(Montreal) The consumption of on-screen content by preschool children seems to interfere with the regulation of their emotions in the immediate and long term, warns a study carried out at the University of Sherbrooke.
These results add to a growing scientific literature that warns parents against the temptation to entrust the iPad with the responsibility of calming a child’s crying or keeping him occupied while preparing supper.
Professor Caroline Fitzpatrick and her colleagues took advantage of the pandemic to examine the daily screen time of 3.5- and 4.5-year-old children. Their data was collected through questionnaires that parents completed online.
They found, first, that 3.5-year-olds spent an average of 3.46 hours glued to a screen each day, almost 3.5 times more than the recommendation of just one hour a day.
“We were a little surprised at the number of hours that the children accumulated in front of the screens, admitted Mme Fitzpatrick. These are screen times that far exceed what is recommended from the point of view of the health of toddlers. »
Their data found that each hour spent in front of a screen at age 3.5 predicted increased displays of anger and frustration at age 4.5. And while several factors can obviously influence the ability to regulate emotions, she added, “in our study, we were able to demonstrate a measurable link between time spent in front of screens and across time, on a period of a year, a decrease in the ability to manage negative emotions”.
Emotion regulation skills that have not been acquired at a young age can be acquired a little later, so “all is not lost”, assures the researcher, while recalling that it is easier to prevent than to heal.
The links that were detected, explained Mme Fitzpatrick, are “progressive and linear”: the more the number of hours a day is increased in front of the screens, the more the child tends to react to different situations with anger and frustration.
How to explain this phenomenon ? A first hypothesis is that the time spent on a screen is not spent interacting with other humans, which would deprive the child of the experiences and activities he needs to learn to regulate his emotions.
“We also know that screen time can decrease the quality of sleep and take time away from physical activity,” said Ms.me Fitzpatrick. And sleep and physical activity are important for managing emotions. »
Some parents have also developed the habit of putting a screen in their child’s hands as soon as the child becomes a little irritable or impatient, which turns the screen into an “external way of regulating the child’s emotion”. , said the researcher, who holds the Canada Research Chair in the use of digital media by children.
“It’s reinforcing for the child and for the parent precisely because we can very easily resolve situations that can be difficult,” she said.
If this practice is repeated often enough over time, one can imagine that it could potentially harm the child’s ability to develop internal strategies to regulate his emotions, said Ms.me Fitzpatrick, who will now try to explore this hypothesis further with his team.
Still, for parents who are often overwhelmed by the demands of everyday life, the temptation can be very strong to obtain a little peace of mind almost instantly by placing their youngest in front of a screen.
Especially since these parents are often bombarded with contradictory information concerning the dangers that screens represent (or not) for their children. The problem, said M.me Fitzpatrick, is that “apples and oranges” are often compared.
“There are sometimes studies that are published on adolescents or on older children, we do not look at the same consequences, she explained. I would say that on the whole, the literature on preschool children is fairly unanimous in suggesting that no matter how good children do on screens, too much screen time is too much, and it can bring negative consequences for children. »
The findings of this study were published by the medical journal Pediatric Research.