In 1941, Mary Preston published “Children’s Reactions to Movie Horrors and Radio Crime” in The Journal of Pediatrics. The American pediatrician had studied hundreds of 6- to 16-year-old children and concluded that more than half were severely addicted to radio and movie crime dramas, having given themselves “over to a habit-forming practice very difficult to overcome, no matter how the aftereffects are dreaded”
I think this genuinely valuable research. Attention spans in kids are nearly non-existent. My own daughter refuses to be in a long car ride without her tablet.
A small help/guide about how to use this great technology to my child’s benefit rather than detriment is fine with me.
Yeah god knows I was never like that as a kid, wishing I could be home playing my N64 instead of sitting on a car ride for hours and hours and hours on end. Who would ever prefer video games to the freshly recycled air pumped over you for the 100000th time that day while staring out at corn?
Oh, I agree it’s definitely a good thing but it’s also good for kids to be without it as well and learn how to be bored. Because one day the battery will die or they’ll need to sit through something boring and not able to whip out their phone out.
I struggled quite a bit missed in college to pay attention without just getting my phone or phone out and zoning out (which I’m not convinced may have been from undiagnosed ADD or something similar, but I still needed to learn to keep my attention on something less exciting)
Moral panics gonna panic.
Edit: nothing new under the sun.
Read about this and more at https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/1745691620919372
I think this genuinely valuable research. Attention spans in kids are nearly non-existent. My own daughter refuses to be in a long car ride without her tablet.
A small help/guide about how to use this great technology to my child’s benefit rather than detriment is fine with me.
Yeah god knows I was never like that as a kid, wishing I could be home playing my N64 instead of sitting on a car ride for hours and hours and hours on end. Who would ever prefer video games to the freshly recycled air pumped over you for the 100000th time that day while staring out at corn?
Oh, I agree it’s definitely a good thing but it’s also good for kids to be without it as well and learn how to be bored. Because one day the battery will die or they’ll need to sit through something boring and not able to whip out their phone out.
I struggled quite a bit missed in college to pay attention without just getting my phone or phone out and zoning out (which I’m not convinced may have been from undiagnosed ADD or something similar, but I still needed to learn to keep my attention on something less exciting)
Lol, “shrinking attention spans” and worrying about what’s happening to the children is the panic. Start here, maybe check out the books mentioned https://time.com/6958809/smartphones-screen-time-danger-pete-etchells/