DIRECTING CHILDREN’S EMOTIONS: FROM SPONTANEOUS EXPERIENCE TO STRUCTURED PRACTICE

 

ABSTRACT

The publication of this article invites the reader to further discussion with the author on a number of issues.

This article examines the challenges of directing children under the age of eight in film and television. Drawing on insights from developmental neuropsychology and professional practice, the author argues for moving beyond traditional acting methods — role analysis, character motivation, and structured rehearsal — which are largely ineffective at this stage of development. Instead, the paper outlines a system of methods and techniques based on play, sensory triggers, and social modeling that allow directors to elicit authentic emotional responses — surprise, laughter, focus, curiosity, etc. — without pressure or harm. Practical strategies are described for each core emotion (for instance, using a playful rule to generate focus or a disruption of sensory expectation to provoke genuine surprise). Ethical considerations are emphasized: the child’s trust in the crew must be maintained, and emotions should arise in safe, game-like conditions. The article concludes that the director of young children acts not only as a filmmaker but also as a designer of play environments and a guardian of psychological well-being. This dual role points toward the emergence of a distinct professional field: the directing of children’s emotions.

АННОТАЦИЯ

Публикация данной статьи приглашает читателя к дальнейшей дискуссии с автором по ряду аспектов.

Статья посвящена специфике режиссуры детей младше восьми лет в кино и на телевидении. На основе данных нейропсихологии и практики автор обосновывает необходимость отказа от традиционных актёрских методов (анализ роли, мотивация персонажа, репетиции) и предлагает систему методов и техник, основанных на игре, сенсорных стимулах и социальном моделировании, позволяющих вызывать подлинные эмоциональные реакции — удивление, смех, сосредоточенность, любопытство и др. — без давления и травматизации. Подробно описаны практические техники для каждой базовой эмоции (например, использование игровой задачи для создания состояния сосредоточенности или сенсорного «разрыва ожидания» для вызова удивления). Особое внимание уделено этическим аспектам: доверие ребёнка к съёмочной группе должно сохраняться, а эмоциональные состояния должны возникать в игровой, безопасной форме. В заключении подчёркивается, что режиссёр детей младше восьми лет выступает не только как постановщик, но и как создатель игровых условий и гарант психологического благополучия ребёнка, что открывает перспективы для формирования отдельного профессионального направления — режиссуры детских эмоций.

 

Keywords: directing children, child actors, play-based pedagogy, cognitive development, emotion elicitation, screen performance, developmental psychology, television directing, film directing, ethical practices, sensory stimulation, authenticity in acting.

Ключевые слова: режиссура детей, дети-актёры, игровая педагогика, когнитивное развитие, вызов эмоций, экранное исполнение, психология развития, телевизионная режиссура, кинорежиссура, этические практики, сенсорная стимуляция, аутентичность в актёрской игре.

 

Introduction

Within the directing community, the line often attributed to comedian W. C. Fields — “never work with children or animals” — has become a cliché. Behind the humor lies a serious professional challenge: both children and animals are unpredictable and resist conventional directing techniques. In the case of animals, structured training methods and safety protocols have gradually emerged. By contrast, no comparable methodology exists for directing children under the age of eight.

The difficulty stems from developmental factors. At this age, children lack fully formed abstract thinking, working memory, and executive functions. Their behavior is shaped primarily by play, imitation, and immediate sensorimotor responses. As a result, classical acting tools — role analysis, character motivation, rehearsal structures — are largely ineffective.

This leaves the director facing a dual task: to achieve the dramatic expressiveness required by the production while at the same time protecting the child from stress or exploitation. Meeting both demands calls for approaches informed by developmental psychology, play-based pedagogy, and screen practice.

The purpose of this article is to outline the theoretical foundations and practical strategies for directing children under eight, to systematize methods already in use, and to suggest the contours of a new professional field — the directing of children’s emotions.

Methodological and Neuropsychological Foundations

The methodological framework for working with young children must be grounded in developmental psychology and neuroscience.

Research consistently shows that at this age, children have not yet developed abstract thinking [1] or reliable working memory [2], and their behavior is still shaped primarily by play and imitation [3]. Classical acting tools — role analysis, character motivation, structured rehearsal — rarely apply.

This leaves the director with a double task: to achieve the dramatic expressiveness required by the film while also protecting the child from stress or exploitation. Meeting both aims demands a different approach, since young children lack the executive functions needed to plan ahead, inhibit impulses, or follow abstract rules [4].

