Play and Sensory Stimulation Therapy

16/07/2026

02/07/2026

The neuroscience of play is one of the most compelling bodies of research I encountered when writing Can We Play Now?

When a child engages in play, the brain is not simply passing time. Neural pathways are being built. The prefrontal cortex, which governs planning, decision-making, and emotional regulation, develops in direct relationship with playful experience. The limbic system — our emotional brain — is regulated through attachment play and sensory play in ways that no instruction or correction can replicate.

Put simply: play is how the brain grows itself.

This is why play deprivation has real, measurable consequences — not just emotional ones, but neurological ones. Children who do not have access to sensory and attachment play show measurable differences in cortisol regulation, stress response, and relational capacity.

For therapists and educators: when we create playful, safe environments, we are doing more than we realise.

We are literally building brains.

25/06/2026

When I began mapping the development of play across the lifespan, I noticed something consistent: the struggles my clients brought to therapy were often rooted in an earlier stage of play that had been interrupted and not met when growing up.

This is the foundation of the Play Development Paradigm (PDP) — a framework I developed to understand play not as entertainment, but as the developmental architecture through which we build emotion regulation, identity, relationships, and resilience.

The five stages are:
→ Sensory Play — the body learns to self-regulate
→ Attachment Play — trust and relational safety begin
→ Constructive Play — agency, problem-solve and identity development.
→ Fantasy Play — imagination and self-worth
→ Competitive Play — rules, fairness, and resilience

Each stage links to neuroscience, attachment theory, and human development.

21/06/2026

I am so proud! My poster about my book 'Can We Play Now?' (available Karnac Books) and the Play Development Paradigm has won the People's Choice Best Poster Award at the UKCP Conference 2026! Thank you for all your votes!

11/05/2026

Play is not a pastime activity that only belongs to the early years.
It is the architecture of development.

Play is not a recreational luxury, but a neurobiological necessity. Through play, pathways of regulation, imagination, relational intelligence, identity, and agency are built and reorganised across the lifespan.

The Play Development Paradigm, based on my book "Can We Play Now? The Meaning of Play Throughout Lifetime Development" (available Karnac Books), explores how different forms of play support psychological development from embodied regulation and attachment, through symbolic imagination, identity formation, and self-agency.

The paradigm highlights that play is not simply something children “do,” but a developmental language through which regulation, relationship, meaning-making, creativity, resilience, and the capacity to become fully human emerge.

In an era of increasing emotional distress, sensory dysregulation, and digital disconnection, rethinking the role of play may be more important than ever.

10/02/2026

"Can we Play Now?", available Karnac Books and written by Nadou Rolli is now officially launched! :) It was such a wonderful evening and thank you to everyone that made this happen!

19/01/2026

The book launch of the Book "Can we play now? The meaning of play throughout lifetime development is approaching quickly!!

13/11/2025

I am aware that I have not posted for a very long time. There was a reason: For over a year, I wrote a book about the meaning of play and why it really matters. It has finally been announced and is available for pre-order. Please have a look:

Can We Play Now? The Meaning of Play Throughout Lifetime Development by Nadja Julia Rolli at Karnac Books

10/08/2023

The countdown is on until the launch of One Tree, Many Branches: The Practice of Integrative Child and Adolescent Psychotherapy

Editors: Bozena Merrick and Di Gammage

One Tree, Many Branches contains twelve inspirational chapters on the practice of integrative child and adolescent psychotherapy in four parts: therapeutic holding, race and cultural identity, neurodivergence and differently wired brains, and systemic issues and working within the system. Subjects discussed include ecopsychotherapy, autism, the lack of male psychotherapists, working with refugees, racial trauma, female ge***al mutilation, working in closed communities, and foetal alcohol spectrum disorder.

The book includes contributions from Audrey Adeyemi, Tasha Bailey, Kelly Brackett, Jamie Butterworth, Alix Hearn, Evania Inward, Irene Mburu, Sasha Morphitis, Magda Raczynska, Nadja Rolli, Zisi Schleider, and Anna Tuttle.

Due to be published in September 2023. To pre-order please click here - https://buff.ly/3Yb2InU