LogFAQs > #963659832

I'm not a parent, but I'm regularly around the younger kids of my friends. And I had a niece and nephew (who are older now).

In my experience, most kids today don't seem to like/care about toys all that much at all. They mostly just throw them around in piles every now and then, and then go back to watching YouTube videos on their tablet/phone.

When they do seem to play with stuff, it generally seems to be non-gender specific. Like piling blocks on other blocks or throwing balls or the like. It doesn't really seem like when I was a kid and everyone played with specific stuff like Transformers and GI Joe or Ninja Turtles or Voltron.

I do know my friend's daughter went through a My Little Pony phase, but that was triggered by her mom giving her her own old toys (and maybe by watching the show), so I don't know how much you can attribute that to the child's own preferences. His older boy liked Paw Patrol when he was younger, but again, that might be more related to the fact that he saw a show he liked (plus cute animals).

But you can't discount the fact that both society and other kids are regularly establishing social norms for what is and isn't acceptable for any given kid to play with, so if your kids are watching TV or playing with friends, at least some of that is going to rub off. And your own biases will play a role as well (if you buy mostly dolls for a daughter, she'll understand on some level that she's supposed to like dolls).

It might also depend on what they have access to. If I'm going to be honest, most of my play as a young kid involved me burying my action figures in my sandbox, because that's where I played most when I was outside. A kid who mostly stays inside and has multiple brothers and sisters to potentially play with is likely going to develop entirely different play styles from an only child who spends most of their time outside.