• Building healthy relationships with technology involves not only protecting youth, but also supporting their positive experiences online.
• Helping middle schoolers navigate the digital world involves strategies similar to those used for their in-person activities: monitoring, spending time on the internet together when possible, educating them about risks, and communicating.
• Ongoing communication is critical. Talk about your values and expectations, ask what young users are doing online, and listen to how they feel about those experiences.
• Parents cannot do it alone. Digital technology companies and policymakers need to ensure that the online spaces where young people spend their time support healthy development while also keeping them safe.

Protecting and supporting youth on the internet are both important

Parents often ask what they can do to protect their children online. This is a good question. But another important question that should be asked is how can we better support our youth on the internet?

As mothers to tweens and teens, we are always looking for ways to protect our children from harm. One of us is also a developmental psychologist who has studied adolescents’ mental health for more than two decades, learning that we need to both protect and support our children – particularly around the middle school years as they make the transition to adolescence and into online spaces.

This is why we recently released a report on what research tells us about amplifying the benefits of digital technology for this age group and calling on technology companies and policymakers to adopt an evidence-based approach to protecting and supporting youth. But even as we urge technology creators to do better, there are steps parents and other caregivers can take to both protect and support positive digital technology use for young people.

Promoting healthy development and well-being with positive online experiences

Early adolescence (from about 10 to 13 years old, or the middle school years) is an important window when positive experiences that support learning and connection can affect development. Going on the internet to create, contribute, or connect can be a positive experience for young people. Online experiences offer new spaces for adolescents to express their creativity, explore who they are and where they fit in, support causes they care about and connect with peers in ways that can enhance their relationships.

Co-viewing, creating, and participating in online spaces can open opportunities for positive joint experiences and allow parents to identify any risks or content that makes them uncomfortable.

Encouraging these kinds of positive experiences online does not require an entirely new set of parenting skills. Instead, parents can use strategies similar to those used when children walk out the door to go to school or hang out at the park with their friends. Parents cannot be everywhere or see everything. But they can find out who their children are with, what they are doing, and how they feel about it, which can reduce problems. This kind of monitoring and communication can also help youth as they navigate the online world.

Keeping youth safe on the internet

Parents should consider some critical issues to ensure their children are engaging with online content safely. During early adolescence, when youth are particularly sensitive to social feedback and belonging, increased exposure to bullying, pornography, unhealthy body images, and harmful targeted advertising can have amplified effects.

Parents should also be aware that some adolescents, for example, those with mental health problems and those who may already be struggling with body image issues, may be more susceptible to viewing negative content on the internet and having negative online experiences than their peers. Knowing your child is key.

Caregivers should also understand that technology use also leaves a digital trace that can follow young people into adulthood by creating a type of permanent record of images and comments that would otherwise be forgotten or excused due to age and immaturity.

Moreover, sleep is critical to physical health, mental health, and learning during adolescence, so families should limit late-night technology use that gets in the way of youth getting more than eight hours of uninterrupted sleep each night.

Photo: Andrea Piacquadio. Pexels.

How parents and caregivers can support and protect youth by making the internet a safer place

Parents and caregivers can make the internet a safer place by:

1. Monitoring and being aware
2. Going on the internet together when possible
3. Educating young people
4. Communicating with young people
5. Using helpful resources

1. Monitoring and being aware

Unlike physical places youth may go that are out of parents’ sight, digital technology provides opportunities to monitor where youth have been online, ideally with youths’ knowledge and consent. Parental controls – such as content filters, time limits, and applications that allow monitoring of online activities – can help.

2. Going on the internet together when possible

Viewing, creating, and participating in online spaces together can open opportunities for positive joint experiences and allow parents to identify risks or content that makes them uncomfortable.

3. Educating young people

Parents can explain the potential risks of digital technology use, discussing the importance of keeping personal information safe and of moderating screen time to make room for in-person activities. Developing a family media plan with your child can help start a conversation about the types of activities and platforms children are allowed to spend time on, and will allow young adolescents to have input into any rules that may govern their use.

4. Communicating with young people

Talking to your child about what they are seeing or experiencing on the internet should become part of daily conversations. When youth are exposed to age-inappropriate content or encounter problematic experiences like cyberbullying or social rejection, having an adult to talk to can make a difference. (Common Sense Media offers prompts to start talking, from conversations about activities to more specific concerns about emotional health and negative feelings.)

5. Using helpful resources

Parents and teachers can access a growing list of resources to help support children online, including:

• The One Mind PsyberGuide provides a teen-specific guide to online mental health applications.
• Common Sense Media resources support parents navigating traditional and new forms of media engagement.
• The American Academy of Pediatrics has a guide to creating a family media plan.
• Teens and Tech Center provides education and resources for parents, educators, and teenagers.

Designing technology to support young people

Even with parents’ best efforts, it is impossible to oversee children’s every online interaction. As parents, we have limited influence over how our children’s data are handled and stored, the types of targeted advertising they are exposed to, and the features intended to encourage them to stay on the internet for long periods of time.

Talking to your child about what they are seeing or experiencing online should become part of your daily conversations.

We expect that the physical spaces where our children spend time, like community parks, sports fields, and classrooms, help them grow and learn while keeping them safe. Digital spaces should be the same. Some lawmakers are working toward this.

For example, last year, California passed a bill that will require digital technology companies to protect young users’ privacy and personal data, limit dangerous content, and maintain default settings that prioritize safety. New York is considering similar legislation. While changes that would enhance safety are important, companies and policies must also consider regulations and design features that intentionally promote positive development in online spaces where youth congregate.

What do caregivers need to know about equitable access to digital technology?

Research is clear that children in families and schools with fewer resources receive less guidance tailored to learning as they begin to navigate the online world than do their peers in families and schools with more resources. Adolescents from minoritized and marginalized communities – such as youth of color and LGBTQ+ youth – are at the greatest risk for experiencing harassment and victimization online, even as they report positive experiences like finding “spaces of refuge” and community on the internet that may not be available to them in their physical environments.

Although discussion of technology tends to focus on limiting screen time, too many students are unable to access the basic benefits of technology, particularly for learning and education. Black and Hispanic students and those from families with lower incomes are more likely to have limited access to devices and the Internet than their peers.

Photo: Omar Ramadan. Pexels.

To help address these gaps, many school districts are working to provide free or reduced-cost WiFi to students. Families who need help to afford reliable Internet access and connected devices can contact their local school district or apply for the Affordable Connectivity Program.

In addition, digital technology companies and policymakers need to establish digital solutions and innovations that make the online world a place of opportunity rather than posing added risks for our most vulnerable youth.

Conclusion

Early adolescence brings new opportunities for building connections, education, and healthy learning and exploration. If we focus the conversation around “teens and tech” only on protection, we may miss opportunities to meet young people where they are and build online environments that match their needs.

