By the time they graduate from high school, many of today’s children will have spent more time in front of a television than in a classroom. One study says that children ages 2 to 11 watch an average of 20 hours of television a week, while their teenage brothers and sisters spend 18 hours a week on the same activity. These numbers mean that watching television takes up a large part of many children’s time. For parents and guardians, this raises concerns about how much television time children should be allowed to watch and how it may influence children’s behaviour, values, development and health.
Experts have studied all of these questions, and the data they get doesn’t just focus on instructional TV or carefully constructed children’s shows. Rather, it is mostly adult primetime shows. Research shows that it is not a good idea for parents and babysitters to get used to using the television as a babysitter, as this will result in long periods of unsupervised viewing and sometimes material that is not suitable for young.
It is generally recognized that a certain amount of viewing is normal and even good for children, as it can be entertaining, informative and socially relevant. However, a lot of viewing offers diminishing returns. In this case, as in other areas, too much of anything is not good for young people, experts say. Children’s time can be better spent doing things that teach them more about their world, their environment, and encourage them to develop their talents, mind, and physical abilities.
Children who watch violent shows a lot, where that violence is presented as an acceptable solution to problems, tend to solve their own problems in the same way. Aggressive skills are acquired earlier and more easily than mental and social skills. Children will admire the aggressiveness of their heroes or heroines and may find little reason to spend time and effort learning other ways to solve problems.
Experts are careful to emphasize that the children who are most affected are the ones who watch programs in which violence plays a significant role. This leads them to suggest that in addition to limiting viewing time, parents should also monitor the types of shows children watch and take the time to watch together with them. In this way, they can explain or avoid problematic materials.
Although it’s not always easy to gauge exactly how much screen time is actually spent, intense viewing remains the single factor associated with most of the negative effects of television. For this reason alone, parents should really be wise to put limits on the amount of television they allow their children to watch each day.
