Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection

Within the pediatric hospitalization experience, fear and anxiety are two emotions commonly felt by children of all ages. Hospitalized children can greatly benefit from interventions designed to help them cope with these emotions throughout their medical experiences. This study draws on each of our clinical experiences as volunteers at Phoenix Children’s Hospital, and uses a qualitative analysis of three semi-structured interviews with currently employed Child Life Specialists to understand and analyze the use of medical play, a form of play intervention with a medical theme or medical equipment. We explore the goals and benefits of medical play for hospitalized pediatric patients, the process of using medical play as an intervention, including the activity design process, the assessments and adjustments made throughout the child’s hospitalization, and the considerations and limitations to implementing medical play activities. Ultimately, we found that the element of fun that defines play can be channeled into medical play activities implemented by skilled Child Life Specialists, who are experts in their field, in clinical settings to promote several different and beneficial goals, including pediatric patient coping.

Within the pediatric hospitalization experience, fear and anxiety are two emotions commonly felt by children of all ages. Hospitalized children can greatly benefit from interventions designed to help them cope with these emotions throughout their medical experiences. This study draws on each of our clinical experiences as volunteers at Phoenix Children’s Hospital, and uses a qualitative analysis of three semi-structured interviews with currently employed Child Life Specialists to understand and analyze the use of medical play, a form of play intervention with a medical theme or medical equipment. We explore the goals and benefits of medical play for hospitalized pediatric patients, the process of using medical play as an intervention, including the activity design process, the assessments and adjustments made throughout the child’s hospitalization, and the considerations and limitations to implementing medical play activities. Ultimately, we found that the element of fun that defines play can be channeled into medical play activities implemented by skilled Child Life Specialists, who are experts in their field, in clinical settings to promote several different and beneficial goals, including pediatric patient coping.

This essay analyzes the immense popularity of the online video game The Sims through the lens of Sigmund Freud’s theories about desire. Specifically, it utilizes the concepts of wish fulfillment, the pleasure and reality principles, and the life and death drive to draw conclusions about why the game is so appealing. The two main aspects of the game that this essay analyzes are the game’s extreme customization of the mundane and its endless design. It asserts that these aspects provide a unique opportunity for players to choose to engage in wish fulfillment, in either the pleasure or the reality principle, or in either the life or the death drive. These choices are unique to the game because, in the real world, these principles are inextricably linked, so the separation of these principles from each other allows players to fulfill their desires in unique ways. The essay challenges Freud’s theories by exhibiting how these principles appear differently in a virtual space, compared to reality. It explores how these challenges improve the player experience by providing a space for them to explore their desires and drives in a safe and controlled setting in their customizable, virtual world.