Parents and caregivers have an important role in helping our children develop a healthy relationship with digital technologies. That includes talking directly with them about potential risks of online interactions and how to moderate digital technology use, providing oversight where possible to see what children are doing on the internet, and setting limits to ensure that technology does not interfere with sleep and other activities important to well-being. Most importantly, it means building strong relationships with our children so they tell us what is going on and when they are struggling.

But we cannot do this on our own. It is time for the owners, designers, and creators of the online spaces where young people spend their time to step up and build environments that support young people while also keeping them safe. We need to ask different types of questions so we learn not just how to protect but also how to support our children’s healthy development in an increasingly digital world.

The post Making the internet safer, engaging and evidence-based for tweens appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Key takeaways for caregivers

• Most studies on young children’s use of screens and unfavorable developmental outcomes have subtle, nuanced findings that prevent definitive conclusions that screen time directly causes developmental delays in children.
• If parents use screen media with their young child, they should interact with their babies, view content together, and watch programs that are educational (e.g., Public Broadcasting Service shows like Sesame Street and Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood).
• Background media, particularly programming intended for older children, teenagers, and adults, should be turned off when not in use, especially during child’s play time.
• Screen media should not be used before bedtime.
• The entire family should practice and model appropriate levels of screen use and make time for activities that promote social, motor, language, and cognitive development.

Current guidelines for screen time with young children

Current American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) guidelines recommend no screen time for children 18 months and younger (except caregiver-assisted video chatting), no screen use between 18 and 24 months without an adult, and no more than an hour of screen time after age two. However, nearly 70% of parents do not follow these guidelines and only 20% of parents are even aware that they exist. This is why I argued in my 2021 paper that the AAP should revise their guidelines to take into consideration the current technological landscape, updated research, and the realities of the home lives of families with children.

The most consistent benefits associated with a child’s screen time come from caregivers watching content with the child, a practice known as co-viewing.

Child screen time may not be as harmful as previously thought

Will regularly putting your young child in front of Sesame Street while you wash dishes or take a phone call be detrimental to your baby’s development? Probably not. Much of the research examining child development and screen media use has yielded mixed and nuanced findings.

It is difficult to determine cause and effect in these studies. For example, imagine a researcher finds an association between high rates of developmentally inappropriate screen time and non-optimal developmental outcomes. Is screen time directly causing developmental delays in this scenario?

Possibly, but it is more likely that several interacting factors contribute to both high rates of screen time and developmental delays (e.g., child characteristics like a “difficult” temperament or high levels of fussiness, families’ low income, parents’ education level, caregivers’ stress levels, parents’ mental health status).

Ethical and methodological limitations

Determining if screen time or other factors directly contribute to developmental outcomes is difficult given the ethical and methodological limitations of long-term studies. For example, researchers cannot ethically expose children to inappropriate amounts of screen time or unhealthy environments to measure their effects. Instead, they must measure existing risk factors in a child’s environments and examine the relations that emerge.

In addition, risk factors often occur together, making it difficult to isolate the specific effects of one particular factor, like excessive screen use. In light of research on children’s screen use and current trends in households’ technology use, many scholars who study this age period argue that the current AAP screen time guidelines for children may be too restrictive and unrealistic.

Photo: Ali Smith. Pexels.

Under certain circumstances, a child’s use of screens may be beneficial

Creators of educational programming (e.g., PBS) often consult with developmental experts when writing and producing content. As a result, certain techniques currently embedded in educational shows help young children learn. For example, pausing after asking a question, modeling simple tasks, highlighting important information to draw a child’s attention, and using familiar characters all increase a child’s ability to learn from screens.

In addition to these benefits to cognitive development, several recent studies have found that early use of touch screens may enhance a child’s physical development, particularly their fine motor skills (e.g., finger and hand coordination).

Benefits of co-viewing

The most consistent benefits associated with a child’s screen time come when caregivers watch content with their child, a practice known as co-viewing. Co-viewing creates opportunities for conversations about new situations and objects that families may not otherwise encounter.

This may have been especially useful early in the COVID-19 pandemic when caregivers were less likely to take their child out of the home setting. Co-viewing also creates more occasions to discuss emotions, sometimes even more so than traditional toys. Finally, co-viewing provides opportunities for caregivers to model and teach healthy media use habits, such as taking regular breaks from screen time to go outside, read books, or play with toys.

It is important to remember that children still need considerable amounts of face-to-face interactions to thrive.

Despite benefits, some screen time practices should be avoided

Screens cannot replace caregiver-child interactions. While screen time for children may not be as detrimental as once thought, it is important to remember that children still need considerable amounts of face-to-face interactions to thrive. Face-to-face interactions ensure that children learn social and emotional cues related to facial expressions, as well as accompanying language, skills children cannot learn from screens.

Children also need adequate opportunities to move around to support their physical development. As with older children and adults, sedentary behavior in children leads to a host of non-optimal outcomes, including a greater risk of obesity and delays in motor development. If families choose to let their child engage with screen media, they should ensure that child has adequate time to move around rather than being kept in a stationary, seated position.

Additionally, screen exposure disrupts sleep at all ages. Caregivers should be mindful to avoid screen time around sleep, particularly before and during bedtime routines.

Finally, there are no benefits associated with child viewing content intended for older children and adults. Occasionally watching adult-oriented programming (e.g., daily news programs) in the background will not have adverse outcomes for children. However, prolonged exposure to age-inappropriate programming can interrupt and distract children from beneficial learning activities, such as playing and shared reading. Long hours (2.5-3 hours/day) with age-inappropriate media and without a caregiver can result in non-optimal developmental outcomes.

Photo: Tuấn Kiệt Jr.. Pexels.

Recommendations for caregivers: Best practices for screen use with young children

Most families with children are not following current AAP guidelines for child media use. A solution to the disparity between AAP guidelines and actual child screen time habits may be to acknowledge a child’s screen media use, update and widely disseminate the AAP guidelines, and help families make decisions that take advantage of the known benefits and avoid the clear risks associated with advancing technology.

Meeting families where they are and making minor changes with regard to screen time habits is a more realistic goal given the current technological landscape than is trying to avoid screen time for children altogether.

I recommend the following best practices for screen time:

1. If digital media use is part of the family’s lifestyle, be sure to allocate adequate time for sleep and for activities that develop motor, language, and cognitive skills.
2. Engage with media content together; talk about what children are seeing, point out important features, and relate content to daily activities.
3. Limit content to educational and prosocial programming (e.g., PBS shows like Sesame Street and Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood)
4. Turn off media when not in use, especially during a child’s play and reading time.
5. Avoid watching adult-directed programming around children.
6. Avoid using screens in the evening.
7. Limit parents’ and siblings’ screen use to model appropriate levels of screen time and create adequate opportunities for children to engage socially with the family.

