More Screen Time Linked To Lower Test Scores For Elementary Students (www.cbc.ca)
- Reference: 0179749416
- News link: https://mobile.slashdot.org/story/25/10/11/0036214/more-screen-time-linked-to-lower-test-scores-for-elementary-students
- Source link: https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/screentime-test-scores-9.6935108
> The study by a team from Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children (also known as Sick Kids) and St. Michael's Hospital was [1]published in the Journal of the American Medical Association . It found that children who spent more time on screens before age eight [2]scored lower on standardized tests . Child psychiatry researchers say handing kids digital devices, like iPads, every time they have a tantrum could lead to future issues. One new study links too much screen time to emotional and anger management problems.
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> The study followed more than 3,000 kids in Ontario over a 15 year span from 2008 to 2023, tracking how much time they spent watching TV or DVDs, playing video games, using the computer or playing on handheld devices like iPads, as reported by their parents. That data was compared to their EQAO standardized test scores, which are used to assess the reading and math skills of kids across Ontario in grades 3 and 6. The findings point to a "significant association," between screen use and lower test scores, according to Dr. Catherine Birken, a pediatrician and senior scientist at Sick Kids and lead author of the study.
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> "For each additional hour of screen use, there was approximately a 10 percent lower odds of meeting standards in both reading and mathematics ... in Grade 3 and mathematics in Grade 6," said Dr. Catherine Birken, a pediatrician and senior scientist at Sick Kids and lead author of the study, in an interview with CBC News. The study didn't differentiate between different types of screen time -- for example, whether a child was playing a game on their iPad versus FaceTiming a relative in another city, or watching an educational video. It was also an observational study that relied on parents answering questionnaires about how much time their kids spent in front of screens. The study authors note that this means the research can't be taken as definitive proof that screen time causes lower grades, just that the two things tend to go hand in hand.
[1] https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamanetworkopen/fullarticle/2839927
[2] https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/screentime-test-scores-9.6935108
But is is causation? (Score:2)
Or are the dumbest simply more fascinated by the pretty lights?
Re: But is is causation? (Score:2)
Childhood is all about learning how the world works. Whether that's why you don't play with sharp objects or how to handle your own boredom and channel it into something useful. Every minute spent on a screen is a minute a child doesn't spend in the world experimenting, discovering and understanding. If I took 7 or more hours out of my work week, I'd be behind at what I'm doing too.
Re: (Score:2)
It's so rewarding watching small children discover principles of physics (action and reaction) as they begin to interact with their world. And awesome when they start becoming interested in how things work. Or interested in mundane things around them like insects, or frogs. My niece once spent an hour looking at frogs and toads on the banks of a small pond near her home. Time much better spent than than on a screen that's trying to give her hits of dopamine to addict her to mindless games.
Given his low
Correlation does not equal Causation (Score:4, Interesting)
A friend of mine is extremely fortunate to have a bit more of an 'old school' environment. They have a TV, but she doesn't let her kids use her phone. She's able to be a stay-at-home-mom, supplementing the household income with baked goods and Etsy projects and eggs from her chickens. She pays attention to her kids, not as a helicopter parent, but as a genuinely involved parent - going on walks, taking them to the library, teaching them how to interact safely with the chickens, having them cook with her, teaching them arithmetic and reading, playing with them, giving them simple chores...really making it a point to focus on early childhood education. This in turn is evident in her kids' longer attention spans, and ability to have discussions at levels in excess of their peers.
Something tells me that they will do far better than their peers on standardized tests...not because they had less screen time and spent their formative years staring at the wall instead, but because she's been an active parent and made it a point to make the most of the pre-kindergarten years.
She's an exception, sure...but the point generally stands - parents who just hand their kid an iPad and leave them alone are going to end up with kids focused on entertainment rather than exploring their world and gaining understanding, which will likely be reflected on standardized test scores to some extent.
