In what ranks as something of stunning reversal, the American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has changed its stance on the potential harm smartphones and iPads can do to developing children.
Based on research culled from a meeting of educators, pediatricians, neuroscientists, educators, media researchers and social science experts in May, the organization now takes a more permissive stance on the issue of allowing children access to computers at a young age.
The findings were presented during an event called “Growing Up Digital: Media Research Symposium”, in which experts shared their updated views on the relative benefits and pitfalls of children engaging with smart devices at a young age.
In a 2013 paper, the AAP advised against allowing “screen media exposure” (smartphones, tablets, etc.) to children under the age of two, and specifically advised that parents “keep the TV set and Internet-connected electronic devices out of the child’s bedroom.”
The study was widely cited, led to a number of alarming reports (see video above) and may have influenced some parents to guard their infants against early developmental app tools delivered via tablet and smartphone.
“Although media are not the leading cause of any major health problem in the United States, the evidence is now clear that they can and do contribute substantially to many different risks and health problems and that children and teenagers learn from, and may be negatively influenced by the media,” read the AAP’s warning to parents.
However, today’s AAP — faced with a population of children and adults even more closely tied to their smartphones and tablets — seems to have accepted that mobile devices are nearly ubiquitous and now believes, if handled properly, the mobile screens pose no threat to developing children. The group cited studies from 2014 and 2015 that found that “one-third of children under age three have a TV in their bedroom and 72% of six to 17-year-old children have at least one screen in their bedroom.”
Given those overwhelming numbers, it’s no longer a question of whether parents will allow small screens on tablets and smartphones into the lives of their young children, it’s just a question of how. To that end, the group has come up with a new set of advisories.
Digital media can be used to facilitate executive function, build self-control and problem-solving skills, and improve children’s ability to follow directions,” reads one passage from the new position paper released by the AAP earlier this month.
The group’s expert panelists also found that “parent and child’s co-viewing and co-participation with media facilitates any educational experience gained from media activities in the youngest children.”
But perhaps the most interesting point made in the new position paper is the notion of parents using their “digital native” children as instructors when it comes to technology. The paper states, “Parents should let their children teach them about media and participate with them. Media should be viewed as a tool rather than a babysitter, reward, or punishment.”
The experts have spoken: Go ahead and give your kid that iPad, just don’t use it as a substitute parent.
