Family Law

Study Discusses Children Watching Television in Day Care

By Ben Stevens

Do you know how much television your kids watch every day?  Do you really?  If your children are in day care, you probably assume that they are doing things like taking naps and learning to play nicely with others, but you might be surprised to learn that many day care centers allow child to spend as much as two hours a day in front of a television.

A study published last week in the journal Pediatrics, "Preschool-Aged Children's Television Viewing in Child Care Settings" by Dimitri A. Christakis, MD, MPH and Michelle M. Garrison, PhD, was the the first to look at TV watching in child care in more than 20 years.  It found that the amount of time children in child care spend watching TV has doubled since the last study, and preschoolers in child care may now spend more than a third of their 12 waking hours each day in front of a TV (when taking into consideration the two to three hours many parents allow at home).

The American Academy of Pediatrics discourages television viewing of any kind in the first two years of life and recommends a daily limit of only one to two hours of quality programming for older children. Children go to day care to develop social skills, build on cognitive abilities and enjoy imaginative play, as well as allowing their parents to work.  Other research has connected excessive TV watching during the preschool years with language delay, obesity, attention problems and aggression.

Source:  "Some Kids See Lots of TV in Day Care" by Donna Gordon Blankinship, published at AOL News.

Full post as published by SC Family Law Blog on December 02, 2009 (boomark / email).