Gaining insights into young people's playful wellbeing in woodland through art-based action research

As part of the Good from Woods research project exploring the wellbeing outcomes of time spent in woodland-based activity, an artist-practitioner undertook research for over 18 months to explore the benefits of outdoor play. Using techniques that encouraged young people playing outdoors to collaborate in the research, data generation took place within a managed woodland adventure play area in a neighbourhood challenged by multiple deprivation. This article explores how arts practice as action research can help to capture and represent how young people aged 7 to 15 feel about themselves and their free play. The research methodology was able to encompass playwork practitioners’ principles for child-led activity and perspectives that understand play as an art form. However, tensions can be found in the use of such an approach and generation of analysis and findings comparable to investigative frameworks used in other wellbeing research.