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No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

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Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#81

Post by cheeseomlit »

nevinera wrote: post #41
onemoresoop wrote: post #23

Dubious at best. If one has children they notice quite visibly that screen time makes their children more agitated during the days they have screen time. And screen time is as addictive to children as it is to adults, and we should consider the effects they have on their developing brains.

When science doesn't match your personal observations, that doesn't make the science wrong. It also doesn't make your personal observations wrong - it usually (in my experience) means that you're measuring/observing different things (assuming you're reasonably intelligent, which I am doing). In this case, "cognitive development and well being" are complex concepts that probably do not map exactly (or maybe even gross…

When it comes to social science and studies involving self reporting I don't give it the same weight as I would to a study where all the variables are quantifiable and controlled

And in this case the quantifiable, non-self-reported part is the MRI brain scans they're doing, but what does that data indicate? I'm too ignorant of neuroscience to know. Are all changes in behavior and cognition detectable through an MRI scan? Maybe the average kid who spends 8 hours a day playing video games finds it nearly impossible to read a single page of a Harry Potter book without getting distracted, while a kid with 2 average hours of screen time has no problem with it, yet the difference maybe isn't reflected in an MRI scan? Did they perform these same scans on some Amish kids as a control?

Point being sometimes studies like this are hard to swallow when their conclusions go against so much anecdotal observation, particularly when the methodology leaves room for all kinds of other interpretations

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#82

Post by diplodinkus »

avgDev wrote: post #79
diplodinkus wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why is that so bad? Movies retell the same story with the same beats over and over again. I think we should be more concerned about people who can focus on something repetitive for extended periods. What's wrong with them?

Not being able to focus on 'boring' tasks is bad. When I had an addiction to social media, I could not enjoy 'slow' things. I also felt anxiety and depression. After detoxing I am again able to enjoy the 'slow' things, like taking time to learn and resisting instant gratification hits. Watching a movie sometimes requires 'getting into it' before you can really appreciate it. Most of our jobs are repetitive tasks. Eve…

If everyone found joy in boring tasks, wed never advance as a society. All progress is through laziness.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#83

Post by vinhcognito »

diplodinkus wrote: post #65
usgroup wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Children and everyone else … I can’t watch a movie anymore without either reading something or playing chess at the same time just to up the frequency of those hits.

But why is that so bad? Movies retell the same story with the same beats over and over again. I think we should be more concerned about people who can focus on something repetitive for extended periods. What's wrong with them?

A movie is not just what story beats it contains. If that is all you consider a movie is, then I suppose you might as well just read the wiki summaries of every movie.

But I wouldn't dismiss an entire form of complex expression because of an inability or unwillingness to engage with it at its level.

A movie is the visuals, the acting, the sound, the camera movements/editing, etc and how it all comes together to essentially give you a 2d slice of a person's realized thoughts.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#84

Post by diplodinkus »

DanHulton wrote: post #71
diplodinkus wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why is that so bad? Movies retell the same story with the same beats over and over again. I think we should be more concerned about people who can focus on something repetitive for extended periods. What's wrong with them?

Maybe you should try expanding your cinematic repertoire, if that's the impression you have of movies? I'm saying this genuinely, not to make a snide point or anything. There are some really good movies out there that aren't just "the same beats over and over again." If, say, you're only watching big studio blockbusters, try branching out into smaller dramas, that kind of thing.

The last movie I thoroughly enjoyed was (you're going to laugh and I'm OK with that):

Hardcore Henry

Frenetic, insane, indulgent, madness. Loved it. Can stand most blockbusters, can't stand most dramas.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#85

Post by SkyBelow »

civilitty wrote: post #19
jari_mustonen wrote: post #2

The title is misleading. This is not about child cognitive development, merely just some brain imaging. In short, the MRI method can not see the effects of screen time. This is of course a good thing but does mean nothing about cognitive development. From the abstract of the article [1]: We studied a [...] sample of young people [...] (ages 9–12 years) to investigate the relations between self-reported use of various…

Hopefully it wasn’t the children themselves self reporting their screen time

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S001094522...