Young children vary widely in temperament, socialization, and emotional stability. Still, as with animals — the comparison may sound blunt but is not inaccurate — certain patterns appear with striking regularity. Developmental neuropsychology explains why: in children under eight, the prefrontal cortex, which governs abstract thought, impulse control, and long-term planning, is not yet fully developed. Their behavior is driven mainly by imitation, emotional resonance, and sensorimotor processing, with play as the dominant mode of experience. This interaction of stimuli, neural processing, and behavioral outcomes is summarized in the block diagram below (Fig. 1)

 

Figure 1. Block diagram of children’s cognitive-emotional regulation

 

For this reason, children rarely respond to the “meaning” of a role. Instead, they react to direct stimuli: a game, an action, a sound, or a touch. The first response is almost always impulsive. If a short delay occurs between stimulus and reaction, the impulse fades, allowing a more deliberate action. This mechanism is captured in the model of passive dissipation: the initial surge weakens over time, giving the child a chance to respond more appropriately — not grabbing an object at once, but waiting for instruction; not blurting the first word, but pausing for a partner’s line (Fig. 2).

 

Figure 2. Passive-dissipation model showing how delay can improve performance on inhibitory tasks (from Simpson et al. 2011)

 

The practical lesson is clear: directors should avoid abstract commands such as “act sad” or “pretend you’re scared.” What works is creating concrete play or sensory conditions. To evoke surprise, it may be enough to trigger an unexpected light effect or place an unfamiliar object within the child’s view [5].

 To elicit concentration, a simple rule — “you can only step on the red squares” — is more effective than layered verbal instructions. Because working memory and cognitive control are limited, abstract demands rarely yield results. Directing children under eight must therefore translate dramaturgical goals into simple, playful, and psychologically accessible forms.

At the same time, it is worth noting that modern postproduction tools — including CGI, digital compositing, and subtle facial retouching — can serve as an ethically acceptable means of amplifying the desired screen effect without exposing the child to psychological stress. When used responsibly, such technologies do not replace the child’s authentic reactions but rather complement them, ensuring narrative impact while preserving emotional safety. This approach aligns with contemporary ethical standards in both film production and academic research involving minors, reinforcing the principle that artistic expression must never compromise a child’s well-being.

Core Emotions and Techniques

Surprise

Surprise is one of the most “honest” and valuable emotions for a director. Asking a child to “pretend to be surprised” almost always leads to caricature: eyes opened too wide, mouth in an exaggerated “O,” and a mechanical pause. Psychological studies show that only about 15% of surprise is expressed through facial musculature, while 85% is conveyed through changes in eye movement, pupil dilation, and shifts in fixation [6]. In children under eight this reaction is particularly pronounced and difficult to control voluntarily: they may reproduce a pose or gesture, but their gaze inevitably betrays the artificiality.

Authentic surprise can be elicited only by a real stimulus. The most reliable results come from situations in which the child’s normal prediction fails. One effective method can be described as a “logical disruption of the object.” The sensory system responds before consciousness has time to interpret the event, and the child’s face instantly registers genuine astonishment (Fig. 3).

A notable example is the “empty object” technique. The child is given a light box several times in a row, always with the same weight. After a series of identical interactions, the same box suddenly becomes heavy. This method is highly reliable because a change in weight cannot be anticipated and is difficult to rationalize.

Another sensory variation involves shifting the temperature of an object. A familiar item, neutral to the touch in one take, becomes slightly warm or cool in the next. The child has not yet processed the change cognitively, but the expression of surprise is already visible. In film, this can be achieved with props that are gently heated or cooled. Such techniques are particularly effective when the dramatic task requires the child to be surprised by the object itself — a framed photograph, a key, a book, a toy, or another localized prop. In these cases, attention is concentrated, the gaze is fixed on the object, and the sensory disruption produces a fast, authentic effect.

Sometimes, however, the dramatic context calls for a different kind of surprise — one that comes not from an object but from space itself. Here the child does not handle a prop but interacts with the environment. A classic method is the “empty cupboard”: the child opens a cupboard ten times in a row, always finding it empty. On the eleventh time, a soft light appears inside or an unexpected item is revealed — a plasma globe, a distorted mirror, or another unusual prop. The repetition establishes the prediction of “nothing will happen,” and when that prediction is broken, a fully genuine astonishment occurs. Work with space is especially valuable when the scene requires a sense of entering a “new world” or a sudden shift in reality: the child is surprised not by a single object but by the transformation of the environment itself, which reads more convincingly to the audience.

