Investigators
Vincent Mancini, Amy Finlay-Jones
Project team members
Gabriella Wells, Bec Young
Project description
Australian children aged 5 years and younger are exposed to more screen time (e.g., televisions, tables, and smartphones) than ever before. Existing government guidelines recommending no screentime for children under 2 years old are not realistic for many families, particularly given that most households will contain multiple electronic devices. Currently, most measures of screen time focus on the duration in which young children are exposed (for example, 90 minutes per day). However, these measures are sometimes unreliable, and do not capture the complexities of parenting that influence childhood screen time exposure. In this study, 500 parents of young children were surveyed and provided insights into their own experiences and beliefs about screen time exposure, as well as voicing their concerns about the potential impact of screen time on their child’s development. Our preliminary results suggest that parents were conflicted about their child’s exposure to screens, highlighting several perceived benefits, but also risks, about the impact that it may have on their children. The scale that we developed as part of this study provides a promising tool that may help large-scale studies quickly identify parental attitudes about childhood screen exposure, thus helping to provide important context that will help govern how clinicians work with families around screen use behaviours.