How much screen time is okay for children during a pandemic?

For years, experts have lined up to lecture parents on the perils of screens and smart devices. But all reason appears to have left the building the moment coronavirus hit, writes Darren Levin.

It’s funny how the rules of the ‘real’ world don’t apply during a pandemic.

Want to do a full day’s worth of Zoom meetings in your underpants? No one’s watching. Order UberEats nachos for breakfast, lunch and dinner? You do you, babes. Go full Don Draper and drink an old fashioned on your lunch break? That’s chill – just don’t forget to garnish it with a citrus rind. Wear pyjamas and uggies to the supermarket as you shop for essential supplies? Actually, that’s not OK and I’m calling the authorities.

Throughout this pandemic the only “gradual loosening” we’ve been enjoying has been the impossibly high standards we set for ourselves during pre-COVID times. For parents that’s mostly related to screentime.

Remember how much we used to beat ourselves up for letting our kids commandeer the iPad for an hour so we could eat our dukkah spiced eggs in a cafe in peace? Remember eating eggs in a cafe? RIP.

Newspaper headlines would admonish us for destroying an entire generation, bolstered by shoddy scientific research by academics who cared more about their own speaking tours and book sales than the welfare of our kids.

Remember how much we used to beat ourselves up for letting our kids commandeer the iPad. Picture: iStock

There’s currently no definitive evidence that screentime meaningfully alters young brains. The results of hundreds of studies have been “mixed, and sometimes contradictory”, according to the New York Times. And yet, the messages cutting through from the academic community were increasingly alarmist. We were depleting their “neurotransmitter deposits” apparently, and rendering their attention spans to a goldfish-like state.

Next to ‘resilience’, screentime became the most discussed topic at school information nights and it also opened up a generational fault line between ourselves and our parents.

“Why are they always on those damn things?” they’d say, momentarily pausing their game of Words With Friends to give you a screentime serve.

Now that narrative is being backtracked in the wake of COVID-19, and the irony is as delicious as those dukkah spiced cafe eggs.

If it’s not Victorian Premier Dan Andrews reminding us of the thousands of ABC resources “available online and on TV”, it’s the vast majority of remote learning happening through the Seesaw app. Even UNICEF is inviting us to “revisit assumptions” about children and devices which, they argue, come from a place of fear.

Even UNICEF is inviting us to “revisit assumptions” about children and devices. Picture: iStock

“Research shows that social media and video games provide temporary escape from real life and offer valuable social engagement.”

Wait, what? Doesn’t social media lead to brain damage, meth addiction, or worse yet, really bad grades? Don’t video games led to anti-social behaviour, mass school shootings, and inappropriate Cosplay?

According to this new directive it’s not so much about the time spent on screens, but what they do on there that counts. And yet despite this welcome U-turn in screentime expectations, there still seems to be a double standard when it applies to kids.

I mean, if it’s OK for us to binge watch Too Hot To Handle and Tiger King on Netflix, why can’t our kids engage with their own forms of age appropriate escapist media?

If screentime is now considered an important self-care and educational tool during COVID, maybe it’s time we accept our their fascination with Ryan’s World, ToyPudding TV, and Fortnite?

But not CookieSwirlC unboxing videos. Those are still creepy as hell.

Darren Levin is a columnist for RendezView.com.au