Boggle

[judith_s]

According to a bit on NPR (about TV and ADD), the average one year old watches 2.24 hours of television per day. I'm stunned. Andrew has watched a total of about 45 minutes of TV, 15 minutes oriented toward him and about 30 minutes of being in the same room with a TV at my parents. Apparently, by age three, the average viewing time goes up to 3.36 hours. And 34 percent of 3 year olds have televisions in their own room.

Am I out of touch or is this just scary? Both Charles and I grew up in relatively TV-free households, and we don't plan on exposing Andrew to television for at least another year or so. American Association of Pediatrics recommends no TV before age 2.

Oh, and the study that triggered this showed a 20% increase in ADD-related disorders in kids who watched TV before age 2. Of course, this was a relatively small sample set, survey based study, so it's probably not worht much... but it's an interesting area of exploration nontheless.

Comments

[toxgunn.livejournal.com]

Gah. I can't help but think that infants watching TV would develop wiring to throw away data because of overstimulus.

Teletubbies against higher thinking!..;)

[selkiediver.livejournal.com]

Kids and tv viewership is a fascinating topic and there's a bunch of research out on it.

I remember reading one study that found that children did not understand that David Baxter changed into the Incredible Hulk and that those two characters are one and the same. Further, those same children did not understand that the scary green creature actually ran around and did good. The children in the study were simply scared of the monster. Also interesting was the age of the children. I think they were 8 years old. I would have thought that 8-year-olds could process the story.

There is also a lot of research about how children who watch less television are better socially adapted, and there is yet more research linking violent behavior to watching violent tv shows (8 year old boys who watch violent tv shows tend to be more violent at the age of 18).

It seems like it might be better for kids to go out and play! (:

[judith-s.livejournal.com]

No doubt about that. But babies are SO high maintenance. And the TV is apparently a pretty good baby-sitter. Right now, one of us has to be around (within view and preferably within touch range of) Andrew. I can imagine the convenience of parking him in front of the TV for a few hours, so we can get some stuff done.

I'm curious about the violence connection as well. How do you isolate all of the other factors? For example, the lower the level of education in the household the more likely it is that kids will watch violent TV. The less the kids read, the more TV they watch. So how do you control for factors like that?

[xeger.livejournal.com]

I'll cheerfully admit that when I was doing a lot of babysitting, oh so many moons ago, each kid was allowed "their" show - so there was often TV watching in the morning. OTOH, putting them to bed involved being read a book, and the rest of the day involved running around like madmen.

For myself, I didn't grow up with a television, and haven't really noticed that I've had neither TV nor cable for something over 6 months.

The TV screen is nice for online games, though :)

[selkiediver.livejournal.com]

It makes you wonder what parents of old did with their children when there was no television, eh? Well, you know since you do not have a television. (:

Controlling for factors in the violence studies is a challenge. I honestly don't remember how it was done other than trying to get a varied sample. That is to say, children of different socio-economic levels, etc. I know that boys and girls were studied. also, different age levels (kids who started seeing violent tv at 10 did not tend to be more violent later on. Also, girls did not show the same patterns as boys. The other challenge in that study was that it was longitudinal, so they followed the same kids over at least 10 years.

I'll see if I can find the reference again. I read it at least several months ago...