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No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

nytimes.com

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Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#31

Post by darkmethod »

pwenzel wrote: post #25

My wife and I chose to adopt a "no screen time" policy for our child, who is presently 7 months old. Here are my observations so far: 1. At a restaurant with TVs, we've observed our child go from laughing and socially engaged, to completed zoned out and unaware of people in mere seconds, just because the television appeared in his field of view. :-( 2. At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away f…

My wife and I have found similar results as an experiment with three of our children (yes, experiment) progressively allowing more screen time per child at a younger age. We have found that attention span alone is inversely proportional to the amount of screen time allowed.

We now limit to just 1/2 hour per day per child in a family of iphones, ipads, itv, laptops, kindle, etc.

As a result, our oldest who collectively has as much screen time as our youngest is into reading/writing, drawing and someday soon I intend to get her writing some code. Of course, your millage may very, and I'm not quick to judge others when it comes to parenting. Not an easy task.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#32

Post by Ryanmf »

ajross wrote: post #23
Ryanmf wrote: post #17

If it hadn't been for watching Sesame Street and Reading Rainbow at that age (c.1988), I wouldn't have been able to participate in the mind bending parlor trick wherein my father handed his two year old son a box of cereal, and I promptly sounded out Maltodextrin (or whatever else). (And if I hadn't been that two year old, it's unlikely I'd be the voracious reader and passionate lexidweeb I am now. In fact, it's unli…

You're misreading the headline or misinterpreting your parents. When you were reading as a "two year old", they mean you were between your second and third birthday[1]. When the study says "No TV for infants under 2" they mean babies between birth and their second birthday. And the recommendation isn't about "bullshit" TV, it's about the fact that kids watching a screen aren't interacting with a human being and learn…

As long as we're being pedantic:

1. The first word I ever sounded out on my own (at least in an adult's presence) was "Mobil"—from the sign above the gas station near our home in Glendale, CA. (Très Américain, non?) For all I know this was before I turned two.

2. Most of the "embellished" stories regarding my memorable reading tricks come from family members who joined us on a trip to Lake Tahoe in the winter of 88/89 and were astounded/terrified to see me reading things like the snack bar menu. This was beyond the point of sounding out "Mobil" or "Maltodextrin"—I could read the menu, I comprehended that apples were available, and I wanted one.

3. My 2nd birthday was in July of '88. So yes, I was between my second and third birthdays. But no, I wasn't closer to three, or "in fact, three."

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#33

Post by shortlived »

pwenzel wrote: post #25

My wife and I chose to adopt a "no screen time" policy for our child, who is presently 7 months old. Here are my observations so far: 1. At a restaurant with TVs, we've observed our child go from laughing and socially engaged, to completed zoned out and unaware of people in mere seconds, just because the television appeared in his field of view. :-( 2. At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away f…

> At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away from the television, under the watch of in-laws.

Really? My son was not even able to have a fit at 3 months old. He was pretty blob-like...

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#34

Post by ajross »

Ryanmf wrote: post #32
ajross wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're misreading the headline or misinterpreting your parents. When you were reading as a "two year old", they mean you were between your second and third birthday[1]. When the study says "No TV for infants under 2" they mean babies between birth and their second birthday. And the recommendation isn't about "bullshit" TV, it's about the fact that kids watching a screen aren't interacting with a human being and learn…

As long as we're being pedantic: 1. The first word I ever sounded out on my own (at least in an adult's presence) was "Mobil"—from the sign above the gas station near our home in Glendale, CA. ( Très Américain, non? ) For all I know this was before I turned two. 2. Most of the "embellished" stories regarding my memorable reading tricks come from family members who joined us on a trip to Lake Tahoe in the winter of 88…

I'm not intending insult your status as a prodigy. I'm just cautioning that you aren't interpreting the recommendation properly. One data point doesn't do much to disprove the existing studies that show a clear anticorrelation between speech development and screen time.

Basically, you're saying essentially that parents should ignore clear science and let their kids watch ("non-bullshit") TV because you know a kid who watched a lot of TV and is really smart. That's bad science, and frankly it's bad parenting.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#35

Post by guygurari »

dadkins wrote: post #21
jsherry wrote: post #8

I'm not here to promote the idea of children under 2 should watch TV, but statements like this largely invalidate studies such as this: "The pediatrics group’s guidelines point out that research to date suggests a “correlation between television viewing and developmental problems, but they cannot show causality.”"

