It’s a question that every parent asks. And if they aren’t asking it, they should.
How much time is too much time when it comes to the time your kids spend on their iPhone, iPad, tablets or other digital technology, not counting the time they spend using those devices for school work.
That’s the question that all parents need to know.
San Diego State professor Dr. Jean Twenge and the author of studies and books on what she calls the I-Generation….. wrote an article at Time.com the other day in which she offers a suggestion and some facts to back it up.
She wrote the article to respond to recent reports that claim that kids’ use of digital technology does not affect their mental health. She says don’t believe them.
Dr. Twenge says four large studies show the same thing: happiness and mental health are highest when kids are limited to between one half hour and two hours of extracurricular use of digital media a day. Kids who spend more than that, are worse off with twice as many heavy users of digital devices described as being unhappy, depressed or distressed as lighter users of digital media.
So while it’s up to each parent to decide how much time is too much time when it comes to a child’s use of digital devices outside of school work, like so much in life, too much of a good thing can be a bad thing,
And that’s something everyone should remember, because as any of us who are parents know.. our kids take their cues from us every day and all the time.
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