ABSTRACT
The 1970s have already witnessed the publication of over 20 research-oriented books on the meaning of play. One has to include the prior 50 years to arrive at an equivalent number of works, even with a fairly liberal definition of research and social science. The three major influences in this novel play research appear to be Bateson (1956, 1972), Berlyne (1960), and Piaget (1962). Bateson speaks to play at the cultural level and in largely communication-theoretical terms. Berlyne focuses on play, along with humor and art, in terms of revised forms of stimulus-response theorizing. And Piaget discusses infant and early childhood play in terms of his own theory of cognition.