 

Figure 3. Frame from Little Captain: Anastasia Țețe reacts with genuine surprise when, instead of the expected object, she encounters a live hedgehog

 

It is important to emphasize that although the mechanisms of surprise and humor are related in cognitive psychology — both rely on the violation of expectations — their outcomes differ. Humor requires a cognitive “reappraisal” of the situation leading to laughter, while surprise is registered as a pure reaction to mismatch without a comic component [7].

Thus, techniques based on the disruption of sensory predictions allow the director to capture genuine, rather than imitated, surprise on set.

Fear

Even adult actors find fear harder to reproduce convincingly than joy or surprise. Fear is a complex organismic reaction that involves not only facial expression but a wide range of physiological changes: increased heart rate, altered breathing pattern, pupil dilation, and activation of facial and neck muscles. Many of these processes are involuntary, which is why viewers readily distinguish genuine fear from its simulation [8].

For children under eight the task is yet more difficult. Their nervous systems respond more quickly and directly than adults’, and voluntary control is minimal. Whereas an adult performer can use self-regulation techniques (for example, breath control to generate inner tension), a child operates essentially within a stimulus–response loop. In genuine fright the child’s face changes not only through wide eyes but via numerous micro-movements — involuntary trembling of the lips, forehead muscle contractions, subtle eyebrow shifts. These fine signals create verisimilitude and cannot be reliably faked by conscious effort.

Working with video for future creating fear demands the utmost caution. It must be never traumatic. This is dictated not only by ethics but also by the practical need to preserve the child’s trust in the set: once that trust is broken, further collaboration becomes very difficult. Provocations that rely on “ghosts” or unexpected physical manipulations can produce results but carry a high risk of psychological harm and of justified intervention from parents or authorities.

 

Figure 4. A frame from Little Captain: Rodica (Anastasia Țețe)

 

Instead of frightening signals such as air horns, the director can use neutral but unexpected sounds that evoke surprise instead of fear. For example, a comic pig’s grunt or the sound of glass breaking (as if something has fallen). Such impulses are brief, non-traumatic and easily framed as part of a game, yet they create an authentic reflex reaction that reads convincingly on screen.

If a director needs to elicit a “slow build-up” of tension, this can be achieved by progressive environmental changes: dimming light, a gradual musical swell, or other cues that the child perceives as unusual but not threatening. Physiologically, this still corresponds to a progressive increase in attentional activation [10]. On screen this reads as tense foreboding, emotionally denser than a single jump scare.

Localizing the sound source in space — behind a door, in a cupboard, behind a curtain or under a table — sharpens the emotional reaction and simplifies editing. Small directional speakers or Bluetooth units are typically used.

 

Figure 5. A frame from Little Captain: Rodica’s escalating reaction (Anastasia Țețe) was produced by a concealed long-rising neutral sound, introduced without the actress’s prior awareness during filming

 

Safety is integral to the technique. Parents must be informed and give consent; the child must be screened for contraindications (hearing impairments, epilepsy, pronounced anxiety). After the take the sound source is revealed to the child and the situation is framed as a game. The child is returned to a resource state with humor, a smile, or small reward. The child should be warned in advance that a couple of surprises are possible during filming (and the child’s consent should be obtained, not only parents’ consent), and each surprise should be subsequently rewarded. A doctor's supervision (during filming and prior to filming) is necessary to ensure that the filming crew don't overdo it with surprises planned and fulfilled.

If a stimulus loses effectiveness through repetition during a shoot, do not reuse the same sound; vary it (for example, substitute one neutral comic noise for another). Adaptation occurs quickly, so changing the character of the stimulus preserves responsiveness.

In summary, directing fear and other anxiety-related emotions in young children demands absolute ethical vigilance. Such states must never be provoked through real frightening or distressing stimuli but only simulated through acting, controlled staging, sound cues, or visual effects. This approach ensures emotional realism without causing psychological discomfort and reaffirms the director’s dual responsibility — as an artist pursuing authenticity and as a guardian of the child’s emotional safety. The proposed method is aimed at developing expressiveness and emotional authenticity in the child’s performance, without any risk to the child’s mental or physical well-being.

