Children’s mental health and mobileImage Credit Source: Getty Images
Digital stress in children: In the digital era, small children are also spending more time on the screen. Online class of school, pictures of homework on mobile, cartoons or games on YouTube, all of these have started looking clearly on the brain and eyes of children. Earlier, where children used to spend more time in outdoor games, now the same time passes on mobile, laptop and TV screen. This habit is gradually becoming a problem for their mental development and physical health.
Children’s eyes are first affected by continuous viewing on the screen. For a long time, seeing mobiles or laptops, problems like dryness, burning, blurring and headache in the eyes have become common. Children’s eyes are not fully developed yet, in such a situation, watching screen can affect their retina and muscles. Many times parents also give children a mobile to feed or calm the children, which becomes a habit.
At the age when there is time for children to play, join the nature, they are spending at that time in front of a screen. Due to which it is evident in the development of children, as well as their mental level can also cause problems. Know whether there can be some problem to the child by looking at the screen continuously
Difficulty in mental development of children
Research suggests that children who spend more time on screen, their ability to focus is reduced. They forget things quickly and they have difficulty in minding studies. Lack of sleep is also a big effect. Running mobile at night disrupts sleep, due to which the child feels tired throughout the day and his nature also becomes irritable.
Social behavior reduction
The impact of screen stress has also been seen on the social behavior of children. Children who watch more mobiles like to live alone. They are not interested in talking to others or playing outside. Gradually, lack of confidence and symptoms of anxiety start emerging. Many children become restless without mobile and even get angry things.
How to reduce children’s screen time.
- First of all, make a fixed rule in the house that you can use the screen only for a certain time every day. For example, permission to play just 1 hour game or 30 minutes to see YouTube. The rules should be strict but explain it with love so that children do not consider it but necessary.
- The second important thing is that the screen should always be used under the supervision of parents. Avoid giving mobiles alone to young children. If they are watching the video, then sit with them, so that you can see what they are watching. This will also prevent wrong content and the child will feel that his parents are more than the screen.
- Remove the children from the screen and give another option according to their interests. Such as drawing, puzzles, reading books, outdoor activities or music. This will give them more fun things instead of screen. It is also important that parents themselves spend less time on the screen, because children learn by looking at their parents.
- Apart from this, make children habit of watching the screen in the right position and from the right distance. The brightness of the screen should be reduced and it can be beneficial to keep blue light filter on. At least one hour before sleeping at night, distance should be made from the screen so that sleep is good.
If the child starts to get angry, stay alone or complain about the eyes again and again, then these can be a symptom of screen addiction. Do not delay in such a situation and consult a pediatrician or psychologist. It is difficult to save the screen completely in today’s time, but by fixing the right guidelines and limits, we can protect children from its bad effects.