Child Addiction to Electronics

Child Addiction to Electronics

4 Ps

Addiction is a very strong word to say but this is very common that people are saying now a day that kids are addicted to electronics. We are focusing on screening devices such as TV, Computer, laptop, I pad, Cell phone, video games etc. First we need to understand what is an addiction? After that we need to decide whether my child is addicted to electronics or it just an excessive hobby. Using something in excessive amount to feel comfort and continue using it despite of knowing the bad consequences.

ASAM says that addiction is a chronic brain disorder, not simply a behavioral problem.

The American Psychological Association (APA) says that an addicted individual may experience physical and psychological withdrawal symptoms when the addiction is taken away.

'When people feel an uncomfortable sense of withdrawal when not online, we know that the relationship with technology is not being managed properly,' said Dr Graham from the Capio Nightingale Hospital, a mental health hospital based in central London.

We will discuss the sign of child addiction in our bellow discussion.

Project: 

When we read the final paper presentation guideline we found that we have to present something from our own life that we want to change and the leadership aspect to make the change. When we were thinking of changes the first thing that came to our mind is our family and kinds are the most important part of our family. So we were planning how to become a good leader in front of our kid and help them to become a great leader in future.

  Our project is “Child Addiction to Electronics”. It seems like a so common to most of our family that now we treat it as a very normal practice. Now a day’s kind are using screen based technology for 9 hours a day and it seems like parents are pretty much ok with that. That is the alarming sign so we want to draw the attention of the parents to this and will try to give a clear picture of this problem and solution.

Purpose:

According to a national study 1 in every 8 kids become an addict. Children under the age of 12 are using these devices as like as toys and parents are treating it a learning device. As per The American Academy of Pediatrics kids should learn from face to face interaction to develop their communication skills rather than the device they also says strongly no screen time at all before 2 years and after that just 1/2 hours daily.  We are providing some statistics of how often kinds are using electronics.

• In a typical day, children consume just over three hours of media. This includes computer use, cell phone use, tablet use, music, and reading. Two thirds of this time is spent with “screen media” (TV, computers, the Internet, etc.) while reading is less than 20 minutes per day.

• The time spent with on screen media dramatically increases from the toddler to preschool to school-age years. Children under two have a screen time average of 53 minutes per day. This increases to almost two and a half hours per day among two to four year old and almost three hours for kids in the five to eight year old range.

• Although the use of computers, the internet, and electronic devices are steadily increasing among children, television remains the type of media that children spend the most time with. Sixty-five percent of children under eight years old watch television daily. On average, they spend about an hour and a half (100 minutes to be exact) watching TV every day. 

• As a group, children under eight spend an average of 25 minutes per day playing video games.

• 66% of all children under the age of two have watched television.

• Television watching typically begins at 9 months of age.

• Compared to watching television, playing video games starts later, but nearly half of all two to four year olds have played video games. This increases dramatically just a few years later – 81% have played video game console games and 90% use computers.

• 10% of children under eight years old use educational software and 6% use a computer for homework.

• 11% of children under eight years old use a cell phone, iPod, or iPad / tablet.

• Listening to music actually decreases from birth to age eight. Children up to a year old spend an average of 39 minutes per day listening to music, 30 minutes at ages two to four, and just 23 minutes at ages five to eight.

• By age eight, 96% of children have watched TV, 90% have used a computer, 81% have played console video games, and 60% have played games or used apps on a portable device (cell phone, handheld gaming system, iPod, or tablet). http://www.techaddiction.ca/media-statistics.html

                  Spending long hours in screen electronics can cause long term health problems and the most alarming thing is that it also has some withdrawal symptoms like drug addiction.

• A recent journal of the American College of Cardiology (JACC) study shows that individuals who devote more than four hours a day to screens, including TV, video games or surging the web have a 113% higher risk of heart attack and stroke and a 50% higher risk of death via any cause than people who spend fewer than 2 hours on screens per day even if any individual got plenty of exercise, the results were the same.
• Cell phone and tablet can link to aggression.
• Development delays for communication and speech as they rely on devices to communicate.
• They are having trouble to critically thinking and that leads them to learning disabilities.
• Lack of movements can result on obesity.
• Can cause Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).
• The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) note that too much screen time may leads to sleep and eating disorders.

Victoria Dunckley, M.D. would like to call this a syndrome Electronic Screen Syndrome (ESS). How video games effects a child brain?

Video games create toxic pathways in the brain and body of our youth. They do so in not just one way, but many ways.

First, the brain is being over stimulated by the visual channel as the eyes are exposed to the bright and changing lights (which have been found to cause seizures). This stimulation can cause the release of “feel good” hormones (dopamine) during play but create sharp withdrawal symptoms once play has been stopped. This creates irritability and long terms effects of mood imbalances.