Focus and Attention

Focus is one of the most difficult states to elicit in children under eight. Unlike joy or surprise, it does not arise as a reaction to a single stimulus but requires the activation of cognitive mechanisms. Neuropsychology shows that at this age the prefrontal cortex, responsible for voluntary control of attention, is still developing [11]. The leading role is played by the orienting response: a child concentrates not because of an abstract instruction such as “pay attention,” but through the automatic capture of attention by a concrete stimulus — a rule, an object, or a sensory change [12].

This explains the critical importance of atmosphere on set. Children display a high degree of emotional mimicry: their attention and behavior adjust to the prevailing mood. When the crew maintains quiet and seriousness, a mechanism of social resonance is triggered — the child absorbs the emotional tone and stabilizes their own behavior [13]. On a physiological level, this is expressed in fewer distracting micro-movements and longer periods of steady gaze.

A reliable technique is to introduce a playful rule tied to a sensorimotor task (Fig. 6). Instead of the abstract “walk slowly,” the instruction becomes “do not step on the lines between the tiles.” For the child it is a simple game, but on camera it appears as convincing concentration. A similar effect can be achieved with an unusual object: a mechanical toy or a prop with an unfamiliar texture fully absorbs the child’s attention, and the attempt to “figure it out” registers on screen as organic focus [14].

Acoustic games are also effective: the child is asked to listen to silence and wait for a signal (e.g., a cat’s meow) upon which they must raise a hand. During filming, the gaze remains intent yet unfocused, the child appears absorbed in waiting, and the shot conveys natural concentration.

 

Figure 6. A frame from Little Captain: Rodica (Anastasia Țețe) reads a book; since she had no reading skills, the text was memorized, and small marks inside the book guided her gaze to create a focused expression

 

Particularly effective was a technique the author applied in practice with the help of an assistant dressed as a “doctor” in a white coat. This visual symbol triggered a stable association with medical examination and potential threat, which by itself induced slight tension. The “doctor” first interacted with adult crew members — for example, “checking the operator’s eyesight,” shaking his head in dissatisfaction, or pretending to administer an injection. Even at this stage the child entered a state of alertness, closely observing the scene.

The “doctor” then turned to the child with a simple rule: “Follow my finger with your eyes.” The finger was raised sometimes on the right, sometimes on the left, with quick and unpredictable movements. The child’s gaze shifted automatically in response, with no deliberate “acting” involved — it was pure visuomotor reaction.

On camera, this technique produced exactly the required dramatic state: the child’s face showed slight tension combined with intense focus, while the rapid eye movements conveyed inner tension. The author used this method repeatedly, and each time it reliably delivered the expression of anxious concentration that was needed.

It is essential to keep in mind that participation of children in filming must take place exclusively under safe and controlled conditions, with the presence and supervision of qualified professionals — such as a psychologist or pedagogue — who can monitor the child’s state and ensure that each directing method remains within ethical and developmental boundaries.

Laughter

Eliciting genuine laughter from a child on camera is one of the most challenging tasks in directing. Unlike adults, young children cannot summon joy on command — their voluntary control over emotion is limited [15]. They may mimic gestures or tone, but their facial expressions and gaze quickly reveal inauthenticity. As a result, true laughter must be sparked by an immediate trigger.

Tickling, while seemingly obvious, is almost always ineffective on set: it produces sudden movements, throws the child out of focus, and in close-up the result looks more disruptive than joyful.

The most reliable strategy is to identify individual “triggers” during early rehearsals. Working with parents, the director can test different approaches: an oversized hat, absurd glasses, an unexpected word, a comic sound, an exaggerated adult walk, or a dropped object (Fig. 7). Each child responds to specific stimuli, which should be reserved for filming and not repeated excessively to avoid habituation. In this way, the director develops a toolkit that can reliably produce several takes of authentic laughter. From a scheduling perspective, such scenes are best planned for the second half of the shooting day, when the child is active but not yet fatigued.

There are also universal techniques. For example, the game “who can stay serious the longest” often yields a brief but genuine effect: attempts to suppress laughter almost always collapse into fits of giggles. From a cognitive standpoint, laughter at this age is most often a response to incongruity [16] — a break in expectation. That is why physical gags, such as an oversized hat or a solemn adult suddenly meowing, tend to work more reliably than verbal jokes.