I would also submit that one of the contributors to this problem is how basically every video game has devolved into a skinner box and dopamine dispenser. Puzzle games exist, but it's an incredibly exhaustive process to load an iPad exclusively with games that are pay-once, no-IAPs. It would be interesting to see if such a thing *could* be used as part of an experimental group, where kids who only played games that had traditional progression mechanics were compared to kids who had games that were colorful slot machines.
Re: (Score:2)
So good to hear about these sorts of parents. Kudos to her, and also to the first poster who is able to keep his kids off of devices and social media. Takes a tremendous amount of effort and resources to do that. I know many parents struggle with it. They don't have the time and resources. It's not easy at all. And many single homes are single parent where it's even harder to balance working to survive and helping the children have the best possible chances to succeed.
Last week someone accused me of not
From The Departmet Of Duh! (Score:2)
My grand father knew this when I was a child.
Today, I watch my grandson with poor language skills and being trained into ADD because of being baby sat by YouTube and cartoons.
I fuck hate seeing it.
That's fine. (Score:3)
We're going to teach most of those kids how to ask AI for everything anyway. Their value-add will be dubious at best. They can autocorrect their lives. We need them literate enough to order off of Amazon.
So long as we right-size their expectations in life it should all work out.
Re: (Score:1)
Honestly we're not even going to do that. At the rate we are going we aren't going to give most of kids electricity and running water. That stuff has to go to data centers.
Covariates? (Score:2)
The study mentions covariates, including income, ethnicity, and maternal education and gives population descriptions for some of these covariates. However, the report then almost completely fails to discuss covariates for the remainder of the paper, including in the discussion. The only statement in the results is that the results were "adjusted" for covariates.
Kudos to the study authors for tabulating covariates and a huge minus for asking the reader to just trust them that they did "the right thing" in
I had low grades in the 80s... (Score:3)
Because I spent all night on my Commodore 64 when my parents thought I was asleep. I failed several classes because I refused to do homework.
Today I've had an incredible 35 year career in technology up to and including being a CIO. I own three separate business, property rental, an ecommerce site, and an arcade bar. If you ask me, I would tell you that school failed me, I didn't fail school. They wanted me to spend 7 hours at school and then two more at home doing busywork (home work) on subjects that mostly have zero relevance to my life today. That's bullshit. I learned far more using that C64 than I'd ever have learned doing that waste of time homework.
Being a screen nazi was my best decision (Score:2)
My kids didn't have unsupervised access to anything with a screen until age 11 or 12--and by "supervised", I mean "actively being watched". Until age 18, nothing with a screen and an internet connection was allowed in a bedroom. Screen time had to be earned at a 1:1 ratio by reading assigned books. NO SOCIAL MEDIA ACCOUNTS.
The result is wonderful. They have their issues like anyone else, but I look at what other parents are dealing with and feel like I didn't completely bungle the job.
Re: (Score:2)
Sounds like somebody in delusion trying desperately to justify child abuse.
Re: (Score:2)
Probably the most inappropriate comment I've read on Slashdot in quite a while. You're way out of line. Stop and think before hitting submit next time.
I suppose you think preventing your kids from smoking, vaping, and consuming alcohol would be child abuse too? I don't think you realize the harm being done to very young children that the original poster has managed to prevent thus far. His children will be well-adjusted and very grateful as they reach adulthood (I know I am grateful for that kind of rai
Re: (Score:2)
There is a growing body of scientific evidence that suggests dopamine-trigger mechanisms exploited by social media and other online outlets can cause permanent neurological effects in children. It's much worse than TV, and TV was pretty bad when I was growing up in the 70s and 80s.
I'm not super judgmental about how other people screw up their kids after having spent a couple of decades screwing up my own. We want to save them from everything, but taken too far it robs them of seasoning and even agency. I
Re: (Score:2)
Why are you posting anon if you're so proud of this?
I grew up to be a responsible citizen despite messed up hippie parents, what's your point?