Media and technology can be fun for everybody, especially children, but when a dependence starts to grow around it, a real problem emerges.
As time progresses and technology improves, devices and media are becoming more and more accessible to people. This increase in technological advancement, though it may be beneficial in many ways, can be extremely harmful to our youth.
Early exposure to technology poses a countless amount of high risks to children's development, like degrading communication skills and fostering social isolation. The pure convenience of technology may come at the expense of crucial aspects of childhood growth.
Social skills are one of the most important learned skills because they teach us how to properly interact with the world around us, so when kids are not mentally present in social situations, for example, going out to dinner, they never properly gain those skills. When a young child is out at a public place, instead of parents trying to converse with their child and entertain them, they simply throw an iPad their way to be their main source of entertainment. This happens to be such a common affair that kids are beginning to grow extremely behind in social skills and academics.
But social skills aren’t the only side effect. Today’s kids 10 and under are absorbing the most media as children compared to any other generation before them. Also, in this age group, behavioral issues are off the walls. Being on a screen for hours at a time can really take a toll on your attitude and the way you act around people, and children are much more impressionable and prone to these negative mood swings that cause them to act out.
Of course, one of the biggest problems with giving your child access to the internet at such an early age is the risk of the people they could meet through there, like potential bullies and weirdos, as well as the fact that they have free access to any information they know how to ask for. Depression rates for this age group is also at the highest it’sever been. All of these are side effects of the internet. Overall, these documented risks of feeding children too much technology truly takes away from the human experience of interaction with each other and making connections.
