MIAMI.- The use of electronic devices such as tablets, televisions and phones has an alarming impact on young children’s interaction with their parents and other family members during their early years, according to recent research.
The study carried out by a group of scientists from the University of Western Australia in Adelaide revealed that excessive screen time was associated with a decrease in conversations between parents and children.
Australian researchers dubbed this phenomenon “technoference,” a scenario in which young children’s overexposure to a screen may be interfering with opportunities to talk and interact at home.
To reach this conclusion, the team of experts tracked the amount of time young children in 220 families spent in front of a screen for 16 hours of an average day. In addition, they evaluated how much time these children between the ages of 12 and 36 months spent talking to their parents.
They did this using an advanced voice recognition technology called Language Environment Analysis (LENA), whereby children wore a special t-shirt or vest equipped with sensitive monitors that record all audio around the child throughout the day.
The monitors automatically quantified the number of words spoken by the adult, the number of vocalizations made by the child, and the number of speaking turns between the adult and child. It also calculated the amount of time the children were exposed to television or electronic noise.
The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends no more than 1 hour per day of screen use for children ages 2 to 5, “so they have time to participate in other activities.” important for their health and development.” However, many young children exceed these screen time guidelines, according to this study.
The findings
During the study published in the journal JAMA Pediatricsthe average child at the age of 3, looked at some type of electronic device for two hours and 52 minutes a day.
They also found that for each additional minute of screen time, children heard fewer adult words, uttered fewer vocalizations, and engaged in fewer interactions.
Overall, at age 3, each extra minute spent watching television, phone screens, or computers was associated with 6.6 fewer words directed by a child toward an adult during that day.
“By replacing 1 hour with the average screen time children were exposed to at 36 months of age in this study, children could miss 1,139 adult words, 843 vocalizations, and 194 conversational turns per day,” they detailed. .
Lack of awareness of the problem
The team led by Mary Brushe, from the University of Western Australia in Adelaide, said this may be because parents are not aware of the impact of using these devices on children’s development.
So they may need support “to understand the consequences that increased screen time has on the opportunity for children and adults to talk and interact in their home environment,” they noted.
According to experts, identifying the different ways to get involved during this time could facilitate interactions between father and child, “for example, joint viewing, would be an important strategy to improve family communication.”
Lastly, they highlighted that this study could be an important avenue for future exploration to help inform parents and family members of updated guidelines on how long a child should be exposed to electronic devices.
@Lydr05
Source: With information from the journal JAMA Pediatrics and Health Day
