health, education, design, sustainability, or social media.

Phygital technologies and environments for breakthrough innovation in customers' and citizens' journey. A critical literature review and future agenda

Article