Children's Outdoor Activities: Advantages and Why It's Important
In today's fast-paced world, families with lower incomes often find themselves working long hours or juggling multiple jobs, leaving less time for outdoor recreation for their children. However, access to nature and outdoor play is crucial for children's health, development, and well-being.
Access to Nature and Outdoor Spaces
Children's ability to engage with and learn from nature depends heavily on physical access to safe, green, and natural environments. Inequities arise when children from disadvantaged or urban areas have limited or no access to quality outdoor spaces, limiting their opportunities for outdoor play.
Socioeconomic and Demographic Context
Children living in areas of socioeconomic disadvantage, certain ethnic groups, and those with lower parental socioeconomic status participate less in outdoor physical activity. These inequalities in access and participation are systematic and socially produced.
Policy and Funding Support
Effective governance and funding at all government levels shape the availability and inclusiveness of outdoor play opportunities. Multi-sector coalitions and state-level policies, such as the Michigan Children & Nature Coalition, aim to increase equitable access by promoting green schoolyards, early childhood nature-based learning, and outdoor recreational infrastructure.
School and Community Environments
School-based programs influence children’s physical activity but can unintentionally widen inequities if not inclusively designed. Attention to contextual characteristics at school and community levels is essential to ensure equitable adoption of interventions promoting outdoor play.
Environmental and Climate Factors
Climate change and environmental hazards disproportionately affect vulnerable populations, limiting safe outdoor play opportunities. Rising temperatures, air pollution, and extreme weather events increase respiratory illnesses, reduce outdoor activity time, and exacerbate inequities, especially in regions with high social and racial disparities.
Health Equity in Outdoor Play
Addressing health equity in outdoor play requires integrated efforts across environmental justice, socioeconomic policy, urban planning, education, and climate resilience sectors to create safe, accessible, and inclusive outdoor environments for all children.
Benefits of Outdoor Play
Being in a natural environment can teach children more about the world. Outdoor play provides multi-sensory stimulation, requires children to be more dynamic, improves physical strength, helps maintain a moderate weight, and reduces the risk of developing weight-related health conditions. Outdoor play also helps children learn risk management skills, fosters cooperation among children, encourages independence and decision-making, and may help lower stress and mental fatigue.
Promoting Outdoor Play for All
Outdoor play is not accessible to everyone due to factors such as increased urbanization, low availability of play spaces, poor urban planning, the increasing appeal of device-based activities, fear surrounding the risks of outdoor play, low social cohesion, economic inequity, pollution, racism, sexism, and systemic racism. Treating girls the same way as boys is important in encouraging outdoor play, as a 2019 review notes that girls play outside less than boys.
Caregivers can take several steps to encourage children to gain outdoor play benefits while spending time indoors, such as by playing physically active games, recreating activities children can do outdoors, and allowing children to solve problems for themselves.
Unfortunately, outdoor play has declined in Western countries over the past few decades. However, by addressing the factors that hinder access to outdoor play, we can ensure that all children have the opportunity to reap its numerous benefits and grow into healthy, confident, and resilient individuals.
