Are Screens Robbing Your Children?
How do you respond when your children get upset? When they “throw a tantrum”? How do you help them calm down? What do you do when they complain of boredom? In today’s environment, I often witness parents giving their child a digital device to—a smartphone, a tablet, a handheld gaming device—to help them calm down or to distract their bored mind. This approach may work well in the short-term. After all, children love digital content. It quickly diverts their attention as they calmly engage in the device. However, using a digital device in this way does not work in the long-term. Instead, it robs your children of important skills. A study of children between two- and five-years-old found that children who were given devices more often to manage negative emotions showed less effort to manage their emotions at a one-year follow up. They exhibited poorer anger and frustration management skills. Since the children had poorer emotional management skills, they were given devices more often, creating a negative cycle of increasing usage.
An unrelated study revealed that teens (10- to 19-years-old) who were diagnosed with an internet addiction showed decreased connectivity in the “executive control network,” the parts of the brain involved in thinking ahead, impulse control, and problem-solving. They also showed changes in the default mode network of the brain, the part of the brain activated when resting. These brain changes have been associated with addictive tendencies in adolescents and with intellectual ability, physical coordination, mental health, and development.
I mention these two studies together because I fear using digital devices to calm children’s emotions or to distract them from their boredom sets them up to become addicted to internet usage as an adolescent. Combined, using digital devices in this way may contribute to poorer emotional management skills as well as behavioral changes in physical coordination. Taking these studies into consideration, it may also negatively impact intellectual ability and mental health. To protect your children from this danger:
- Let your children experience boredom. Supply them with non-screen resources with which to curb their boredom. Then let them “figure it out.” Non-screen resources might include balls, puzzles, books, Legos or other building blocks, a backyard, a cardboard box, or any other toys or resources that might spark their imagination. Let them learn creative ways to manage their boredom. In other words, give them the gift of boredom.
- Listen to their emotions, both the fun emotions like joy, excitement and happiness and the “harder” emotions like frustration or anger. Let them express their emotions and talk about what triggered the emotion. Let them tell you about any solution or partial solution, good or bad, that they have considered using in response to their emotion. Listen to each one. Acknowledge each idea. Help them think through the implications of their options. Then discuss which response they believe best.
- At appropriate times in this process, show physical affection—put a hand on the shoulder, give a hug, rub their back. Use wisdom and discernment to assure the best and healthiest use of touch. Sometimes our children don’t like being shown physical affection during a particularly emotional moment. They simply desire your presence.
These three actions can help your children develop better and healthier emotional regulation skills independent of any digital devices. They will help your children develop an internal ability to manage emotions and that will help them achieve greater success in life.
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