Screen viewing time from age 1 to 8 years and subsequent academic performance

Markoff

In this longitudinal study, cumulative average screen viewing time was associated with lower academic performance but not working memory, with the strongest effect sizes seen for single screen viewing time occurring in early infancy. Cumulative average exposure models showed that screen viewing time over childhood was consistently associated with poorer academic performance but not working memory.

BartShoot

I guess that's hard to measure, higher screen time could be correlated with less caregiving from parents - screen will not teach them.

phartenfeller

Interesting. I have bad hopes for the data on children growing up with AI, which makes it easy to never apply critical thinking and finding own solutions.

magicalhippo

An average of two hours of screen time at age 1 seems insane to me. Should be measured in seconds as far as I'm concerned. Though I admit I'm privileged by living in Norway and don't have to work crazy hours to make ends meet.

apopapo

"Screen viewing" seems very vague. What did they do with their screens? Did they read an encyclopedia, or did they watch entertainment content videos? It's an important distinction.

eleventen

I hope to have my first child soon; I am fucking terrified.

HelloUsername

Shouldn't the title be changed to the conclusion? "Screen viewing time from age 1 to 8 years associated with lower academic performance, but not working memory"

graemep

There is a lot missing here. Without paying £30 I cannot see what the adjustments in the adjusted models are. There is no breakdown for different ages. Its very likely that the effect on a one year old and an eight year old would be very different. There is no breakdown of what they are watching. A whole of of confounding variables. Screen time is inevitably going to be associated with less adult attention which is known to be a major factor in development. Lots of others.

porridgeraisin

A lot of new parents in my family are simply not giving any screen to kids until they are much older. The only exception is using it to play some brainrot to get them to eat if it's turning out to be a particularly difficult meal. Most of the time though, they're shown the birds or the clouds or something. It works well, but I see one 11 year old watching YouTube sometimes, so I guess that's about when you just can't avoid it anymore. None of them have their own devices though.

alexchamberlain

Given the negative social perception of screen time, wouldn't the parents be motivated to report lower than actual numbers? Furthermore, this is one population (Singapore) and doesn't detail (at least not in the summary) how screen time varied from day to day (eg my children have substantially less screen time on school days, than weekends. Screen time in both cases tends to be biased towards breakfast time, when the house is a bit manic, or after significant periods of outdoor/energetic activity when everyone needs a rest.)

greatgib

Probably lot to see in the details about cause and correlation but could certainly be used to confirm that "screens" doesn't make children stupid. Just lazy or impatient at most. But difference between passive screen like tv and active like smartphone would have been interesting also.

shymaple

Directly mapping screen time with academic performance is difficult to correlate. Like the article shows that age 1 has the strongest association, but I feel at a very early age like 1, screen time is not in your(toddler's) hands and slowly, as age grows, kids become habitual. It like the impact is not linear. Also, I think the type of content kids consume can tell us more about the performance, because IMO, long form content can have a different impact than short form. It's an interesting study to follow and if anyone has access to the raw data, I would be really interested in looking into it.