In his pioneering research on play (in animals), Gregory Bateson theorized play in terms of (meta)communication. Bateson's line of thinking later became fundamental to play research among children. In the present study, we extend this line of investigation. Building on methodological and theoretical advancements, we empirically study play in-depth as communication and metacommunication through an exemplar of child-adult play. The aim with this investigation is to further the empirically grounded theorization of play as (meta)communication and discuss what the implications are for early childhood education and care (ECEC). More specifically, we address questions concerning play as communication and metacommunication as well as adult participation in and contributions to play, which are matters of foremost importance to ECEC. The theoretical concept of triggering, argued to be more functional than scaffolding for conceptualizing the participation and contributions of more experienced participants in play, is presented and differentiated with the help of empirical observations.

格雷戈里·贝特森（Gregory Bateson）在对动物游戏的开创性研究中，从（元）交流的角度对游戏进行了理论化。贝特森的思维方式后来成为在儿童中进行研究的基础。在本研究中，我们扩展了这一研究范围。在方法论和理论发展的基础上，我们通过儿童成人游戏的范例，对游戏作为交流和元交流进行了深入的研究。这项研究的目的是进一步促进基于游戏的（元）交流的以经验为基础的理论化，并讨论对幼儿教育和护理（ECEC）的影响。更具体地说，我们处理有关游戏交流和元通信以及成年人参与游戏和为游戏做出贡献的问题，这对ECEC至关重要。在经验观察的帮助下，触发被认为比脚手架更能发挥功能，以概念化游戏中更多有经验的参与者的参与和贡献。