Continued research on child screen use is needed

Experts acknowledge the pros and cons of children’s screen use, and debate continues regarding its risks and benefits to child development. Researchers should consider the type of content children are being exposed to, the amount of parent involvement that accompanies a child’s screen viewing, and the context in which children are using screens to better determine the risks and benefits of using screens at this age.

Additionally, research needs to keep up with technological advances. For example, some content developers are teaming up with researchers to design developmentally appropriate screen media for children. These new approaches to content will need to be thoroughly evaluated, but they offer the possibility of age-appropriate content for children in the near future.

The post Is screen time detrimental to a young child’s development? Maybe not appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Key takeaways for caregivers

• Screens may be beneficial to but may also prove problematic for infants’ development.
• More than half of infants in a study on child development had been exposed to screens by six months and many had a screen in the room where they slept.
• Mothers reported using screens with infants for at least 1-3 hours a day and during daily activities, such as during meals, when going to sleep, while waiting, and to calm infants.
• Maternal stress did not predict the use of screens with infants, but moms’ educational level did.
• Research suggests that we need to learn from caregivers why they offer screens to their young children, as well as the need for increased guidance and resources for caregivers regarding exposure to and use of screen time.

Screen use can negatively affect caregiver-child attachment and children’s development

The popularity of cell phones, tablets, and other screens is undeniable and has changed our world, largely for the better. These media are instruments of daily life, helping us navigate both time and location.

Mothers’ self-reports of their perceived levels of stress did not predict whether a screen was provided. However, educational attainment did predict screen exposure.

They allow us to read on the move, serve as a form of entertainment, and connect us rapidly and easily with those around the corner and around the globe. Screen devices are everywhere, and exposure to them now extends beyond adults to include teenagers, tweens, and young children.

Yet while cell phones may help us connect, they may also serve to disconnect. The challenges of disconnection, or technoference, are revealed in adult relationships and, in similar ways, may be particularly disruptive for parents and other caregivers of young children.

Young children form an attachment to parents and caregivers, relying on them to satisfy needs for food, warmth, safety, and affection. By attending to a child’s cues, a parent is participating in the type of back-and-forth interactions that bolster development (Maccoby et al., 1983).

Research shows that the healthy development of a child depends in part on the consistency of these back-and-forth interactions, sometimes called serve and return. Considerable evidence shows that language, emotional, and cognitive development all begin in the small and unscripted interactions between caregiver and child.

But research also shows that screens may sometimes disrupt or interfere with this type of interaction between a parent and their child, and can result in changes in infants’ sleep, language, executive function, and attention.

Photo: Sunvani Hoàng. Pexels.

A study of mothers’ screen use with their infants

Given the importance of the back-and-forth relationship between caregivers and young children, we conducted a study to understand why some mothers give their infants screens and others do not. While mothers offer screens for many reasons, we studied whether mothers’ descriptions of their own stress levels and their educational attainment played a part.

Our study used data from an ongoing study seeking to understand how early experiences influence child development outcomes. Eighty-two mothers were invited to share their prenatal experiences with our team of researchers, completing surveys that asked, among other questions, about their levels of stress and their educational attainment. Our sample of mothers was diverse in terms of race, ethnicity, and educational attainment.

After giving birth, the mothers were contacted periodically until their child turned three years old. When the infant was six months old, mothers were invited to return with their child to the research lab. At this visit, mothers were asked if their child had been exposed to screens. If they answered yes, the moms were given a survey that asked about the ways the child had been exposed to screens, including questions about what they watched, with whom, and for how long.

Caregivers may not be fully aware that screens can disrupt parent-child interactions and children’s development.

Many infants are exposed to screens through daily activities

Forty-three of the six-month-olds had been exposed to screens, with 28 (70%) having a screen in the room where they slept. About a third of the infants were given a screen at mealtime, while going to sleep, and while waiting at the doctor’s office. About half of mothers reported offering a screen to calm their infant. More than half of moms reported providing a screen between 1-3 hours per day, and about a third reported providing a screen more than 3 hours per day.

Mothers’ self-reports of their perceived levels of stress did not predict whether they gave their infants a screen. However, moms’ educational attainment did predict screen exposure: Less maternal education was associated with mothers more often offering screens to their infants.

This information is important to consider when thinking about infants’ screen use but should be taken at face value. Our study was a small sample of mothers and infants. We did not talk with mothers about why they provided screens to their infants so we can only attempt to interpret their survey responses without knowing the full picture of these early experiences for children.

One possibility is that stress is felt universally by parents of infants and as such, was not a strong predictor of who might provide a screen. However, educational attainment is not equal or equitable among people in the United States, and it may serve as a marker of knowledge about screens or other characteristics that predict screen use.

Photo: pxfuel.

Educating parents about screen exposure and use is essential

Researchers need to understand more about why mothers offer screens to their infants. Caregivers may not be fully aware that screens can disrupt parent-child interactions and children’s development. They may be less prepared by people they encounter in health care or social service settings to consider screen exposure and use with their infants in the same way they consider, for example, feeding or providing safe sleeping conditions.

Given the findings from our study that screen use and daily care activities may be intertwined for some caregivers, personnel in health care and social services should facilitate these conversations with new parents.

We hope to continue research on this topic so we can better understand how parents’ educational level is related to social supports or services for mothers. We would also like to understand more fully how these supports for parents of infants might reduce the need to provide screens at certain times during the day (e.g., during meals, at bedtime, while waiting) and for extended periods of time.

If you are a caregiver with questions about screen exposure and use with your infant, visit the AAP website, where there are resources for caregivers, including guidelines on screen use for young children and their development. In addition, ask your pediatrician or other health care provider questions about age-appropriate screen use so you can learn how to navigate potentially stressful times when the distraction of a screen may seem helpful.

The post How and why do six-month-old infants interact with screens? appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Key takeaways for caregivers

• Self-regulation – the ability to monitor and manage behaviors and emotions – is a critical aspect of early childhood development.
• Television viewing is associated with lower levels of self-regulation, or greater levels of dysregulation, in young children, especially difficulties in attention and self-soothing.
• The specific impact of TV exposure on dysregulation may differ across cultures, perhaps stemming from different cultural or family practices around TV viewing experiences.
• Parents and caregivers should limit TV viewing for young children, but can also consider how to help their child understand and engage with high-quality programming.

What should parents know about the risks of television viewing for young children?

Exposure to television and other digital media is frequently discussed and often discouraged, but many parents and caregivers might wonder, “What is the harm?” and “Is all television bad?” The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that digital media be avoided for children under 18 months, with the exception of video chatting. For parents who wish to introduce digital media between 18 and 24 months, the AAP advises choosing “high-quality programming” (American Academy of Pediatrics, 2016).

However, as we progress further in the digital age, children are being introduced to many forms of media at younger ages. Television and other electronic devices may serve as “electronic babysitters,” especially for infants and young children whose temperaments are considered “difficult.”

