How Much Tech Can Kids Take? 240
Barence writes "Are today's children facing technology overload, or simply gearing themselves up for life in a digital world? This article examines the effects of exposing children to technology at a young age. Researchers warn of the potential dangers of too much 'screen time,' pointing to alarming (some say scaremongering) research that suggests over-exposure leads to an increased risk of developing autism and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder. Educators, meanwhile, highlight how technology can improve interaction between child and parent, and provide essential life skills, such as enhanced communication and multitasking. Parents are left with conflicting messages — but how much technology is too much technology for children?"
Common sense (Score:5, Insightful)
It all comes down to common sense. It has never been said that raising children should be easy.
Overloaded or Preparing for Future? Neither! (Score:5, Insightful)
Does Television cause Autism? Everybody used to be so in arms about letting kids watch too much TV, it'll rot their brains out. Now we grew up and we all watch TV, but ooh, videogames and the internet will rot your brain! Its just society adapting to itself as always, you've got the early-adopters and you've got the naysayers.
Re:It depends on the kid (Score:2, Insightful)
Exactly right. You turned your brain on using a computer; some kids turn their brains off.
Re:As a techie and a parent (Score:5, Insightful)
She's had her own PC since she was 3. She also plays softball, soccer, and chess.
And I think that is the silver bullet right there. It's not so much a case of "technology is baaaaadddd!" but rather all things are good in moderation. This means it is excellent for kids to have some exposure to technology as this is a wonderful way to learn logical thinking and problem solving, but these two things alone do not make a person. Children need social interaction, and this means spending time with parents, siblings or other children and interacting with them. This will give them many other valuable life skills that they need.
When I was young, I was programming at the age of ten, but at the same time, my parents in their wisdom limited my time in front of the PC (okay, Amiga at the time) and I spent a lot of time with my father, with neighbourhood kids and doing simple things like taking the dog for a walk - or my favorite passtime back then, reading. I am very glad that I had access to technology from that young age, it has gave me the foundation that I have built my career on, but I am also very grateful that I wasn't allowed to utterly sink into my own little PC world. I see a lot of programmers or other IT professionals who are much better at what they do than I would be, but they lack the social skills to be able to truly thrive in the workplace. I think that due to these shortcomings many of these folks are doomed to live out the stereotypes that shows like the IT Crowd love to mock (in a nice way).
What matters is "how", not "how much" (Score:4, Insightful)
I've always thought that "screen time" is a ridiculous metric for kids. As though watching the Disney Channel, writing C++, playing Halo, and Skyping with friends/family are all the same thing. And it only gets worse as LCD panels become cheaper (and thus more prevalent in our lives). Are we going to count sitting in the family minivan playing with the GPS on the way to school as screen time? How about reading textbooks on the family iPad?
What really matters, of course, is the engagement of the parents to set up, support, and reinforce the environment of their children. I have no doubt that many parents simply hand their child their iPhone to distract them when they're busy with other things. Too many parents don't burden themselves with getting involved in the choices their children make, and then usually regret it later or try to fix it in artificial ways (see: "screen time"). At the same time, there are parents who teach or enable their kids to do great things with technology, like film and edit home movies, or write simple iOS/Android apps, or build simple circuits.
The parents matter. More specifically their time, effort, and creativity matters. Friends, other family, choice of school, and other available resources matter. The "amount of screen time" doesn't matter. Stop worrying about it, and start worrying about the choices that do.
Re:TV is the worst.. (Score:4, Insightful)
I understand what you're saying, and have observed that in my kid. Our solution (your mileage may vary) is to watch nothing in real time. Everything is prerecorded in some fashion. This helps all of us, but especially the kid, to make the TV our slave rather than being a slave to the tv. So at a very early age, when I need her attention, kid will instinctively reach out for the stop button so she can pay attention to me without missing any of the dialog. There is no such thing as "wait until the show's over" at our house. We leave when it's time to leave, and the kid picks up where she left off when we get back. (Right now she's going through all of Criminal Minds.)
As to whether this is healthier, I have no idea. On my way into work I listen to the news in real time, and I find myself reaching for a non-existent rewind button if I missed something interesting. (Like emergency routes out of the city...) But for us, TV is something we watch when we want to watch it, and for as long as we want to watch it, and no more than that. If any of us has to take a potty break, or get a refill, or make a comment longer than five seconds, the show gets paused. Since we don't watch commercials, the amount of time in front of the tv is still less than were it live, even with pauses.
What this does do is really mess up network planning. Tactics like Sandwitching an unpopular show between two winners to drum up viewership doesn't work if you only watch what you want to watch and nothing else. The concept of "prime time" and peak weekdays and dualing timeslots and even networks lose their meaning. I don't watch much TV anyway, but after programming the appliance, I couldn't even identify the network for most of the shows. (That's what IMDB is for.) Although I do follow directors and cast because they might do something else that's interesting.
I strongly suspect that the conventional network TV industry is basically running on inertia right now. I think the "tv tray" mentality, where you sit back in your barcolounger and watch whatever is on until it's time to go to bed, will die with the boomer generation. (Of which I am one, but I'm a geek, and we're usually on the leading edge of things technological.) I heard recently that some shows are going directly to Netflix now, without ever having been on network TV, and I suspect that something like it is the wave of the future.
In other words, technology finds a way, if you let it.
Re:As a techie and a parent (Score:5, Insightful)
Every single generation seems to have been saying the same thing.
Re:As a techie and a parent (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right it depends, do you want the kid to be socially crippled or not. It's getting harder and harder to find jobs that don't require one to play well with others. Hell, even engineers, those bastions of social interaction, are being expected to work on teams for most projects.
I don't personally like it, but it's reality, if you've kids that are socially inept their earning power and quality of life is going to reflect that.
Re:Common sense (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Many Factors (Score:5, Insightful)
Speaking as an adult who wasn't diagnosed with or treated for "nonexistent" ADHD until 39, in no small part because his parents bought into the absolutely bullshit line of crap you're spouting when his teachers pointed it out at age six:
Fuck you.
Your other points may be valid, but your straw man is so deeply offensive that I can't possibly absorb them.