A study on the screen time of children shows us that our charming darlings are unfortunately too often absorbed by these small skylights.
The National Institute for Health and Medical Research (Inserm) and the National Institute for Demographic Studies (INED) are at the origin of a large-scale longitudinal study intended to estimate the screen time of the most younger generations. Called Elf, it follows over a period of 20 years more than 18,000 children in the country born in 2011.
Too many children in front of screens
While at the end of the 2000s, the proliferation of screens, which goes hand in hand with the advent of the Internet, could be considered as a potential educational tool, the authorities have been alarmed in recent years about the harmful aspects of these devices in the cognitive development of children. Concentration disorders, aggressiveness, depression, impact on health or language… The list of negative consequences is vast.
But while the younger generation must surely be kept away from screens, where particularly addictive applications like TikTok exist, for the moment, the job is not done. According to the Elfe study, the average daily screen time of a 2-year-old French child is 56 minutes, then 1 hour 20 minutes at 3 and a half years old, and finally, 1 hour 34 minutes at 5 and a half years old. In addition, many of them have their own smartphone earlier and earlier.
A clear social determinism
These figures are too high, the recommendations of the WHO being to avoid contact with screens before the age of 2 and to reduce it to 1 hour per day between the ages of 2 and 5. But if the first results are alarming, they also shed light on the disparities between the categories of children more or less exposed to these new machines.
A strong social determinism can be observed in the phenomenon. The more a family has an educated mother, the less the child is posed in front of a screen. Thus, children whose mother has a secondary school level spend on average 45 minutes more in front of the screens at 2 years old and 1h15 more at 5 and a half years old than those whose mother has a level of education at least bac + 5.
Similarly, the children of immigrants are more affected. Those whose mother was born in the Maghreb, Turkey or sub-Saharan Africa are absorbed by a screen on average 30 to 50 minutes more each day than another child whose mother was born in France.
Sources: Release, France 24
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