It is not new that children are spending too much time with their eyes on the screen.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
In the 70s, 80s and 90s it was the TV screen, nowadays it is the smartphone screen.
A recent survey confirms this and the consequences are alarming.
According to a survey undertaken by Roy Morgan research, 94 per cent of Australians between the ages of 14 and 17 have a smart phone.
This figure may surprise you, but in today’s fast paced world it is almost impossible to argue that teens don’t need a mobile device to stay connected with their friends as well as their parents.
Unfortunately the devices also now needed for teenagers to stay part of the group.
But alarmingly, according to an article published over the weekend, the survey “also found that adolescents' psychological well-being decreased the more hours a week they spent on screens, including the Internet, social media, texting, gaming, and video chats.
“The findings jibe with earlier studies linking frequent screen use and teenage depression and anxiety.
“The Australian Bureau of Statistics found that teenagers between the ages of 15 and 17 are the biggest internet users, with 99 per cent of the people in that age group using the web.
“Teenagers between 15 and 17 years old were also spending the most amount of time on the internet, reaching 18 hours a week usage,” it was reported.
That’s one entire day per week, if you take into account normal sleeping patterns, spent looking at a screen connected to the internet and social media.
“Overwhelmingly, the amount of time Australian teens are on the internet is spent on social media,” the report went on to state.
“The study graphed correlations between happiness and screen activities and non-screen activities such as sports, in-person interaction, religious services, print media and homework. For all the non-screen activities, the correlation was positive; for the screen activities it was uniformly negative.”
You have to ask the question, why are parents allowing their children to spend so much time doing something that basically, makes them unhappy.
Parents first, and perhaps our schools second, need to increase the amount of instruction given to our children before they are left to their own devices.
