The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has published several articles about TV time for young children from the amount of time spent watching TV, to what is being watched and where it is being watched.
The AAP published the findings of a study by Dr. Michelle Garrison, Kimberly Liekweg, and Dr. Dimitri Christakis from Seattle Children’s on what effects watching violence on TV has on preschoolers. They studied over 600 children between 3 and 5 years of age and reviewed their media diaries.
Their findings:
- Preschoolers watched on average over an hour of TV daily (72.9 min) with the minority being at bedtime (14 min after 7pm).
- Children with a bedroom TV watched 40 more minutes of TV than those without one.
- Children with a bedroom TV watched more TV after 7pm.
- Children with a bedroom TV were more likely to have parent-reported daytime tiredness (8% vs 1% without bedroom TV).
- Children were more likely to have trouble falling asleep, have more nightmares, and more awakenings if in the 1 hour prior to going to bed, if they watched TV, violent or not.
- Fortunately, nonviolent daytime TV didn’t seem to change or impair preschoolers’ sleep.
- It didn’t make a difference on sleep if parents watched TV alongside their children.
While we know that a TV, once in the bedroom, is hard to remove, we also know it is harder for a parent to monitor what is being watched. It can also be turned on in the early am, while the rest of the house is still sleeping, which leads to even more daily viewing time.
We also know that children also pick up additional viewing time in some child care settings
The AAP guidelines recommend no TV viewing before age 2 and then after age 2, only 2 hours maximum screen time daily.
