Digital devices: Nearly 90 per cent of children have virtually unlimited access

MANY parents are refusing to limit their children’s screen time — with close to 90 per cent of youngsters smashing through all the recommended guidelines on the weekends.

Daily Telegraph

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MANY parents are refusing to limit their children’s screen time — with close to 90 per cent of youngsters smashing through all the recommended guidelines on the weekends.

Shocking figures from two surveys reveal a generation of analog-raised parents who are struggling to cope with their children’s digital habits.

Almost two-thirds of parents report family conflict because of their children’s use of screen-based devices such as tablets and smartphones.

On weekends, 80.3 per cent of kindergarten children, 83.9 per cent of Year 2s, 87.7 per cent of Year 4s and 61.9 per cent of Year 6s were found to have significantly blown the recommended screen time, according to data from the 2015 NSW Schools Physical Activity And Nutrition Survey (SPANS) and a recent Australian Child Health poll.

Amanda Roberts is careful to monitor the time daughter Piper and son Wilson enjoy on an iPad. Picture: Nathan Edwards

The research also revealed that 94 per cent of Aussie teens, 67 per cent of primary school students and a third of pre-schoolers had their own smartphones.

“It is not surprising but deeply concerning” parenting expert and author Dr Justin Coulson said of the research.

Dr Coulson said excessive screen use was linked to poorer physical, emotional and social health and behaviour regulation. Screen time at night can also affect sleep quality and health.

His concerns are backed by the federal health department, which warns that children who spend long periods of screen time are more likely to have poor physical, social and intellectual development.

Experts also expect that a quarter of all Australian children are not meeting the correct recommendations for physical activity because they are languishing in front of the TV or tablet screen.

“Our children don’t need smart devices, they need smart parents.”

Some evidence suggests that children under the age of two who indulge in long periods of iPad, phone or TV consumption may suffer language development.

“The evidence is overwhelming but parents don’t know the evidence is there — there has been wholesale acceptance of screens without any thought about how they impact on our health,” Dr Coulson said.

Dr Coulson said parents needed to talk to their children about why screen time needed to be limited, keep devices out of bedrooms, ban them during meal times and “set clear limits” on device use.

He said parents also needed to resist peer pressure to give primary age children devices — noting that Microsoft founder Bill Gates had resisted giving his kids mobiles until they were 14.

Dr Coulson also pointed out that many Silicon Valley heavyweights working for the likes of Google, Yahoo, Apple and eBay usually sent their children to tech-free schools.

The Roberts children are also keen on the outdoors, taking their dog Stix for a run on the beach. Picture: Nathan Edwards

And while much of the focus in on children having access to smartphones and tablets, the SPANS data also revealed that children with TV in their bedrooms would also suffer from negative health effects.

In 2015, about 17.4 per cent of children had a TV in their bedrooms — the study warning that those children “are at greater risk of developing overweight and obesity, have lower academic performance, reduced sleep quality and insufficient sleep”.

Dr Coulson said one approach for parents to effectively limit screen time was to set specific blocks of time for screen use — such as the “technology tickets” available on his website which allocate screen time in 15 and 30-minute blocks.

Parents give their children such tickets to cash in at certain times of the day. “Our children don’t need smart devices, they need smart parents,” Dr Coulson added.

“It is hard to say to your kids, ‘Get off your device’ if you are constantly checking yours.”

Raising Your Child In A Digital World author Dr Kristy Goodwin said device use should be kept away from bedrooms and limited to specific times and areas in the home.

She also said that parents should set an example by limiting their own screen use. “Kids are wired to imitate but the related issue there is this idea of techno neglect, because if parents are glued to their screens, then they’re not there for their child,” she said.

Academic and Win-Win Parenting CEO Dr Rosina McAlpine said parents should avoid nagging but educate their kids on the potential harms of screen use so they could learn to “self-regulate” and set an example themselves.

“It’s about awareness of being a role model, because it is hard to say to your kids, ‘Get off your device’ if you are constantly checking yours,” she said.

The Australian Child Health Poll also reveals that the majority of Australian parents spend an average of 4.6 hours of screen time on weekdays and 4.5 hours on weekend days.

It found that screentime use generally increased with age — with children often mimicking their parents’ screen usage.

“A strong relationship was seen between parent screen time and that of their children, with parents who reported high levels of screen-based use themselves being more likely to report having children with high levels of screen-based use,” the report said.

“Children with parents of lower income were reported to have more screen time than those of higher income.

“This effect was strongest in young children.”

Limiting screen time is important to Port Macquarie parents Amanda and Mike Roberts, who said they were “always conscious” of using their devices in front of their 10-year-old son Wilson and eight-year-old daughter Piper.

But Mrs Roberts added that the children were “big-time outdoor kids”.

“So I don’t have any trouble limiting (screen time),” she said.

“But they do have to be in the loungeroom or in the office, we don’t let them take them into their bedrooms or anything like that.”.