That doesn't invalidate the study at all. A correlation is still a very real statistical thing. It doesn't automatically imply causation, but it doesn't rule it out either. In fact, it's usually pretty good evidence in favor of causality. If this correlation shows up in enough studies without any alternative explanations, causality would become the prevailing theory. Dealing with human subjects and long term effects…

"A correlation is still a very real statistical thing. It doesn't automatically imply causation, but it doesn't rule it out either. In fact, it's usually pretty good evidence in favor of causality."

If A and B are correlated, it might mean that A -> B, or that B -> A, or that there's a C that leads to both A and B. Without further data, there is no way to distinguish between these possibilities. And often the actual causation is different from what you'd guess based on intuition alone.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#36

Post by transburgh »

pwenzel wrote: post #25

My wife and I chose to adopt a "no screen time" policy for our child, who is presently 7 months old. Here are my observations so far: 1. At a restaurant with TVs, we've observed our child go from laughing and socially engaged, to completed zoned out and unaware of people in mere seconds, just because the television appeared in his field of view. :-( 2. At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away f…

While I completely agree with you, the one thing I question about the restaurant tv example is, does the child zone into the tv because it is something they rarely experience and provides changing imagery that catches their eye?

Again, I don't disagree with the overall point, I just wonder if their interest that you are experiencing is due to the intrigue of something new and not necessary zoning out just because it is a tv.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#37

Post by [deleted] »

lwhi wrote: post #26

Perhaps the most useful way of looking at this, is to think about whether a child who isn't exposed to TV until two years old would gain benefit, over children who are. I agree with the premise that, being able to respond to feedback, and alter and hone their responses over time is a central part of any child's development. TV isn't as passive as some commentators make out - but the mechanisms required to process the…

[deleted]

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#38

Post by Errumtication »

lwhi wrote: post #26

Perhaps the most useful way of looking at this, is to think about whether a child who isn't exposed to TV until two years old would gain benefit, over children who are. I agree with the premise that, being able to respond to feedback, and alter and hone their responses over time is a central part of any child's development. TV isn't as passive as some commentators make out - but the mechanisms required to process the…

Indeed, watching TV is not a passive, structured experience, as the experts claim. No more than is reading a book, or playing with lego.

If it were then TV shows would not be interesting.

My guess is that there are two factors which may harm children's development. One is that watching TV until exhaustion, if done too often, may divert resources which would otherwise have gone into growing the brain. This applies only in the very early years when that growth is rapid.

The other is parents using TV to pacify children instead of helping them and paying attention to their problems.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#39

Post by gldalmaso »

shortlived wrote: post #33
pwenzel wrote: post #25

My wife and I chose to adopt a "no screen time" policy for our child, who is presently 7 months old. Here are my observations so far: 1. At a restaurant with TVs, we've observed our child go from laughing and socially engaged, to completed zoned out and unaware of people in mere seconds, just because the television appeared in his field of view. :-( 2. At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away f…

> At less than three months of age, he had a fit when pulled away from the television, under the watch of in-laws. Really? My son was not even able to have a fit at 3 months old. He was pretty blob-like...

I agree, at that age any observation is purely conjectural. In my case, with less than four months of age my daughter would have a fit for nearly anything including us just trying to move or acomodate her position to get more confortable.

At that age they are just passively interacting with the world, so it would really make no difference it they stare at the TV, a mobile toy or the parents interacting with each other. Whichever is most colorful or resambles a face is more likely to attract attention. It's only after three months or so that you can say that the baby can somewhat interact with anything.

Re: No TV for children under 2, urge doctors

#40

Post by gldalmaso »

guygurari wrote: post #35
dadkins wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That doesn't invalidate the study at all. A correlation is still a very real statistical thing. It doesn't automatically imply causation, but it doesn't rule it out either. In fact, it's usually pretty good evidence in favor of causality. If this correlation shows up in enough studies without any alternative explanations, causality would become the prevailing theory. Dealing with human subjects and long term effects…

"A correlation is still a very real statistical thing. It doesn't automatically imply causation, but it doesn't rule it out either. In fact, it's usually pretty good evidence in favor of causality." If A and B are correlated, it might mean that A -> B, or that B -> A, or that there's a C that leads to both A and B. Without further data, there is no way to distinguish between these possibilities. And often the actual…

Well put.

More and more papers these days rely on loose correlation to point to conclusions (not saying the linked one is because I didn't actually read the paper, just the link).

I'm sure it's a similar scenario all around, but at least in Brazil, universities are very, very production-driven, so any paper out is better than some good papers out, which leads to a rather poor quality overall.

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