Now that the election is over, the TV in our living room is starting to feel neglected. I’m looking forward to having my evenings back, and Sally and I are both glad to reduce the amount of time CJ spends in a room with the TV on.
We knew that extended TV viewing has been linked to a variety of negative consequences in children. The American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry states, “Children who watch a lot of television are likely to
- Have lower grades in school
- Read fewer books
- Exercise less
- Be overweight
Further, a study in the April 2004 Pediatrics found a link between early TV viewing and attention problems later in life. (This was challenged in November 2004 with another study in which the researchers concluded, “We cannot exclude the possibility that watching television in childhood may cause behavioral problems, but we need better studies to further elucidate this association.”)
A 2006 Cornell University study even found
that as cable television became common in California and Pennsylvania beginning around 1980, childhood autism rose more in the counties that had cable than in the counties that did not. They further found that in all the Western states, the more time toddlers spent in front of the television, the more likely they were to exhibit symptoms of autism disorders.
These are not the reasons, however, that The American of Pediatrics recommends no TV viewing for children under 2. Rather, they state
babies and toddlers have a critical need for direct interactions with parents and other significant care givers (eg, child care providers) for healthy brain growth and the development of appropriate social, emotional, and cognitive skills. Therefore, exposing such young children to television programs should be discouraged.
So, whenever the TV was on, we made certain one of us was interacting with her to take her attention away from the set.
But apparently that wasn’t enough. According to PBS.org, (though they don’t cite the studies)
research has shown that one-, two-, and three-year-olds’ play and attention spans are shorter in length in the presence of background television, and parent-child interactions are also less frequent in the presence of background television.
It would seem no amount of television, even in the background, is “good” for infants. If that’s true, what about those “educational” videos? Aren’t the Baby [insert name of artist/scientist here] videos good for babies, don’t they help developing brains?
A 2007 study by Frederick Zimmerman and Dmitri Christakis of the University of Washington, published in the Journal of Pediatrics, found
that for every hour per day spent watching baby DVDs and videos, infants understood an average of six to eight fewer words than infants who did not watch them. [emphasis mine]
Not only do they not appear to help, but they could actually be impeding development. How, then, are these things so ubiquitous, and why would anyone believe they’re beneficial?
Intimidation and misinformation, apparently.
After the University of Washington issued a press release about the study, Disney (who owns Baby Einstein) sent a letter to UW president Mark Emmert, demanding
the immediate retraction and clarification of a misleading, irresponsible and derogatory press statement issued by the University of Washington…. In short, the University’s press release was grossly unfair, extremely damaging, and, to be blunt, just plain wrong in every conceivable sense.
In a letter of his own, Emmert replied,
The researchers find no inconsistencies between the content of the news release and their paper. They believe the release accurately reflects the paper’s conclusions and their commentary. For these reasons, the University of Washington will not retract its news release.
Though I would like to believe this would be an ordinary response in a rational world, I applaud Dr Emmert and the University of Washington for standing up for science in the face of such opposition. It couldn’t have been easy.
And, in keeping with the best spirit of skepticism, Dr Christakis said of the DVD’s,
I believe the onus is on the manufacturers to prove their claims that watching these programs can positively impact children’s cognitive development.
In early 2008 Disney changed the way they market the DVD’s, toning down the “educational” references, instead using terms like “explorative” and “interactive.”
Sometimes skepticism and science can really warm my heart.
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Very good points. I tend to think that on this topic, as with most others, moderation is the key. We didn’t let our first child watch any TV until he was about a year old (I think, it’s been 6 years now). Not a big deal for us since we only watch specific shows that we DVR and never have the TV on in the background. Not trying to be high-and-mighty about it; having the TV on drives my poor little ADHD brain crazy
Anyway, when we started watching the Baby Einstein videos with him, we always watched with him; he sitting in our laps or next to us and us pointing things out on the screen or naming what we saw. It was actually a neat experience for us because we got to hear a piece of music and go “oh, I didn’t know that was by Beethoven” or whoever.
TV in our house is still a communal activity. Very seldom does he get to watch anything without us sitting there with him. Now that he’s older, he is actually learning quite a few things from The Magic Schoolbus and shows like that. And having a DVR gives us a big advantage in that we can fast-forward through the commercials. He even knows how to do this himself now.
All that being said, it occasionally happens that mommy and daddy are really tired in the morning and we may put on a show for him and go back to bed. Nothing like a family bed to make you truly appreciate the joys of sleeping without another body touching yours
We let our daughter watch too much television, I think. However, she did watch the Baby Einstein videos when she was a toddler, yet she started speaking very early knew the entire alphabet and single digit numbers by sight before she was 21 months old. By the time she was two, she knew all the primary, secondary, and a whole slew of other colors, and would even distinguish between silver, grey and black (which is apparently not all that common) She’s 4 1/2 now and has a better vocabulary than other kids in her preschool a year older than she is. Now, I know this is anecdotal evidence and doesn’t speak to the accuracy of the study, and I suspect that they’re right, statistically speaking. It’s also possible that our daughter would be even more advanced if we hadn’t had the television on. I’m just saying that there are probably exceptions to their findings, and/or that it’s not as serious as their findings show.
One thing that might be a factor is that while our daughter did watch television as a toddler, we also spent quite a bit of time engaged with her, and have always spoken to her as an adult, not dumbing things down or using simple concepts or words when we could take the opportunity to teach her a new word or concept.
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