Anxiety in Young Children
Fears a child can’t yet name in words — separation anxiety, worry about a parent, anxiety about school — enacted symbolically and worked through in play a trained therapist learns to read as communication in its own right.
Specialty Focus
Play therapy for children.
Evidence-based, developmentally matched treatment for the range of concerns that bring young children into therapy — in the language they already speak.
Play isn’t a warm-up to the real treatment. It is the child’s native language, and the therapy happens in it.
Play therapy spent decades being viewed as a pleasant activity rather than a treatment — a view that hasn’t held up against the evidence. A landmark 2005 meta-analysis by Sue Bratton and colleagues, synthesizing 93 controlled outcome studies, found an overall treatment effect of 0.80 standard deviations — a large effect by any clinical standard. Children who received play therapy fared meaningfully better than untreated children across age, gender, and presenting concern.
Areas of focus.
Grief & Loss
A death in the family, a divorce, the loss of a pet, or a family member’s illness. Grief in young children rarely looks like adult grief — but it is real, and it moves through the same channels play makes accessible.
Medical Trauma
The aftermath of hospitalization, an accident, a difficult procedure, or a frightening diagnosis. The symbolic distance play provides is often what makes this material approachable for a child at all.
Family Transitions
Divorce, remarriage, a new sibling, a move to a new home, or blended family adjustment. Play therapy meets the child in the developmental language they use to process change.
Behavioral Concerns
Behaviors that look like behavior problems but often mask an underlying emotional need the child cannot yet articulate directly. Working the emotional layer changes the behavior downstream.
Trauma-Focused Play Therapy
For children processing frightening or overwhelming experiences, the ability to work symbolically — through a toy or story rather than a direct verbal account — is often what makes the work possible at all.
How we work.
Play as language
Young children don’t yet have the verbal capacity that talk therapy assumes. They can’t easily narrate “I feel anxious because I’m afraid something will happen to my parents.” What they can do is enact that fear symbolically — and the therapy happens there.
Developmentally matched
The average age of children showing measurable benefit in play therapy research is seven — the developmental stage where most other therapeutic approaches are still out of reach. Play therapy is not a lighter option; it’s a better-fitted one.
Evidence-based, rigorous
For parents accustomed to evidence-based decision-making, it’s worth saying plainly: play therapy has one of the more robust outcome literatures in child mental health. It is a matched treatment, not a softer alternative.
Research Cited
- Bratton, S.C., Ray, D., Rhine, T., & Jones, L. “The Efficacy of Play Therapy With Children: A Meta-Analytic Review of Treatment Outcomes.” Professional Psychology: Research and Practice, 36(4), 2005.
- Lin, Y. & Bratton, S.C. Meta-analysis of Child-Centered Play Therapy studies, 1995–2010. University of North Texas Center for Play Therapy.
- Parker, M.M., Hunnicutt Hollenbaugh, K.M., & Kelly, C.T. “Exploring the impact of child-centered play therapy for children exhibiting behavioral problems: A meta-analysis.” International Journal of Play Therapy, 30(4), 2021.
Interested in this focus area?
Our practice is expanding to include specialized clinicians in this area. Join the waitlist to be notified when sessions become available, or reach out to discuss your situation with our practice manager.
Telephone
(916) 990-2326
Email
[email protected]