This Seattle Times article outlines a recent study that links the
ADHD child and watching too much TV as a toddler. The findings of
this study are no real surprise to experts in the field and backs
previous research showing that TV shortens attention span.
Researchers of this ADHD and TV study found that the average
1-year-old in this study watched 2.2 hours of TV daily and the
average 3-year-old watched 3.6 hours of TV daily.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no TV before age 2
and that children over 2 be limited to one to two hours a day of
educational material on TV or other screen media.
Attention Deficit Risk Linked to Young Kids' Television Time,
Study Finds
By Warren King
Seattle Times medical reporter
Child-development experts have long warned there are plenty of
reasons for kids not to watch too much television. Now a major
Seattle-based study shows that very young children who spend hours
in front of the tube risk having attention problems when they
reach school age.
In the first research of its kind, scientists at Children's
Hospital & Regional Medical Center and their colleagues found the
risk increases by the hour.
For every hour of television watched daily by children at ages 1
and 3, the risk of attention problems at age 7 increases nearly 10
percent.
"The study adds one more reason for children not to watch TV,"
said Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a Children's pediatrician and lead
scientist for study.
Other research has shown that children who watch television
excessively have increased risks of obesity and aggressive
behavior. The new study suggests young children who watch too much
have a greater chance of being among the 4 to 12 percent of
youngsters in the United States with attention-deficit
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
Children in the study with attention problems at age 7 were more
likely to have difficulty concentrating and to be easily confused,
impulsive, restless or obsessive about things in their lives. The
problems were similar to symptoms for ADHD.
About 10 percent of the youngsters in the study had the
difficulties at age 7.
"A child that watched, say, six hours a day would be 60 percent
more likely to have these problems at age 7 than one who watched
no television," said Christakis, also director of the Child Health
Institute at the University of Washington. "That child would have
greater challenges in school."
Conducted by researchers at Children's and the UW, the study is
reported in the April edition of the journal Pediatrics. It
assessed the television-viewing time of 1,278 children at age 1
and 1,345 children at age 3 - all participants in a continuing
government-sponsored study that looks at many aspects of
children's lives.
The researchers found that the children watched from 0 to 16 hours
a day, with an average of 2.2 hours at age 1 and 3.6 hours at age
3. Content of the television programming was not analyzed.
The study took into account several factors, including gestational
age, prenatal substance use by the mother and socioeconomic
status.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no TV before age 2
and that children over 2 be limited to one to two hours a day of
educational material on TV or other screen media.
The recommendations appear far from reality.
Some 43 percent of children under 2 watch TV every day, and 26
percent have a TV in their bedrooms, according to a recent survey
of parents by The Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.
In their earliest years, children's brains are undergoing rapid
development, both with their brain cells and with how brain
impulses are regulated by substances called neurotransmitters.
Studies have shown that young laboratory rats given high levels of
visual stimulation have abnormal patterns of brain cells.
Scientists say increasing evidence shows that young children's
brains are similarly vulnerable.
The rapidly changing images and sounds of television, even in
educational children's programming, are certainly mesmerizing to
young children but can be over-stimulating, scientists say.
Television "is not like a piece of real life," said Christakis.
"But it may develop as a child's reality ... a child who later
learns that that is not the pace at which events unfold. Yet he is
expected to be able to focus."
......
Christakis hopes next to conduct a seven-year research project to
see if children whose television watching is significantly reduced
or eliminated have lower rates of attention problems. Parents,
teachers and others will be asked to discourage TV watching, he
said.
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