In practice, role reversal has proven particularly effective. The child is invited to act as the “director” and instruct an adult, who deliberately performs the directions clumsily and with exaggerated mistakes. This approach engages two mechanisms: first, the “inverted hierarchy,” where the child gains authority normally reserved for adults; and second, the “comparative failure” effect, where laughter arises from observing another’s mistakes in a situation where the child feels more competent [17]. On a neuropsychological level, this process activates the dopamine reward system, reinforcing the sense of superiority with positive affect [18].

 

Figure 7. A frame from the film Little Captain: Rodica (Anastasia Țețe) laughs at the sight of a caricature of her grandfather on screen; in post-production, it was replaced with a shot from an animated sequence

 

A variation involving a shared task can further amplify the effect. For instance, the child and an adult may both be asked to draw a rabbit, but the adult deliberately sketches an elephant with a long trunk instead of ears. The resulting burst of laughter arises not only from the broken expectation (a ridiculous elephant instead of a rabbit) but also from the sense of superiority: the child recognizes that they completed the task correctly while the adult failed in an obvious way. This “comparative advantage” generates a particularly strong rewarding response, combining two forces — surprise at the situation and affirmation of the child’s own competence.

Curiosity

For children under eight, curiosity is not merely an emotional state but one of the fundamental mechanisms of learning. It arises where there is an information gap: a signal points to the existence of “something,” yet the full picture remains incomplete. The brain marks this gap as significant and directs attention toward filling it [19]. In these moments a child’s gaze becomes intent, facial expression takes on an investigative quality, and the body leans forward. This cannot be imitated: any attempt to “act curious” quickly turns into caricature. For a director the implication is clear — the conditions must create a genuine cognitive gap; otherwise, the emotion will not emerge.

Practical directing has developed several techniques, often without formal description in the psychological literature, but repeatedly validated on set. One method is partial concealment of information: light seeping through a crack, rustling inside a box, or a trembling lid. Another is the ritualization of mystery, in which an adult repeats the same action multiple times (for example, opening and closing a drawer), provoking the child to construct hypotheses of their own.

Playful prohibition also proves effective: the child is shown an object but told, “You mustn’t touch it.” In a game-like context this heightens cognitive tension and amplifies interest. Social modeling works in a similar way: if adults exchange glances, whisper, or behave as though the object holds special importance, the child automatically mirrors their attitude.

Film-specific techniques include delayed revelation (the buildup to an event is staged but its occurrence is postponed) and fleeting presentation (an object appears for only a moment before vanishing). The camera captures the child’s expression of expectant focus, which naturally develops into visible curiosity.

In the author’s own practice, one approach was nicknamed the “Pulp Fiction suitcase.” From the first rehearsals a small chest with a soft inner glow (created by a concealed phone) was kept on set. Each time it was opened, adults reacted with exaggerated astonishment — gasps, laughter, shaking their heads — yet the contents were never revealed to the child (Fig. 8).

 

Figure 8. Illia Freiman, author of the present article and director of Little Captain, during rehearsal with actress Anastasia Țețe, demonstrating the glowing chest without revealing its contents

 

The repeated presence of the mysterious object, combined with the absence of explanation, steadily built cognitive tension and deepened curiosity (Fig. 9).

By the time of filming, young actress Anastasia Țețe could no longer hide her fascination. For the scene in which her gaze had to seem directed straight at the audience, the camera was placed at a distance, and the glowing chest was opened slowly beside the lens. At that instant her eyes lit up with unmistakable, almost burning curiosity — a reaction no acting instruction could ever produce.

 

Figure 9. A frame from the film Little Captain: Rodica’s expression of curiosity (Anastasia Țețe) was elicited through an unexpected device — the director slightly opened a casket whose contents had been kept secret from the actress throughout the entire production

 

Sadness and Tears

Paradoxically, sadness and tears are among the easiest emotions for children under eight to reproduce. Unlike laughter or concentration, they do not require the creation of a complex cognitive gap or an orienting response. Psychological studies show [20] that the ability to imitate sadness develops earlier than the ability to imitate other emotions. This is linked to early emotional development: crying and expressions of sadness are innate communicative signals, reinforced from infancy through the mechanism of social response. Adults react to crying more quickly than to joy or surprise, and children rapidly learn that this emotion has high “efficiency.”

Children also find it easier than adults to produce genuine tears. Their nervous systems are more labile: emotional responses arise faster and are not suppressed by voluntary control [21]. In addition, they have not yet developed the cultural barrier associated with social norms of emotional expression. Adults often restrain tears because society expects emotional resilience and “keeping a straight face.” Children lack these filters, so crying remains a natural response to stress or loss (Fig. 10).

