Children overexposed to television are likely to develop behavioural problems later in life. However, if parents curb their children's viewing habits before they reach the age of five years, it may not have lasting consequences. The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children under the age of two years should not watch any television and that older children should not watch more than 1-2 hours of entertainment media daily. To determine whether viewing TV during very early and later childhood had different effects, researchers from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health in Baltimore interviewed mothers of 2,707 children when the children were 30-33 months old, and again when the children were 5.5 years old. It was found that one in five children viewed more than two hours of TV daily at both time points, while 41 per cent had TV sets in their bedrooms by the age of 5.5 years. While early TV viewing had no effect on children's behaviour if they watched less TV later on, children who were heavy TV watchers at the age of two and five years had more attention and sleep problems and behaved more aggressively. And children who had television sets in their bedrooms at the age of 5.5 years had more sleep problems and duller emotional reactivity than their peers with TV-free bedrooms. It is likely that having a television in the bedroom may lead to increased television viewing at bedtime, thereby interfering with regular sleep patterns and decreasing the intensity with which children react to stimulation. The findings suggested that if two-year-olds who watch TV more than two hours daily cut their viewing time to below two hours by the age of five years, no negative behavioural or social consequences are seen. The effects of TV exposure probably vary with a child's age. The findings also confirm that health care providers should keep advising parents to limit their children's TV consumption to less than two hours daily. Also, parents should not put TV sets in their children's bedrooms. However, this study did not take into account the content of the shows children watched or whether they were viewing alone or with their parents. Further research is warranted to investigate these issues and their consequences in changing behavioural patterns in children.
Pediatrics,
October 2007