How screens affect our children

Reset Your Child’s Brain, by American Psychiatrist, Author and Screen Expert, Victoria L. Dunckley, MD., presents the dangers of our children’s screen time, describes the symptoms that a child may experience as a result of large or frequent interaction with screens, and recommends a 4-week abstinence period for the parent to see if these symptoms subside. In addition to scientific explanations for every single effect that screens have on our kids, it also has real-life examples of kids who quit and had their course changed within the first few days of abstinence. Some of these stories follow the path of the children not only in the immediate period after they made the break, but also over time, in their adulthood.

According to the book, screen-time:

• It affects and delays children’s brain development
• It affects children’s ability to concentrate
• It promotes addiction, not just to technology, but in general
• It socially isolates children, who do not feel as comfortable as people their age
• It blocks children’s ability to control their impulses
• Increases aggression
• It undermines children’s ability to empathize and understand others
• It limits children’s imagination
• It reduces children’s natural curiosity about the world
• It makes it difficult for children to find games and activities on their own
• The effect on the body is much longer than the duration of being on the screen itself
• It disrupts children’s sleep
• It affects children’s performance in school
• It poses health risks for children resulting from the radiation they receive when they are in front of a screen
• And others

All of the above are multiplied for children who are more sensitive (with disorders such as ADHD, autism, emotional disorders, etc.).

And all of the above, regardless of what content kids are watching per se. The only important distinction that is made is between the passive form of watching, such as television, and the active, such as video games, in which the child affects the screen, and which is worse.

Unfortunately, research shows that the majority of very young children far exceed the safe limit of screen time each day, and older children can spend as much as 10 and 12 hours a day on screen.

The so-called Electronic Screen Syndrome (ESS), in other words, the set of effects mentioned above, largely mimics a wide range of neurological, psychiatric and behavioral disorders, such as autism, ADHD, bipolar disorder, depression etc. Many children who are diagnosed with these disorders, without actually having them, are put on medication and other very expensive invasive procedures to control their symptoms.

But since their relationship with the screen remains the same, the improvement observed is small, if not nonexistent.

It will take some time for the scientific community to attribute the rapid increase in these (mis)diagnoses to the use of monitors, as the well-being of industry and the economy comes first, as it usually does.

For Dunkley, the connection couldn’t be clearer.

So ask yourself:

• Does your child seem irritable often?
• Does it rebel over things and situations of little importance?
• Does it explode without limits?
• Has it become more reactive, disobedient, or disorganized?
• Is it irritable when you tell it it’s time to turn off the screen?
• Have you noticed its pupils bulging after using the screen?
• Does it have trouble making eye contact with you after being on screen or in general?
• Would you say your child is strongly attracted to screens?
• Do you ever feel like your child is not as happy as they should be or as happy as they could be?
• That your child doesn’t enjoy some activities as much as they used to?
• Does it have trouble making new friends or keeping existing ones because of its immature behavior?
• Are you worried that your child’s interests have declined lately? Or that its interests mostly revolve around screens?
• Do you feel that its thirst for learning and curiosity about the world has disappeared?Are its grades falling at school? Or is it not performing up to its potential and you haven’t identified the reason?
• Have you been recommended by specialists to test your child for ADHD, bipolar disorder, depression, or anxiety disorders without a family history?
• Have you received conflicting diagnoses from different specialists?
• Does your child have a pre-existing condition such as autism or ADHD whose symptoms seem to be getting worse?
• Does your child seem overcharged or tired and unable to sleep? Or is it sleeping but not feeling rested?
• Do you see your child leaning towards laziness and lacking attention to detail?
• Would you describe your child as anxious without being able to point to clear reasons for this?

The book recommends abstaining from screens for 4 weeks if you notice any of the above symptoms in order to assess whether abstinence resolves them. If they subside, you can continue abstinence for as long as you think is needed, or indefinitely, or reintroduce the screen into the child’s life, monitoring if the symptoms return. In most cases, they reappear if the child goes back to the previous limits, so you need to make the necessary interventions in the management of screen time so that this does not happen.

Hopefully, she reports that even though kids react strongly at first, it’s impressive how quickly they stop asking for the screens, as their lives improve on many levels.

The basic argument is that children must live in their time, and live like all other children, as they risk alienating themselves from their interlocutors if they do not have the same habits as them. However, the opposite is true. Children who are not isolated from the screen are more able to relate to those around them. They make and maintain friendships more easily, and they perform better in school and in life in general.

For the ability of screens to ensure free time for parents, which is the main reason for exceeding the limits in most cases, it is important to mention that we can create the conditions to ensure this time without giving our children screens. It’s definitely not as easy, but it’s doable, and it’s worth trying. In fact, positive parenting helps our children to be both autonomous, to respect the rules at home, and outside of it, and to cooperate with the needs of the situation at the right time, without creating problems. Also, the more our children are free to explore the world without barriers, the better able they are to rely on themselves and spend time happily independently of us, and without the need for a screen.

During screen abstinence, as described above, we may only need to be around them for the first few days to help them acclimate to the new situation, but we won’t need to be involved to the same extent afterwards.

The issue of the safe use of screens is particularly important. Screen syndrome has the power to undermine our efforts to raise our children in the best possible way, even if we are doing everything right.

That’s why Parenting is committed to following the latest developments around the topic of screens, so that we can recommend ways you can handle it, always depending on the age of your children and the needs of your own family, and give you the tools you’ll need every step of the way to make it happen.