{"id":2978,"date":"2013-02-27T21:21:20","date_gmt":"2013-02-27T21:21:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.speechbuddy.com\/blog\/?p=2978"},"modified":"2023-11-08T10:23:01","modified_gmt":"2023-11-08T18:23:01","slug":"how-television-is-effecting-your-childs-behavior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.speechbuddy.com\/blog\/news\/how-television-is-effecting-your-childs-behavior\/","title":{"rendered":"How Television is Effecting your Child\u2019s Behavior"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Effects<\/a>

Source: ansonalex.com<\/p><\/div>\n

Television can be a social activity (the Superbowl, Oscars, Grammys) or a solitary one. For children whose brains are just developing, the ever present question is: is this medium a good one for development? As a healthcare specialist, a speech pathologist is concerned about a lot more than language. In order to provide therapy to the whole child, we must become experts in many aspects of child development- cognitive, motor, behavior, attention, learning- these all influence how our patients progress and participate in speech therapy.<\/a> It\u2019s no surprise then that parents often ask about what is appropriate or good for their child, \u201cshould he play the iPad?\u201d \u201cIs Facebook safe?\u201d-<\/a> and \u201cHow much television is ok?\u201d<\/p>\n

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According to a new study in the Journal of Pediatrics, better TV might improve your child’s behavior<\/a>. This suggests that just turning the television off isn\u2019t the only answer but that by changing the channel, children\u2019s behavior can be altered. Thet asked parents to keep diaries and use questionnaires to describe their family\u2019s television habits and their child\u2019s behavior. Half of the parents received advice for six months on getting their 3-to-5-year-old kids to watch programs like “Sesame Street” and “Dora the Explorer” (as opposed to programs like “Power Rangers.)” The results were compared with kids whose parents got advice on healthy eating instead. The researchers found more behavioral improvements<\/a>,\u00a0including less aggression towards others, in the group that received advice on television programming. It\u2019s easy to see why this might be important, as those children watched more educational programs that encouraged empathy while the other children watched more aggressive shows. Sadly, the benefits seemed to diminish over time. One of the most at risk groups, low-income boys, seemed to get the most benefit.<\/p>\n

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\"Children<\/a>

Source: samaa.tv<\/p><\/div>\n

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What the study seems to advocate most is not so much rules for how much use but what kind<\/em> of use. This study highlights that all shows are not created equal, especially for children. Consider Spongebob Squarepants for example. While this can be classified as a children\u2019s show, in 2011, the same journal (Pediatrics) published a study that found watching a snippet of a SpongeBob cartoon negatively affected 4-year-olds\u2019 attention spans. Watching a more realistic PBS cartoon did not.<\/p>\n

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