Additionally, much more media is being targeted to the youngest age groups. Another facet to consider is the nuances of digital media, such as different types of programming and devices (e.g., TV, tablet, cell phone). What, specifically, should parents and caregivers be concerned about? 

Photo: Lars Plougmann. Creative Commons.

Television viewing and the development of self-regulation in young children

When it comes to the impact of early television exposure, concerns regarding reactivity and self-regulation are notable. Reactivity describes the intensity of our response to our world, such as how strongly we feel excitement or fear, or how strongly we react to sensory information (e.g., sights and sounds). Regulation is the processes of monitoring and managing reactivity to the world around us and our internal experiences. This includes how we express emotion, where we put our attention, and how we think about and change our thinking (see Rothbart et al., 2000, for a review).

In early infancy, we rely on others to help us regulate, such as by soothing us. However, as we mature, we gain more independence and the capacity to regulate ourselves. Self-regulation helps children learn, engage with others, and gain independence. When reactivity (e.g., anger/frustration or fearfulness) is elevated and regulation abilities are low, dysregulation can occur. 

Studying the links between children’s TV exposure and dysregulation across cultures

We conducted a study to determine whether exposure to television contributes to deficits in regulation in young children. Early childhood is a foundational period for the development of self-regulation, and television exposure is thought to disrupt related processes. In some studies, frequent TV exposure during and before toddlerhood has been associated with an increased risk of language delays, attention difficulties, and disruptions in the development of executive functioning (e.g., working memory, inhibition, problem-solving skills).

We also examined whether links between early childhood television exposure and regulation development differ across cultures. While children around the world are exposed to TV in early childhood, associated risks may not be universal. Different socialization and cultural aspects of the environment can lead to differences in the development of reactivity and regulation.

Our research suggests that higher levels of dysregulation are associated with more television viewing in young children, with soothability and attention problems being the most commonly affected.

For example, several cross-cultural studies have found differences in children’s inhibitory control (controlling urges), soothability (ability to calm down or recover from stress), cuddliness (willingness to be cuddled), attention (ability to focus and redirect), low intensity pleasure (ability to enjoy quiet and calm activities), surgency (positive affect), and negative emotionality (tendency to show negative emotions).

Given these cross-cultural differences in regulation, it is critical to understand how variability in TV exposure across cultures contributes to subsequent behavioral and emotional difficulties. We conducted an international investigation of television exposure in toddlers (approximately 15 months to 41 months old) in 14 countries: Belgium, Brazil, Chile, China, Finland, Italy, Mexico, the Netherlands, Romania, Russia, Turkey, South Korea, Spain, and the United States.

Using a variety of measures, we asked parents to answer questions about their child’s daily activities, including how much time their child spends watching television each day. We also asked parents to answer questions about their child’s temperament, including reactivity and regulation. 

Photo: William Fortunato. Pexels.

Cross-cultural links among television exposure, attention problems, and soothability

Overall, we found that increased time spent watching television was associated with more dysregulation. That is, the more time toddlers spent watching television, the lower ratings parents provided on measures of regulation.

However, links between TV exposure and both attention problems (difficulty shifting or maintaining attention) and soothability (the ease with which the child could self-soothe or be soothed by others) varied significantly between cultures. For example, compared to children from other cultures, for Spanish toddlers, time spent watching TV was less strongly associated with dysregulation, whereas for Dutch children, time spent watching TV was more strongly associated with problems with soothability and attention problems.

While our study did not investigate the causes of these differences, some cultures may offer protective mechanisms that buffer against adverse effects of TV exposure. For example, many Spanish families watch television together, with TV-related activities constituting one element of family time, rather than relying on TV as an electronic babysitter.

This practice could stem from the central theme of familismo that is traditionally valued by individuals from Hispanic cultures, and includes strong attachment, loyalty, reciprocity, and solidarity among families (Diaz-Loving & Draguns, 1999). Researchers should examine more closely this concept as well as other possible protective effects.

How to reduce the negative impacts of television viewing for young children

Our research suggests that higher levels of dysregulation are associated with more television viewing in young children, with soothability and attention problems being the most commonly affected. These findings add to previous studies that have shown that even background television can have negative impacts on children’s play and parent-child interactions by decreasing attention and active engagement in both children and parents.

Thus, any potential benefits of television stimulation as a new source of entertainment and distraction for young children appear short lived, with likely adverse effects in the long term. Some benefits of educational programming have been reported across cultures; however, these generally show up later in childhood, after children have developed foundational self-regulation skills.

Television viewing might affect children differently depending on a variety of environmental factors, including cultural and familial customs.

Together, the research shows that limiting television exposure could help limit certain aspects of dysregulation. Yet television viewing might affect children differently depending on a variety of environmental factors, including cultural and familial customs. When families or younger children watch TV, some protective factors may emerge through cultural differences, such as the possibility that some cultures incorporate family engagement into television use.

In summary, it is important to consider not only the age when children engage with media content but also how they contextualize it and how it fits into their world. Television programming could be developed to provide more developmentally appropriate stimulation to young children, especially when paired with parental engagement and application to real-world experiences.

Thus, it is important to monitor the amount and type of programming children are watching and how they are engaging with television. It is also important for parents and caregivers to talk about and teach children how TV programming can be meaningful in their daily lives.

The post Considering the impacts of television exposure on toddlers’ dysregulation: Does culture matter? appeared first on Child and Family Blog.

Key takeaways on Children’s Screen Time for caregivers

• Research shows that most toddlers spend a significant amount of time watching screens – an average of about 4 hours a day.
• Toddlers who spend more time watching screens, such as television, videos, and digital games, may have fewer expressive language skills, or the ability to express themselves verbally.
• Caregivers can support language development by having conversations with their child during or after screen time and by engaging in high-quality language interactions without screens at other times of the day (e.g., while on transportation, at meals).

Why screen time might affect a child’s language development

Young children rapidly learn words by interacting with their environment, such as through conversations with their caregivers. However, how much language children are exposed to in the home environment varies widely across families, contributing to school readiness gaps between children from low- and middle-income backgrounds. Children’s screen time, including watching television and videos, and playing digital games, is one early experience that may be related to their language development.

There is research to suggest that brain development through screens may be slower when compared to interaction with caregivers. Photo: Thom Cochrane. Creative Commons.

High levels of screen time may replace interaction with caregivers

Many researchers have theorized about the impact of screen time on young children’s language development. First, high levels of screen time may replace interaction with a caregiver who can respond to and elicit responses from children. This tailored back-and-forth interaction, or contingent responding, influences learning and allows children to practice their language skills.

Young children have trouble learning from media

Second, although some media products for toddlers are marketed as educational, evidence suggests that children this age have trouble learning from media, perhaps because videos are often simpler than real-life experiences and replace rich real-world stimuli. This may be especially important for toddlers from homes with low incomes, who are likely to experience high levels of media exposure and are most at risk for delays in language development.