>Self-report estimates provided by participants were our predictor variables. Participants used a 7-point scale to estimate the amount of time they spent on each of a series of six digital activities on both “typical” weekday and weekend days;

Sounds like it was.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#86

Post by slowmovintarget »

nevinera wrote: post #41
onemoresoop wrote: post #23

Dubious at best. If one has children they notice quite visibly that screen time makes their children more agitated during the days they have screen time. And screen time is as addictive to children as it is to adults, and we should consider the effects they have on their developing brains.

When science doesn't match your personal observations, that doesn't make the science wrong. It also doesn't make your personal observations wrong - it usually (in my experience) means that you're measuring/observing different things (assuming you're reasonably intelligent, which I am doing). In this case, "cognitive development and well being" are complex concepts that probably do not map exactly (or maybe even gross…

The difference is that the science will have tightly defined terms for "cognitive development" and "well being" that is different than what a parent is measuring when they're looking at agitation, misbehavior, impulsiveness... etc.

My wife and I have seen the same thing with our child. More agitation, more self-satisfying behavior ("forgetting" to do as told and playing instead), more temper tantrums. Kiddo still gets screen time, but it's limited.

There's a much bigger correlation with bad behavior, mental "fuzziness," and impulsiveness to diet, than to screen time. Too much processed food, food with preservatives, and food with refined wheat flour... yikes. Night and day difference in some cases. (Turns out a lot of kids have a "wheat allergy" but it isn't just that.)

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#87

Post by vidarh »

dudul wrote: post #74
vidarh wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're assuming causality, and assuming less screen time would mean screen time would be replaced by activities you see as better. One possible reason why that logic might not hold might e.g. simply be that restrictions on screen time might correlate with more involved parents.

No there is causality when a group is hitting each other with sticks, pretending to be jedi knights, and the other is setting up a "fake" farm with some complex "economy" between the baker, the blacksmith, the tailor, etc. There is causality when all the kid can draw involves violence with vague shapes, while others can draw complex sceneries. Where I do agree is that at the end of the day, the screen is not really t…

> There is causality when all the kid can draw involves violence with vague shapes, while others can draw complex sceneries.

Without anything else all you have is correlation.

There is no logically sound basis for your argument.

It's staggering to me how many arguments in this thread are devoid of proper application of reasoning.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#88

Post by vidarh »

justrealist wrote: post #67
vidarh wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a great deal of irony of this criticism coming from someone claiming to know better than this study while providing nothing to back up your dismissal.

I dismiss this study because I have children and I am not a moron.

I don't dismiss this study because I have children, and I'm not a moron who will dismiss a study based on anecdotes. I also don't blindly trust it, but it has far more weight than anecdotes about correlations.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#89

Post by vidarh »

vinhcognito wrote: post #83
diplodinkus wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But why is that so bad? Movies retell the same story with the same beats over and over again. I think we should be more concerned about people who can focus on something repetitive for extended periods. What's wrong with them?

A movie is not just what story beats it contains. If that is all you consider a movie is, then I suppose you might as well just read the wiki summaries of every movie. But I wouldn't dismiss an entire form of complex expression because of an inability or unwillingness to engage with it at its level. A movie is the visuals, the acting, the sound, the camera movements/editing, etc and how it all comes together to essen…

I love many movies. I have a huge collection. But there are also plenty of movies I will not bother giving my full attention because they're not worth it. If people struggle to give full attention to movies they actually find engaging and want to give their full attention, then that is an issue. If people feel they get more value from not giving a movie their full attention, that's a perfectly reasonable choice.

Re: No evidence screen time is negative for child cognitive development, well-being

#90

Post by vidarh »

upsidesinclude wrote: post #77
nevinera wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When science doesn't match your personal observations, that doesn't make the science wrong. It also doesn't make your personal observations wrong - it usually (in my experience) means that you're measuring/observing different things (assuming you're reasonably intelligent, which I am doing). In this case, "cognitive development and well being" are complex concepts that probably do not map exactly (or maybe even gross…

Not "wrong", dubious. It is quite appropriate to call such declarations dubious. Your explanation is fine, however, this 'no evidence' refrain that has been used to mislead the public has gone on long enough. At this point when that is in print the assumption may as well be the opposite. Every sensible person can see that children are not developing as they have in the past and the clear major difference is full atte…

> Every sensible person can see that children are not developing as they have in the past

Can we? On what evidence?

The "no evidence refrain" happens because people keep advancing claims without even trying to back them up.

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