Parents should ban electronic media during mealtimes and after bedtime as
part of a comprehensive 'family media use plan, ' according to new
recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics. The influential new guidelines are being spurred by a growing recognition of
kids' nearly round-the-clock media consumption, which includes everything from
television to texting and social
media. 'Excessive media use is associated with obesity, poor school performance,
aggression and lack of sleep, ' said Marjorie Hogan, co-author of the new policy
and a pediatrician. Families should have a no-device rule during meals and after bedtime, the
guidelines say. Parents should also set family rules covering the use of the
Internet and social media and cellphones and texting, including, perhaps, which
sites can be visited, who can be called and giving parental access to Facebook
accounts. The policy also reiterated the AAP's existing recommendations: Kids
should limit the amount of screen time for entertainment to less than two hours
per day; children younger than 2 shouldn't have any TV or Internet exposure.
Also, televisions and Internet-accessible devices should be kept out of kids'
bedrooms. Doctors say parents need to abide by the family rules, too, to model healthy
behavior. That, some say, may be the toughest part. 'If you go to any
restaurant, Family 3.0 is Mom and Dad are on their devices and the kids are on
theirs, ' says Donald L. Shifrin, a pediatrician in Bellevue, Wash., and an AAP
spokesman. 'Who is talking to each
other?' Children ages 8 to 18 spent an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes a day
consuming media for fun, including TV, music, videogames and other content in
2009, according to a 2010 report from the Kaiser Family Foundation. The report
was based on a survey of 2, 002 third- through 12th-graders, 702 of whom
completed a seven-day media use diary. That was up about an hour and 17 minutes
a day from five years earlier. About two-thirds of 8- to 18-year-olds said they
had no rules on the amount of time they spent watching TV, playing videogames or
using the computer, the Kaiser report found. Use of mobile devices by young kids has soared. A new report from Common
Sense Media, a child-advocacy group based in San Francisco, found that 17% of
children 8 and younger use mobile devices daily, up from 8% in
2011. 按:Family 3.0指“信息时代的美国家庭”,援引自“Real Clear Politics”的一篇题为“With Its Roots in the Nuclear Family, the Nation Evolves Into America 3.0”的文章,其中指出“the nation as having evolved from an agricultural America 1.0 to an industrial America 2.0 and struggling now to evolve again into an information age America 3.0.”Read more: http://www./articles/2013/07/05/with_its_roots_in_the_nuclear_family_the_nation_evolves_into_america_30_119099.html#ixzz2lCHzrq5f |
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