More screen time was associated with lower levels of language skills for toddlers.

Studying screen time and language in children

To examine the relationship between screen time and a child’s language development, we conducted a study that asked two questions:

1. How much screen time do toddlers from homes with low incomes experience?
2. Is the amount of screen time related to toddlers’ language development?

Our study used data from the Kids in Columbus Study, a longitudinal study on midwestern U.S. two- and three-year-olds living in poverty (i.e., 185% of U.S. Poverty Income Guidelines). We collected data on 157 toddlers; 54% were Black, 47% were White, and 8% were Latino (respondents could select all races and ethnicities that applied).

Caregivers completed surveys on toddlers’ screen time during an average weekday (e.g., in front of a television watching programs, videos, and DVDs; playing video games; using computers, cell phones, handheld video games, tablets, smartphones, and other electronic devices). About six months later, we observed toddlers’ language abilities by taking a standardized measurement of what words toddlers understood and what words they could speak. 

Screen time can influence a child’s language development. Photo: Karolina Grabowska. Pexels.

How much screen time do children from homes with low incomes experience?

The toddlers’ amount of screen time varied. While some families reported little to no screen time, a substantial portion reported more than 8 hours per day. The average amount of daily screen time was nearly 4 hours. This finding is similar to nationally representative data showing that daily screen time for children under eight years old living in homes with low incomes was 3.5 hours.

More screen time was related to lower levels of expressive language

Next, we sought to determine whether the amount of toddlers’ screen time related to their language development. We measured language development by looking at toddlers’ scores on two tests: the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development and the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test. More screen time was associated with lower levels of language skills for toddlers.

It is challenging, and probably not necessary or advisable, to avoid all screen time.

Interestingly, screen time was related only to toddlers’ expressive language (i.e., their ability to express themselves verbally) and not to their receptive language (i.e., how well they understand when others speak to them) or vocabulary (i.e., the words they understand). Screen time could influence children’s ability to use language themselves because it may replace opportunities to practice talking, such as conversations with a caregiver or other adults.

How can caregivers support children’s early language development during screen time?

Today, it is challenging, and probably not necessary or advisable, to avoid all screen time. Yet caregivers can take several steps to support children’s language development in the context of our digital world.

First, caregivers can co-participate in the screen time with the child. They can talk with their child about what they are watching or doing on screens. Second, they can engage in high-quality language interactions without screens at other times of the day (e.g., while on transportation, at meals). And third, because not all screen content is created equal, caregivers can monitor what children are using and help them seek out high-quality programming, including educational shows and applications. Caregivers can look to sources informed by research, such as Common Sense Media, to find age-based recommendations.

Co-participating in screen time could enhance a child’s development. Photo: Wayan Vota. Creative Commons.

Our finding that more screen time was related to lower levels of expressive language skills is especially important because children from homes with low incomes are already at risk for language delay and lower levels of school readiness than their peers from middle- and upper-income homes. More screen time could further widen this gap. Researchers may benefit from comparing relations between screen use and language development in children from other income levels (e.g., middle and high income).

In addition, researchers need to examine whether using educational media or using media with an adult is less likely to be related to lower levels of language skills than is using screen time for entertainment or alone. Studies could also explore potential interventions to support caregivers in providing stimulating language environments for children and keeping screens as a fun, but not predominant, part of their lives.

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Key takeaways for caregivers

• Many parents look for clear guidance on how to navigate their children’s use of digital media, asking “Is too much screen time bad for my child?” or “How much tablet time should my child get?” But the answer is not a simple “yes” or “less,” especially for infants, toddlers, and preschoolers.
• Instead of hard rules about how much digital media children should use or when, it can be more fruitful to consider how they are using technology, what they are doing with it, and who is engaging with them as they use this media. This is particularly important when looking at impacts on young children’s vocabulary development.
• The world in which young children are growing up is digital. Instead of banning technology, parents should consider how it can supplement their children’s learning instead of distracting from it.

Children’s use of technology and digital media are inevitable: Focus on how and what they are doing with it

Imagine your own childhood and where you learned about new animals – a dog, fish, or even a giraffe or elephant. Chances are, it was by seeing the dog in the neighbor’s yard or watching an elephant at the zoo, perhaps supplemented with stuffed animals or pictures in a storybook.

How children experience the world vs adults

Now consider where your child has encountered the concept of “dog” or “elephant.” In addition to the petting zoo, you might have added “in Paw Patrol” or “while playing ABCMouse” or even (for older children) “in Minecraft.” How children experience the world today is different from how their parents might have, or even from how an older sibling might have learned before the COVID-19 pandemic began.

Technology and digital media are rapidly increasing and present in daily life for most Western families. They are impossible to avoid for adults and young children alike. Most parents have wondered if too much screen time will cause their child to be delayed or if particular applications can “fry children’s brains.” They wonder if it is okay to let their child use a tablet every so often, or which applications are educational. The truth is that there is not an easy response to these questions because the answer varies depending on the family, child, and type of media being consumed.

Photo: Toca Boca. Creative Commons.

Advice on how to navigate this space as a parent or caregiver is also changing rapidly, in part because research is still yielding results. Each day, researchers add a bit more to our knowledge of how children use technology, what it means for their learning, and what later impacts it might have. As we continue to learn more about the role of technology and digital media in young children’s lives, updating how we think about technology and looking to the future can be instructive.

In a recent paper, I examined the role of digital media by considering whether questions about what and how much children are using are not the right questions to ask in the first place. Instead, what if we asked: How are children using technology? What is their experience with digital media like? Who is helping or interacting with young children as they engage in screen time at home?

Questions might also consider how digital context differs from real-world experiences, how the content of digital applications varies from the content in books or toys, and how each child and household may be unique in their uses of and needs for technology.

Learning in a digital context differs from learning with real items

Digital applications are often less social than real-world interactions, with fewer interactive elements. Even when an application or program includes a relatable human character, it often does not factor in the child’s responses or behavior or has low quality of an interaction (e.g., it asks hypothetical questions, but does not allow time for the child to respond).

Most parents have wondered if too much screen time will cause their child to be delayed, or if particular applications can “fry children’s brains.”

We know that having dyadic – real-time, back-and-forth – conversations is critical for children’s language development. The more digital videos replace everyday conversations like grocery store banter or before-bedtime rituals, the fewer words and language skills children learn. Nonetheless, when technology is used in ways that make the context social – such as connecting with Grandma on video chat or playing a joint game in an application – children’s learning and social connectedness improve.

Digital learning allows less exploration

In addition to digital contexts being less social than actual conversations, they are also less rich and allow less exploration. Cartoons and 2D drawings are frequent in digital media and many features of the real world simply cannot be replicated even in virtual reality (e.g., the technology for virtual smells and tastes is still in development and uncommon outside of high-tech centers). This means that digital context at home is simpler and of lower quality than what real life might provide a child.

