By Dave Sylvestro, with Eve Kessler, Esq.

Electronic media fill our homes and classrooms. We have more TVs in our homes than people residing there.  Between 1999 and 2010, school-aged children’s exposure to screens and electronics more than doubled.  In 2010, our children spent 900 hours per year in school and over 2,000 hours watching TV and electronic media, averaging seven hours a day in front of screens.  We download more TV shows than we check out books from libraries.  On cell phones, kids average over 90 minutes of texting each day, while talking only 30 minutes.  As of 2010, 85% of adolescents 14 to 17 years old, 69% of 11 to 14-year-olds, and 31% of 8 to 11-year-olds possessed cell phones.  And each day, 70% of day-care facilities have their TVs on, although no research proves that children under the age of two learn from information presented on screens.

To be sure, electronic media is here to stay, and no one is suggesting that there is not a place for it in your lives or the lives of your children. But as parents your role is to facilitate positive screen time while minimizing the potential harms associated with it. Following is some food for thought as you navigate this terrain for your child.

The Plus Side of Screen Use

• Education: Learning software and Assistive Technology serve as effective educational tools for kids who need help with reading, writing, and organization.

• Parent-Child Interaction: Talking with and instructing your kids while using media together turns a solitary experience into one that is educational and social, and can enhance their critical thinking skills. Learning how to play video games together encourages cooperative learning.  Having children teach you how to play a video game effectively encourages language use, develops patience, and helps improve their self-esteem by giving them an opportunity to be an “expert.”

• Encourages shy kids to interact. Peer-to-peer computer activities can nudge socially reluctant kids in a fruitful social direction by creating “virtual” peer networks where they can bond over shared computer activities and interests.

• Cell phones: contribute to feelings of security within families.

 The Downside of Screen-Time Overuse

• Limits opportunities to hone social skills. Too much screen time at the expense of face-to-face interactions leaves kids with fewer opportunities to practice social skills needed for positive, direct social and emotional interactions.

• Escape from social learning. Unbridled use of screens can become an enticing refuge for kids seeking to avoid the discomfort of social learning situations, such as unstructured recess or awkward play-dates.

• One-dimensional communication. Although texting is efficient, it doesn’t allow parties to take into account subtle aspects of communication such as vocal modulations, tonal nuances, facial expressions, and body language: When kids can’t see and hear complete reactions of those with whom they’re communicating, they can’t fully understand how socially acceptable or inappropriate their messages are or how they are being interpreted.

• Discourages formal aspects of writing. The use of organized thoughts, reflective, conscious communication, and proper grammar and spelling are lost with texting.

• Exacerbates symptoms of ADHD and contributes to “screen addiction.” Kids with ADHD can become addicted to the need for immediacy and the constancy of communications and responses, without taking into account that the “real world” has boring parts to it and gratification is not immediate in daily life.

• Delayed language development. In young children under age two, over-exposure to screens may cause language delays.

• Influences behavior negatively. Exposure to entertainment media with high sexual and violent content may lead to social isolation and promiscuity among children.

• Contributes to childhood obesity. 

• Parenting issues. Increased parental screen time: displaces positive and instructive parent-child interactions.

David P. Sylvestro, MA, CSP, is a school psychologist at Eagle Hill Schools.  Eve Kessler, Esq., is a criminal appellate attorney with The Legal Aid Society, NYC, a co-founder of SPED*NET Wilton, and a Contributing Editor of Smart Kids.

Related Smart Kids Topics

• Promote Social Skills: Step Away From the Screen