More Screen Time Linked To Lower Test Scores For Elementary Students (www.cbc.ca) 46
An anonymous reader quotes a report from CBC News: The study by a team from Toronto's Hospital for Sick Children (also known as Sick Kids) and St. Michael's Hospital was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. It found that children who spent more time on screens before age eight 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.
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.
"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.
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.
"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.
Being a screen nazi was my best decision (Score:4, Informative)
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.
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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:Being a screen nazi was my best decision (Score:4, Insightful)
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. It's difficult to know where the line is! To be a parent is to be confronted on a daily basis with one's own shortcomings. My kids still want to talk to me, and they say they are grateful they didn't end up like their peers.
I pat them on the head and send them back to their dark, safe closets.
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We want to save them from everything, but taken too far it robs them of seasoning and even agency. It's difficult to know where the line is!
It is not that difficult if somebody is this extremely over the line.
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Several years ago I talked to a Navy doctor who said he started getting a lot of sailors with sexual dysfunction issues. It turns out all these guys (mostly, not exclusively) had been porn-dependent since childhood and needed all kinds of help when confronted with the real thing.
How many kids have you raised to adulthood?
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You're way out of line.
Nope. I am right on the mark. And I have thought carefully about that comment. If that cretin were my parent, I would cut all ties as soon as I reasonably could.
Re: Being a screen nazi was my best decision (Score:2)
Sounds like someone has a serious addiction problem.
My 22 year-old son has thanked us for similar parenting choices. Difference was, computer was in his room, but we used software to limit his screen time and Internet destinations. Didn't get a smartphone until highschool. We're doing the same with his 13 year-old sister.
My wife and I made this choice based upon observation of our friends who had children before we did. We didn't want the device-addicted zombies we saw them becoming. We made the same choice
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My kids had almost no screen limits (they could even play whole night long if it wasn't a school night). Younger was playing video games since the age of 3. Both were A-students for the first 9 years of school, except for arts and PE.
Another funny thing is that after playing their whole childhood. One has given up playing and is reading books and refuses to play when asked. Other has given up playing and is focusing on school with the aim of getting full scores from everything, even when we as parents try t
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I grew up to be a responsible citizen despite messed up hippie parents, what's your point?
Re: Being a screen nazi was my best decision (Score:2)
I tell my therapist that I wish I spent less time in front of the TV as a child, and maybe had somwthing like piano lessons, or soccer team, or something more substantial going on
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They are hip to all the latest stuff, but they have to earn that screen time by engaging with literature that stretches their minds--you know, books. It makes them more mindful of the time they spend. There has never been a struggle over this because the rule is fairly applied and liberally interpreted. Keeping screens out of rooms is just common sense.
People kept telling me how bad it w
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The irony of the two stories being together on the front page, "More Screen Time Linked to Lower Test Scores For Elementary Students" and "Microsoft to Provide Free AI Tools For Washington State Schools" is just too good to fail to mention.
And so I'm replying to the both First Posts with it.
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Two of my three had tablets, video games, and TV from the very beginning. Both taught themselves to read BEFORE entering preschool at 4 years old. Both continued to test far above both school and state averages in English language arts and math. My youngest doesn't seem to like devices, prefers more traditionally activities (coloring, doll houses, etc). She just started kindergarten and is more or less average, still learning her letters and numbers (no reading).
So I could say my anecdotal experience is th
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My kids didn't have unsupervised access to anything with a screen
That sounds great. But I always wonder over the "nature vs nurture" argument. It is a lot harder to answer than I would have thought.
Did your kids do well because you restricted screen access?
Or was it because they inherited the genes of a parent who cared enough to limit screen access?
There is some evidence for both. All we know for sure is the correlation.
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Now with regard to screen time and the scroll-and-drool experience that permeates the modern interwebs, the scientific evidence is mounting that childhood exposure to dopamine response mechanisms like social media has almost inevitable bad effects and that some can be permane
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> 70% nature and 30% try-not-to-fuck-them-up.
I'll steal that line :)
I see the "scroll and droll" zombies on the train. Am I sounding like my parents talking about the "idiot box" (TV)? And were they right?
But is is causation? (Score:2)
Or are the dumbest simply more fascinated by the pretty lights?
Re: But is is causation? (Score:2)
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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
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Given his low uid, I'm surprised at gweihir's surprisingly ignorant comments. He's at least as old as I am (I've been reading slashdot since the very beginning which certainly says something about me... sigh).
That one is very simple: My comments are not ignorant and you are just one of those people that lose all rationality when it comes to kids. That you (apparently) agree on other things with me at least occasionally, should tell you something here.
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So, you think what is "on a screen" is not part of the world? Seriously?
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.
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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
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A stay-at-home parent is indeed the best way to raise children where possible. We've seen that throughout history, and it's been proven over and over again. Where it's not possible, I am in favor of governments and societies providing assistance to parents in many different forms to ensure they can parent to the best of their ability. A village certainly helps raise a child.
A village is the best way to raise a child. People should learn that they are part of interconnected communities as they grow up. Ideally people would be directly involved instead of their needing to be some kind of government assistance stepping in, but we've become increasingly disconnected from our neighbors and that allows echo chambers to form and fester.
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.
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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.
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The first 2 days of school were always orientation, and the first thing they'd do is give us our books. I'd then spend those two days doing every assignment in the books. I'd go to class just long enough to turn in assignments, get assignments that weren't in the books, and take tests. I got good grades - not perfect, because I did
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Great for you but that's a fairly different case that what's at stake today. 1) You watched screens and refused to do homework, but you had a great talent. Having potential for a great talent isn't the usual case. 2) You were watching a screen (a C64) that taught you a useful skill. Screens we are talking about now don't teach anything.
I would support a kid's choice who doesn't like classical homework but stubbornly wants to learn a skill. I wouldn't be wise a kid's choice to spend all available time on Tik
It probably reduces concentration (Score:2)
Concentration on things you don't want to concentrate on, requires effort. Concentration on an engrossing fiction novel is effortless. Reading through the latest draft Policies and Procedures manual requires effort. Phones totally remove the requirement to concentrate - just flipping the channels and content as soon as you get the slightest bit bored.
I think phones do increase literacy and information dissemination, but they reduce the ability to concentrate. And concentration-with-effort is a requirement
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And concentration-with-effort is a requirement for academics.
I disagree. If you require significant effort to concentrate, you are not cut out to be an academic. Academics do and must do things they are interested in or they will never be any good at them. It is fine to not be cut out to be an academic, most people are not. And we do not need that many academics, really, we just need to take them seriously and listen to them.
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Not every use is TikTok. And things increasing concentration can start as simple as giving you access to texts that interest you that you don't find in the children's books at home. You can have a look at all the nerds with their overly long screen time in front of C64s and how much they learned in that time, even though it was neither a book nor getting fresh air. Back then they were uncool for it, now they have high paying jobs, because they have knowledge that proved to become much more useful than it wa
Parenting Equation (Score:2)