But that does not mean children cannot learn from digital media. Rather, it means that they are more likely to do when experiences that cannot be replicated online (e.g., smells, tastes, 3D forms) are supplemented off screen. For instance, if a child is learning the word “milk” on an application, she can see the shape of the milk carton, notice its white color, and discover that it is a drink.

Yet if the concept of milk is only presented in simple images on a screen, richer details about actual milk cannot be captured (e.g., texture, material). For example, on a screen, spilled milk might look the same as spilled glue. Only as children explore in real-world settings, such as at mealtimes, can they gain critical knowledge through touch, such as realizing the watery texture of milk and preventing a glue-eating mishap.

Photo: Alex Green. Pexels.

Digital content differs from real-world experiences

The recorded dialogue that makes up most digital media is often slower and more formal than what children hear at home. Similarly, objects in a picture are seen from only one angle without the opportunity to rotate, touch, or attempt to eat the item. These limited views are harder to learn from in the moment. They also make it harder for children to transfer learning from the tablet to the real world; in a phenomenon called the transfer deficit, children may learn the name of a new toy in a video but not be able to recognize the same toy in real life.

However, if children get a real-world foundation first, it can be easier for them to recognize and learn more about those items when they appear in a digital form. Moreover, digital worlds make it possible for children to get a wider variety of experiences – seeing fairy tales in action, or new examples of exotic animals that go beyond the static storybook. This sort of variety is beneficial, especially when learning new words. So digital content is not inherently bad, but supplementing it with real world experiences is key.

Digital media learning needs to be adapted to each individual child

How children interact with digital media varies based on their age, which can change what children do with it, which in turn influences how technology may affect their learning. For instance, by age three, most children know the names of more than 300 different real-life objects and are starting to extend these labels to new items, including those in digital form. But they may have trouble transferring learning the reverse way – from a tablet to the world. Similarly, by the time most children are four, their cognitive maturity is advanced and the transfer deficit presents less of a barrier to learning.

In essence, as children get older and engage in more rich, social experiences, they learn how to learn. Once they know how to learn, they can extend that new ability to new places, including technology.

When technology is used in ways that make the context social – such as connecting with Grandma on video chat or playing a joint game in an application – children’s learning and social connectedness improve.

At the same time, every child is different, with unique strengths and backgrounds. Some children with vision or hearing deficits may need a tablet for adaptive purposes. Other children may be extremely shy but can slowly gain confidence in communicating by using FaceTime.

There are also vast differences in how different cultures and families of different socioeconomic statuses use technology, with children’s prior experience with technology varying as widely as the ways in which it is used. For these reasons, it is difficult if not impossible to give blanket advice on whether children should or should not use technology, or how much screen time they should have.

Focus on how and what children are learning in both digital and real-world experiences

Children’s future includes technology. And that technology looks different from what parents and caregivers have experienced, and will differ even more a few years from now. As the digital landscape shifts, parents should look for digital experiences that are interactive, driven by children’s curiosity, and variable, and that can be supplemented with real-life experiences and social interactions.

But parents and caregivers also should not be too concerned. If children are getting rich real-world interactions and their exposure to technology is supplemented with a variety of other experiences, they will have opportunities for deep learning. Instead of wondering if there should be more or less screen time, parents should think about how and what their children are learning and lean into the children’s world to engage with them.

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It might sound strange to encourage children to spend more time on their phones, laptops, or computer consoles. But a large body of research has identified nothing intrinsically damaging about these activities, provided they do not displace sleep, exercise, schooling, and healthy eating. In short, screen time does not in itself turn children into gambling addicts or overweight, uneducated zombies. And provided children are kept safe, using social media is also okay.

Bad outcomes are much more likely to be caused by eating poorly, missing out on learning, spending too much time on the sofa, or not resting enough. So a parent’s most productive focus should be to encourage physical activity, sleep, good nourishment, and learning – and make sure that time online is not getting in the way of those healthy activities.

Fears of digital media unjustified

Research has failed to justify the understandable fears of many parents who are concerned by the sudden changes over the past two decades in how childhood is lived. It is difficult to identify any clinically relevant impacts of the increased use of screens or social media. Where slight effects are found, they are drowned out by the established effects – such as genetics, socioeconomic circumstances, time adults spend with children, and parental education – that we have known, for 50 years, determine child development.

However, research does demonstrate that children are more likely to respect family rules about good ways to live when those rules are developed though sound and shared reasoning, and when they respect children’s perspectives and as well as adults’ preferences. Children can recognize parents’ wishes for them to have enough sleep, keep fit, learn and eat properly, and spend family time together. However, very strict rules, focussing on a prescribed number of minutes for this or that activity, can lead to added secrecy on the part of a child. They can also damage a child’s trust that their parents will be able to help and understand them, should they, for instance, encounter distressing experiences online.

As a trained neuroscientist, I want parents to follow the science. However, unevidenced “neuro-myths” – often really fears masquerading as science – are now used to justify concerns about screen time and child development. This is understandable. In just a few years, the digital world has disrupted traditional childhood by taking a distinctive place – and considerable time – in children’s upbringing. We did not have iPads in the home until 10 years ago. Internet bandwidth could not support online gaming 15 years ago. Seemingly overnight, gaming has become a cultural mainstay. Social media are everywhere. People are understandably worried about the impacts.

Inevitably, scientific research has lagged in providing reliable evidence about the effect of this dramatic shift. How do scientists prove the long-term impact of something that has not existed for very long? It takes time and science has been predictably slow to reach a conclusion.

The foundation of “neuro-myths”

As a result, people initially sought answers in other fields that seemed relevant. Alert to the psychological rewards computer gaming offers children, they explored studies on outcomes for children who are unable to defer gratification – the so-called marshmallow experiment. They also looked to more gloomy studies of children’s television viewing back in the 1980s and 1990s, and to research on rats allowed to administer dopamine-stimulating drugs to themselves. This work appeared to justify fears that exposure to digital media undermined children’s capacities to concentrate and led them to live more sedentary lives.

But time has demonstrated that these analogies are false and misleading. It turns out that children’s attitudes about marshmallows and lab rats doing drugs do not offer useful insights into the impacts of screen time. Research has not identified the kinds of screen time used today, in itself, as correlated with diminished general cognitive control, capacities to concentrate, or physical well-being. A recent review found the effects of screen time today to be quite similar to those of television time in the 1950s.

Moreover, scientists now better understand that the research into high levels of television viewing was not particularly instructive about the impacts of television viewing, even back in the 1990s. Closer examination showed that this research really told us more about the socioeconomic circumstances of different families: The prevalence of high levels of viewing was skewed toward low-income families. These families tended to have smaller homes, less outside space, a culture of having the television on more often than more privileged groups, and fewer alternative activities. Poverty and lack of opportunity were preventing healthier childhoods; TV usage was largely a symptom, rather than a cause, of the deprivation.

