Excessive use of consumer electronics could reduce brain size in children, as well as weaken neural pathways, leading to one-dimensional, rigid brain structures, experts said.
This overreliance on visual stimuli could limit the development of other areas of the brain, such as language or cognitive abilities, experts said at the Taiwan Child Neurology Society’s annual conference on child development at National Taiwan University Children’s Hospital on Sunday last week.
The brain grows quickly before age 10, said Weng Shih-ming (翁仕明), head of the Department of Speech-Language Pathology and Audiology at the National Taipei University of Nursing and Health Science.
Photo: Chiu Chih-jou, Taipei Times
Although there is no comprehensive census data from Taiwan, the latest surveys from the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) show that more time spent with electronics negatively affects brain development, including reducing brain size and delaying language skills, he said.
US experts believe that addiction to devices is as serious a problem as alcoholism, and even refer to it as “modern opium,” he added.
The AAP recommends that children under 18 months old should get no screen time at all, a maximum of one hour per day for those aged two to five years old and careful monitoring of screen time for those five to six.
Mary Hsin-Ju Ko (柯信如), a pediatric neurologist at the Hsinchu Mackay Memorial Hospital, gave an example of a clinical case in which a three-year-old’s family kept the TV on all day as “background noise” at home.
While the adults barely noticed it, she said, the stimulation overwhelmed the child, and led to issues with social interactions and communication.
After kindergarten teachers alerted the parents to these issues, they took the child to a doctor, who recommended lifestyle changes for the family, Ko said.
They reduced screen time, had more parent-child interactions, and after just two months, the child showed significant improvement, she added.
The Ministry of Health and Welfare’s Health Promotion Administration also highlighted that there is an increased risk of developing myopia with increased screen time.
Research shows that school children using screens for more than one hour a day have a 2.34-times higher risk of developing myopia compared to those who use it for under an hour, with younger children seeing more severe effects, the agency said.
Ko concluded that parents should not just hand over electronics to children, and that children need diverse stimulation to develop their brains.
Excessive screen time can hinder listening, speaking, reading, writing and math skills, and lead to hyperactivity or anti-social behavior, Ko added.
While making electronics entirely off-limits is likely not possible, parents should find age-appropriate content and accompany their children during screen time, which could mitigate some of its negative impacts.
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