Interestingly, before the age of eight, gender differences in the display of sadness and crying are minimal: boys and girls alike slip easily into states of sorrow. During adolescence, however, the picture changes. In cultures where boys are raised under the paradigm of “men don’t cry,” strong barriers develop against showing tears [22]. In such cases, a director faces a different task: not only working with cognitive features of age, but also overcoming socially reinforced mechanisms of emotional suppression.

For a director, handling sadness in children requires specific organizational choices. The most effective approach is to schedule scenes involving tears at the end of the shooting day: by then the child is emotionally fatigued, and resistance to entering a dramatic state is reduced. This makes the task considerably easier. Ethically, such scenes should rely on make-believe rather than real distress: brief imaginative prompts or guided autobiographical recall presented as play, implemented with prior parental permission and the child’s assent, followed by immediate debriefing and mood-repair to baseline, are classified as minimal-risk procedures when properly consented and monitored [25][26][27].

Coercive methods are strictly unacceptable. Attempts by parents or crew members to provoke tears through threats or scolding may produce a temporary effect but undermine trust in the process. The child may then begin to perceive filming as punishment, leading to resistance, sabotage, or the lasting association “filming = stress.”

A more effective and ethically acceptable strategy is to build a make-believe game scenario in which tears arise within clearly framed rules the child understands and accepts, with parental permission and the child’s assent. In the author’s own practice, one of the most successful methods was nicknamed “give–and–take.” Parents reported that six-year-old actress Anastasia Țețe longed for a specific toy — a plush kitten with glowing eyes like her favorite cartoon character. The toy was purchased in advance and integrated into the “legend” of the filming world: it appeared in rehearsals, became part of play interactions, and carried strong positive associations.

On the shooting day, when the script required tears, the toy “disappeared.” Together with the mother, the crew told the child that the kitten had been stolen by an evil queen, and it could only be returned if it heard her crying. The response was immediate: in two consecutive takes she cried with genuine despair, the kind that cannot be acted without playing a game. Immediately after the scene the toy was “returned,” and the “evil queen” apologized and promised never to do it again. Crucially, the episode was debriefed as play and the child’s affect restored through a brief mood-repair activity (humor/positive reframing), aligning with standard minimal-risk protocols for reversible affect induction [27][28].

 

Figure 10. A frame from the film Little Captain: Rodica’s tears (Anastasia Țețe) were provoked by the disappearance of her favorite toy, “stolen” by the “Evil Queen”

 

Imaginative make-believe scenarios and guided recall are established low-intensity emotion-elicitation techniques in developmental research, provided recovery to baseline is ensured; planned mood-repair (attention refocusing or recall of positive memories) is recommended to normalize state [26][28]. This example demonstrates a key principle: children’s tears on screen should not be the result of pressure but of a game situation in which they emotionally believe in the rules. It is precisely trust and playfulness that allow the director to reconcile artistic demands with the child’s psychological well-being [23].

Conclusion

Directing children under eight differs fundamentally from working with adult actors. This is because cognitive and emotional development at this age does not yet support abstract reasoning, analytical engagement with a role, or voluntary control of emotions. As a result, traditional acting methods are either inapplicable or yield only limited results.

An effective strategy is not to demand imitation but to create conditions in which the emotion arises naturally. Laughter emerges as a reaction to broken expectations; focus develops through a simple rule or a sensorimotor task; surprise arises from a violated prediction; curiosity is triggered by an information gap, etc. In all cases the child’s emotional response functions within a stimulus–response model, and the director’s task is to transform that response into a dramaturgically meaningful result.

The preservation of trust remains paramount. The use of pressure, manipulation, or punishment destroys the play context and undermines cooperation. By contrast, playful structures, sensory triggers, and social modeling not only generate authentic emotional reactions but also sustain the child’s experience of the set as a safe and engaging environment.

Thus, the director working with children under eight acts simultaneously as a designer of play conditions and as a guarantor of ethical standards. This approach makes it possible to align artistic objectives with care for the child’s psychological well-being. Future research should focus on the systematic study of these methods at the intersection of cognitive psychology, neuroscience, and play pedagogy. Their theoretical grounding opens the way to a new professional field: the directing of children’s emotions as a distinct branch of screen art.

 

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