TV and your child: is it time to switch off?
When your toddler rushes in exclaiming: "You can get a sofa and you don't have to pay for it for three years!", you know you've been using the electronic babysitter a tad too often. But is it harmful for children to be besotted with the box from such a young age?
An opium for the mini-masses?
After watching TV for ten minutes, my daughters look like they've been on intravenous Valium - glassy-eyed and slack-jawed, a herd of wild buffalo could stampede through the living room and they'd barely blink. Martin Large, father of four, calls TV a 'plug in drug', which can lead to behavioural problems, sleep disorders and all manner of difficulties in playing and communicating. In his book Set Free Childhood, he quotes research showing that children watching TV are in an alpha brainwave state, i.e. passive and aimless - compared to the alert, attentive beta brainwave state, which reading induces.
"The medium tunes out the decision-making part of the brain and lowers consciousness, " says Large.
A recent survey by the Independent Television Commission (ITC) found that many children said they could not imagine life without television and found it "almost impossible to turn it off". Eastenders was voted their favourite programme.
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"Programmes like Tellytubbies are supposed to be so educational," says Large. "Yet what children really want is someone to talk to them and play with them." He argues that rather than being a useful babysitter, TV actually hinders children from learning how to play imaginatively and amuse themselves.
Fractured families
My favourite TV memories aren't so much The Magic Roundabout and Captain Pugwash, as me and my brother laughing ourselves silly watching Morcambe & Wise with our parents. In the 1970s, with only three channels to choose from and one TV in the house, viewing was a shared, squashed on the sofa together, experience.
But now, with dozens of channels and umpteen TVs per household, families are increasingly disparate in their viewing habits - and it starts young. Nowadays, many under-fours are watching alone in their own rooms. An ITC survey found 36 per cent of under-fours have a TV in their bedrooms.
So, the opportunity to spend time together, to at least talk about a programme and - more importantly - to monitor viewing - is becoming lost.
"As children's bedrooms become ever more well equipped with the electronic media, they are spending increasing amounts of time plugged in - up to four or five hours a day," warns Large.
"The number of face-to-face conversations and encounters is decreasing as parents are spending less and less time with their children."
I want that!
My four-year-old daughter, Issy, watches Saturday morning TV giving a Tourette's-like commentary: "I want that; I want that; I want that . . . " over the adverts. Large says that many children see more than 20,000 commercials a year.
But it's not just the advertisements. Product placements, sponsorship and TV tie-ins ensure pester power packs a hefty punch. Ask any parent who's been browbeaten into buying Postman Pat pasta shapes rather than good old spaghetti hoops.
"Kids get totally caught up in being branded; it's absolutely insidious. Children who hardly watch TV are far more individual and less vulnerable to peer pressure," says Large.
Switching off
So how can we limit the effects of too much TV and electronic media on our children? Large is quite hardline and believes that children should not be exposed to television at all before the age of seven. If you are expecting your first child, discuss now whether to bin the box and bring your child up free from temptation.
If the habit already has a grip in your household then use a holiday to kickstart cutting down on consumption. Our recent fortnight away sans TV and computers, saw Daisy and Issy playing complex imaginary games for hours. They didn't ask to watch telly and it was a relief not to have to deal with Issy's 'time to turn off the TV' tantrums. Since getting home, we've severely rationed viewing and they seem happier and busier.
Large advocates banning TVs and computers from bedrooms; covering them up so they're out of sight and out of mind, and having strict rules on when and how much TV is allowed. If older children put up a fight then you could try a new gizmo which you can programme to turn off the TV automatically after so many minutes' viewing . . .
Whatever you do, Large promises life with less or no TV will be far better: "It's more fun, it's calmer and you have more time. You'll find your kids will be more creative and will play better by themselves. You probably won't notice what you're missing."
by Fiona Murray
Click here for more information or to order Set Free Childhood (Hawthorn Press, £10.99)
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