It is difficult to identify any clinically relevant impacts of the increased use of screens or social media.

Research does not find brain damage

Studies also show few, and only slight, correlations between children’s use of social media and their general well-being or mental distress symptoms such as anxiety and depression. Research has found nothing of this nature for boys. In girls, there is a slight relationship between time on social media and psychological distress. But it is small – as a comparative example, wearing glasses seems more damaging to a female teenager’s social well-being than spending a lot of time on social media, according to the same datasets.

Photo: Emily Wade. Unsplash.

Young children’s low exposure

Our research should also reassure parents who may be concerned that young children are exposed to high levels of screen time. We measured the time children are on digital media in Danish kindergartens, where they typically spend about five to eight hours each weekday between the ages of 3 and 6. In general, children were exposed to digital media about five to 10 minutes on these days in the kindergarten environment, which we generally view as a good thing. Technology is part of the world in which children live and provides teachable moments, even for the young ones.

Let us assume that, on weekdays, some children spend another two hours a day of digital time at home, perhaps in the early evening when they are tired, allowing parents time to finish housework and emails. This means that, on most days, these young children’s lives are about 90 percent free of digital inputs. It is understandable that parents might still be worried because much of that time is during the few hours in the evening when children are at home – probably feeling cranky and tired – before they go to bed. However, our research, which looked across the children’s days, suggests that parents should worry less about minutes and hours; young Danish children still have ample opportunities to develop in other ways.

Risk of gambling addiction

Some parents are concerned that their children will become addicted to gambling through their exposure as children to digital media and gaming. Studies have not found causal connections between such use and a greater risk of gambling addiction in typical populations. However, we studied children whose parents were worried about the general effect of gaming on their offspring, and then compared them with children who parents were not worried. We found that the brains of the two groups of children were indistinguishable. But the children with worried parents experienced more stress and conflict between their wishes to game and their need to sleep, do homework, and have dinner with their parents.

It makes sense to worry about preserving lifestyles that we know are good for children – playing, time with friends, being outside – but unwise to confuse this desire with unjustified and unevidenced arguments about the dangers that digital media pose to children’s brains.

Encouraging rather than controlling children

Other research shows that the more restrictive and reactive parenting styles are around media use, the less children internalize and respect parents’ reasons. A more effective strategy is one in which children feel that their wishes and interests are being understood, and they can share their parents’ reasoning about the need for exercise, sleep, and education rather than be part of a strategy based on a groundless fear of digital media.

In a study at the Interacting Minds Centre in Aarhus, Denmark, my colleague Stine Strøm Lundsgård and I found that the parents who were the most worried about digital media were those who placed the most value on different kinds of play. The parents who were most concerned that their children enjoy a traditional upbringing – for example, playing outside with other children – tended to be the ones most worried about screen time. These parents had a strong sense of what constitutes a good childhood and they feared that screen time was displacing it.

This is a very reasonable concern. It makes sense to worry about preserving lifestyles that we know are good for children – playing, spending time with friends, being outside. Parents are right to focus of the importance of these aspects of childhood; they should concentrate on the merits of such childhoods and encourage those shared values in their children. But they would be unwise to confuse this desire with unjustified and unevidenced arguments about the dangers that digital media pose to children’s brains.

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There’s little evidence that screen time harms adolescents’ mental health, and the pandemic highlights how we should look for its benefits.

Young people have been making big sacrifices around the pandemic. Adolescents’ brains are wired to learn through social interaction, and their bodies are designed to respond to it. They have a heightened sensitivity to reward from their friends, with whom life seems so much better. Yet for reasons of safety – predominantly that of others – they have had to set so much of this aside.

Thankfully, they still have social media and networking sites to connect remotely and safely. COVID-19 is making digital technologies more vital for young people, having pushed them almost overnight out of schools, sports and theatres and into their homes, where the only way to connect with peers may be via phones and computers.

As a result, the pandemic has flipped the script on screen time. Hours online have skyrocketed now that young people are using screens more for school as well as for entertainment. That shift is making us talk about a critical but neglected issue – not the tired, ill-evidenced debate about hours of screen time, but how time spent online can be used to benefit young people’s well-being.

Mental health issues predate mobiles

This conversation is helpful because it is false to say that this generation is in a crisis brought on by phones and screen time. For decades, one in four or five young people have suffered a mental disorder. That problem will not suddenly be solved by switching off phones – if only the answer were so simple. Though rates of depression, anxiety, and loneliness have been rising in recent years, today’s young people are a resilient lot with plenty of strengths. They are doing better than other generations: more likely to graduate from high school, less prone to violence or to using drugs and alcohol.

“The pandemic has flipped the script on screen time as hours online have skyrocketed.”

But this pandemic will challenge them. Previous downturns and shocks have affected young people’s mental health for years afterwards. Parents and teachers should be prepared for more mental health issues and a spike in young people looking for supports online, given that many of their offline supports have been taken away.

Screen time and adolescent mental health

My research focusses on adolescent mental health, particularly depression and anxiety, in the digital age – the facts, fears and what we should be thinking about for the future. We have synthesised recent findings from multiple studies. They reveal only small, and often conflicting, associations between screen time, social networking, depression and anxiety. In short, a plethora of studies around screen time has unearthed little of clinical or practical significance and failed to throw much light on the direction of any cause and effect relationships between screen time and mental health.

Indeed, our research, by tracking young people on their mobiles, has found that the days when they are more connected – when they use social media more – are the times when they are happier and experience less depression. Others who have followed adolescents over time have found that social media use does not predict later depression, but earlier depressive symptoms do predict future social media use. It may be that when teens are depressed and anxious, they engage with social media differently.

Photo: Beryl_snw. Creative Commons.

Social media can be a lifeline for young people. Ideally, mobiles can be a just-in-time therapist in the pocket: texting services and crisis text lines have proved themselves in suicide prevention. The digital world offers opportunities to connect with young people who never pass through mental health services. But we have failed to capitalise on opportunities by, for example, designing just for adults and children and not investing in the types of online, peer-to-peer coaching that can appeal to teens as authentic to their ears.

Parenting is similar online and off 

Where does all this leave parents? The good news is that although mobile phones are pervasive among this generation, the fundamental needs of children and adolescents remain largely unchanged. Young people still require social connection and peer engagement. They need supportive parenting to protect them and help them to manage risk. Just as when they are offline, so too in their online activities they need monitoring and scaffolding by caregivers with whom they can openly communicate.

