Too Much Screen Time has a Bad Effect on Child Development

At conferences, more and more parents of a recently diagnosed teen or elementary school child have told me that they may be on the autism spectrum. In some cases, they have an official diagnoses and in other cases, they do not. Almost all the parents who have been told they are on the autism spectrum have worked successfully in a variety of occupations. The question is: why was their life relatively successful and their child is now having problems with a lack of friends, bullying or is extremely hyper and anxious? In most of these cases, the child had no early childhood speech delay as a toddler. When I was in college, I had friends that today would be labeled as having autism.

There may be two reasons why both these mildly autistic parents and my geeky classmates got and kept decent jobs.

Learning how to work at a young age. I have written extensively about this.
In my generation, kids played outside with their peers and learned social interactions. They were not glued to electronic screens.

In the September/October 2016 Carlat Report of Child Psychiatry, I read two articles that were a great “light bulb” moment.

One was written by Mary G. Burke, M.D., psychiatrist t the Sutter Pacific Medical Foundation in San Francisco and the other was an interview with Michael Robb, Ph.D. of Common Sense media. Dr. Burke explained that both babies and children need to engage with other people who react to their behavior. The problem with watching endless videos is that the video does not react to the child’s responses. Today, Michael Robb recommends no more than 10 hours of screen time a week until the kids are in high school. This is the same rule my mother enforced for TV watching.

Electronic Device Free Times

Both specialists recommend that every family should have specific electronic device free times so they can interact and talk. There should be at least one device free meal per day where both parents and children turn off and put all electronic devices away. In her practice, Dr. Burke has observed that reducing use of electronics improves symptoms of OCD, panic attacks, and hyperactivity. A report from The Centers of Disease Control reported that in a four-year period from 2003 to 2007, attention deficits increased 22%.

Children and families need times where they can interact without interruption from screens. One study showed that a session of five days at an outdoor nature camp with no electronics improved the ability of middle school children in reading non-verbal social cues. A farmer who ran a summer camp for 8 to 11-year-olds had an interesting observation. During afternoon periods of free play in a walnut orchard, the boys sulked around for two days. On the third day she said a switch flipped and they discovered free play. My three recommendations are:

1. Have one electronic device free meal where EVERYBODY including parents puts away all screens.
2. Limit video watching, video games and other non-school screen time to 10 hours a week.
3. Engage the entire family in activities where people have to interact with each other.

References

CDC Mobility Mortal Weekly Report (2010) (44):1439-1443. Increased 7.8% to 9.5% 2003-2007, 21.8% increase in four years.

Increasing prevalence of parent reported attention deficit/hyperactivity disorders among children, United States 2003-2007.

Uhls, Y.T. et al. (2014) Five days at outdoor education camp without screens improves preteen skills with nonverbal emotion cues, Computers and Human Behavior, 39:387-392.

Original article published by Dr. Temple Grandin:  http://www.templegrandin.com/temple_articles/screen_time.html