PLAY System Flashcards
Play impacts relationships, place preference and social intelligence. It improves welfare and acts as a buffer against stress. Playing may help animals recover from a bad rearing environment due to lack of CARE system activation from the caregiver, and being in a playful state may help prevent an animal from having his FEAR system activate
The PLAY system is not engaged when the animal is aroused. If the nature of arousal is aversive i.e., the animal feels threatened, then the FEAR system is engaged. On the other hand, if the nature of this arousal is motivational, then the SEEK- ING system is engaged.
As Professor Karolina Westlund says: “PLAY may seem frivolous and not serious. It really isn’t. It may be the emotion that you should take the most seriously” (Westlund, n.d.).
The PLAY system and the SEEKING system are often antagonistic rather than synergistic with each other and cannot be fully engaged at the same time. There are also tell—tale signs that indicate when an animal is engaged in PLAY — we call it MARS, the presence of which indicates healthy play. MARS stands for:
Meta-signals: the animals offer play invitations like play bows or high-pitched barks to solicit play. Activity shifts: the behaviours are shown in a different order than during real fights.
Role reversals: they take turns winning.
Self-handicap: the bigger one handicaps himself to make the play equal.
Opioids (natural endorphins in the brain) play a major role in the PLAY system and the role of dopamine is insignificant by comparison (compare this with the SEEKING system, where dopamine is the major player). When animals play, there’s a lot of body contact which causes the release of endorphins (and other neurotropic substances, which Panksepp calls brain food) in the brain that makes them feel good — almost euphoric.