Families experience much conflict about the amounts of time young people spend online, but they have few conversations about how they spend that time and why. More often than not, the conflict itself is the problem, rather than the screen time. Parents should find out what young people are doing online. Mostly, they are watching videos, connecting with friends from their offline networks, and managing basic tasks around school and meeting up. We can ask young people about their day online, about whom they have been with and what they have seen. Ask your kids to walk you through their digital day.

A good question to ask both yourself and your child is: Are you there to connect, create or contribute? These are the activities that, young people say, provide the most rewards. Ask whether social media is supporting their well-being and happiness. It probably is. If parents switch off a young person’s screen, they should pause and ask what they are shutting off. Is it just a screen, or is it their child’s connection to an important network, to friends and ways to manage anxieties? Parents should know that their fears about too much screen time are not supported by evidence that it leads to clinical depression. We need to learn more about how the digital world influences our children, but the conversation so far has been dominated by fear rather than facts.

“If parents switch off a young person’s screen, they should ask whether they are shutting off their child’s connections to friends and ways to manage anxieties.”

Parents have opportunities to co-play online with young people. I do not enjoy Fortnite (although the dances are growing on me!), but I play it with my son to make sure that it is safe and to see why he is so drawn to it. Kids often love to share what they have learned, so there are chances to collaborate and for them to teach. Maybe that means taking time out of your day to co-create a TikTok video or become friends with your child on Instagram. Your child might have a second account just for friends, but that’s OK: we also want young people to have privacy and a space to connect without us looking over their shoulders.

See the child, not the screen time  

We tell parents who worry about screen time to check other issues first before shutting off their screens. Are the kids getting enough sleep? Are they having time with their friends? If these things are going well, then screen time probably is not a problem. Also, remember that digital use evolves as adolescents get older. It can be a bit overwhelming at the beginning and requires support. But as they move through adolescence, they begin to figure out what activities are most rewarding and how to stay safe as they navigate on their own. Once young people reach college age, many will use digital tools to stay connected to friends and family they see less often. They often report streamlining their digital lives to be less dramatic and more aligned with their interests and goals.

If they are struggling in offline activities, then online activities might also be a problem.  For example, if bullying is taking place offline, then it is more likely that there will be an online issue. Teachers and parents who have their eyes on young people offline are often not surprised to discover that they are also experiencing problems online. A simple principle offers good guidance: see the child, not just the screen time.

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Study shows a correlation between screen time at age of 3 and missed early childhood development milestones at 5.

Young children exposed to high levels of screen time are more likely to show delayed early childhood development in key areas such as communication, motor skills, problem-solving and personal social skills.

Our Canadian study of over 2,400 children aged five and under has, for the first time, shown a clear link between levels of screen time and children missing developmental milestones.

The study does not tell us everything we need to know, and we should avoid alarmism. However, it identifies an avoidable risk that large numbers of young children may face if their screen time is not reduced or not shared with a co-viewing caregiver.

Managing screen time is an opportunity for parents

Our findings also provide a fairly straightforward opportunity for parents to support their children’s development. For many parents, better managing young children’s screen time is easier than reducing factors such as poverty that can also delay early childhood development.

On a grander scale, our study offers policy makers a challenge to influence and support parents. By school entry, one in four children in North America shows deficits and delays in early childhood development outcomes such as language, communication, motor skills and/or socioemotional health. Adapting screen use may be a way to reduce these deficits.

“This is an opportunity for parents – better management of screen time can be easier than reducing factors such as poverty that can delay early childhood development.”

Uniquely, our study measured children’s screen times at two, three, and five years of age. Early childhood development outcomes at each of these ages were also assessed by mothers. So we were able to show that screen time at age two predicted development at three and, likewise, that screen time at three predicted development at five.

Mothers were asked to report, for example, whether their two-year-olds could combine two or three words, such as ‘mum, cat, gone’ and whether, at age five, they could use four or five word sentences. Measures for the different ages were also reported for other motor, problem-solving and social skills.

Screen time link to missed early childhood development milestones

We now know, from our study, that increased screen time predicts delays in children meeting their early childhood development targets later on. However, our study was not designed to prove causality. Showing causality requires a randomised controlled trial, which would be unethical in this case, since we would have to expose large numbers of children to high levels of screen time.

However, our study – calculating screen time first and then testing child development years later – shows important elements that underpin causality: directionality and the fact that screen time precedes the underachievement of child development targets.

Photo: Gordon. Creative Commons.

That helps us clarify a question raised by previous snapshot studies which measured screen time and levels of child development only at a particular moment, rather than over time. Those studies were unable to demonstrate what comes first: delays in early childhood development or excessive screen viewing time.

Big advance on snapshot studies

The previous snapshot study findings were consistent with an explanation that young children who are already showing signs of delayed early childhood development may be given extra screen time in the mistaken belief that it can boost their achievement. Our study squarely links developmental problems to prior screen exposure.

Our study also indicates that screen time is an important predictor of early childhood development and that its impact is on par with many other determinants of child development, such as parenting, socioeconomic status, sleep and physical activity.

However, unravelling the independent role played by screen time is complicated because watching screens interconnects with these other factors. For example, screen time can reduce time available for sleeping.

What is the tipping point for screen time?

Many important questions remain unanswered. We do not yet know if there is a tipping point for screen watching by children at these ages: How much screen time does it take to adversely affect early childhood development?

Nevertheless, our study highlights that large numbers of children, at least in industrialised societies, may be at risk, given their levels of screen time. Most of the children in our study exceeded Canada’s paediatric guidelines, which recommend that children should spend no more than an hour per day viewing high-quality programming. In our study, children aged 24, 36 and 60 months were, on average, watching screens for approximately 2.4, 3.6 and 1.6 hours per day, respectively.

“The study shows that screen time precedes the underachievement of early childhood development targets.”

We also need much greater understanding of both the content and the context of screen time. Our study reported time spent on various devices, such as VCRs, DVD players and computers, as well on different formats such as movies, gaming and television programmes. It could be that some content is fine and other content is detrimental.

Possible reasons for our results

We already understand some of the mechanisms that could explain why screen time is linked to early childhood development problems for young children. For example, other studies have shown that children under 30 months old cannot apply what they learn on a two-dimensional screen to three dimensions in real life. We also know, from other studies, that sharing screen time experiences with caregivers, rather than watching a screen alone, can be important for young children, because shared conversations support understanding and language development.

Our study was not designed to distinguish between a child watching a screen alone and viewing with someone else. Co-viewing with a parent or caregiver who can prompt and label experiences can be a very different and more developmental experience, particularly for very young children. So it would be helpful if future screen-time studies could distinguish between co-viewing and solo viewing.

We also need to know which of the early childhood development milestones are particularly impacted by high levels of screen time. Our study was not designed to separate the impacts.

Our message to parents is to be mindful about screen time. Child development is at its most rapid between birth and age five. The digital interface is highly stimulating and rewarding for children, and it seems to interfere, clearly and measurably, with development, in ways that we don’t yet fully understand.

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