How to get kids to turn off the tablet

Parents have to be smarter in keeping their children’s media consumption at check

Dr Dimitri Christakis from the University of Washington (C), delivers a lecture titled "How Early Experiences Affect Brain Development", at Majlis Mohamed bin Zayed. ( Mohamed Al Hammadi / Crown Prince Court - Abu Dhabi )Show less

We all know that a TV-centric culture has negative effects on young children. Research has shown that watching TV provides no educational benefits for a child under the age of 2.

Older children who spend a long time watching television tend to work less on their homework and have trouble paying attention to teachers because they are accustomed to fast-paced visual stimulation. They are more influenced by commercials and tend to be more overweight.

Unfortunately, it is all too common for parents and caregivers to use the TV, iPad or other types of visual media as substitute babysitters. And who can blame them, as parents seek to juggle their various roles? But it’s important to remind parents that these devices do carry risks.

As The National reported yesterday, a leading paediatrics specialist, Dr Dimitri Christakis of the University of Washington, told the audience at the Ramadan majlis of Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed that parents must carefully plan the amount of time their children spend in front of television and “fast-pace” media, such as video games, as they can lead to serious developmental problems, including attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, which had risen by 30 per cent in the UAE in the past two decades.

While parental oversight may be possible for younger children, once children reach the age at which they can manipulate tablets and computers themselves – and that age is counted in single-digits – it can be almost impossible. So much of what children consume is done in the “privacy” of a single screen, even if the phone or tablet the child is staring at is in the same room. With the proliferation of ways that video and audio content can be watched – YouTube and Netflix, two websites that parents will recognise, are the least of their worries – it becomes hard to limit a determined child’s exposure to inappropriate content.

Perhaps, then, a different approach is needed. While it’s almost impossible to prevent such exposure, parents can make sure to be present in their children’s lives to guide them, by instilling values on what is inappropriate and why. A difficult discussion for young children, for sure, but a useful first step. Even better would be for parents to lead by example. Children will be far more inclined to put away the tablet and switch off the television if they see their parents do so as well.