How Different Technologies Affect Children’s Brain Development

It seems like kids are always on devices these days. Studies agree – over half of kids under 4 engage with smartphones or tablets on a regular basis. Tweens spend, on average, 4-6 hours per day on screens, and teens can spend more. It’s easy to complain that they should be on them less because that’s the way we grew up. But in a world where school, socializing, and even work can be done online, is that actually a problem? Are the dangers of technology and brain development overblown for media hype, or is there real evidence that screens are bad for kids?

Today, we’re digging into the science of how different technologies affect children’s brain development. And you might be surprised by the facts!

How TV Affects Brain Development

Common wisdom says that TV is bad for kids, end of story. As the Oompa Loompas sing in the 2005 cinematic adaption of Charlie and the Chocolate Factory:

What do you get from a glut of TV? A pain in the neck and an IQ of three.

While there are shows like Dora the Explorer and Sesame Street that claim to be beneficial, there are even more that don’t seem to have any value at all. And many parents don’t feel good about their child staring at the screen all day.

TV is probably the oldest screen technology that your kids interact with regularly, so there’s been time for a lot of studies on how it affects the brain. Let’s dig into what the research says about how the technology of television affects your child’s brain development.

TV and the Young Child’s Brain

If you’re Team No TV, this will probably be the most shocking thing you learn this week: It turns out that some TV is actually good for younger kids! Watching Sesame Street is consistently associated with more school readiness, larger vocabularies, and better numerical skills in young children. Other children’s educational shows, like Dora the Explorer, Blue’s Clues, Arthur, and Clifford the Big Red Dog, are also associated with larger vocabularies, as well as more expressive language skills in general.

However, TV isn’t unequivocally great for children. Quality absolutely matters when it comes to how this technology is affecting their brain development. While educational shows do have benefits, other types of shows aren’t good for young children’s brains. Fast-paced cartoons like SpongeBob SquarePants, for example, have been shown to decrease executive function, short-term memory, abstract thinking, and impulse control. And the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children under two years old watch only with a parent or guardian, no matter what kind of show it is.

TV and the Older Child’s Brain

As a child passes the point in their lives where educational TV can help them prepare for school, the effects of this technology on brain development get more negative. Many studies have found that watching more TV is associated with worse educational achievement. Others have found more TV connected to worse physical health. Many of these studies came out years or decades ago, to the point where it seems obvious to state these facts.

However, these aren’t the only effects of this technology on a child’s brain development. One found TV viewing actually changed the frontopolar and prefrontal areas of the brain, resulting in decreased verbal IQ. More TV watching is associated with depression in young adulthood, especially for boys. Some research correlates increased time in front of the television with increases in social problems and aggressive behavior. And people who watched a lot of TV as kids and teens were more likely to be convicted of a crime in young adulthood.

But although the research says TV is generally bad for older children, there are some exceptions. For example, watching comedies can actually be good for brain development. Humor activates regions of the brain that are involved in reward processing and resolving incongruities, which is beneficial for kids. And, surprisingly, watching reality TV can improve preteen and teen girls’ self-esteem (although it also increases their focus on appearance and fame).

The Bottom Line on TV and Brain Development

You don’t have to ban TV from your household. Even if you’d prefer your child choose other entertainment, the technology isn’t evil. Letting your child watch some TV won’t necessarily harm their brain development. And if your child is between two and five years old and you are careful about what shows they watch, it can even be beneficial.

However, it’s important to set reasonable boundaries around what and how much they watch. Choose quality shows with educational value, especially for younger children. The damaging effects of TV increase as the time watching increases. Keeping it to a reasonable amount – experts recommend no more than an hour per day – is a good compromise between the benefits and dangers of this technology.

How Video Game Technology Affects Brain Development

A whopping 97% of kids between the ages of twelve and seventeen play some kind of video game. Traditional parental wisdom says they should get off the video games and go play real games with their friends. The interactive element leaves many parents worrying that their kids could become (or already are) addicted to their games. And with some gun violence activists connecting school shootings with violent video games, parents may fear that PlayStation controller could turn their kid into a murderer.

So where do video games fall on the scale of “actually beneficial” to “irredeemably harmful”? Is this technology harming your child’s brain development or turning them into something terrible? Let’s look at what science says about it.

Your Child’s Brain on Video Games

If your concern is that video games are rotting your child’s brain, let’s put your fears to rest right now: Video game technology can actually be quite good for brain development, especially when it comes to visual-spacial skills.

While playing a game, your child’s brain activates in multiple regions, which benefits perception, attention, task switching, mental rotation, brain plasticity, short-term memory, and more. (That’s right – far from decreasing their attention spam, video games can actually increase it.) Playing games can also give your child a more flexible mindset, faster reaction time, and better working memory.

It can also help some kids overcome natural disadvantages. Girls are generally not as good at mental rotation as boys. But certain types of video games are so good at improving visual-spacial skills that a girl playing just ten hours of an action game completely eliminates that gender gap.

The skills that this technology helps kids develop are useful far beyond games. Careers like engineering, architecture, natural science, design, and more require the visual-spacial intelligence skills games help build. And they also assist with with everyday tasks like reading maps, driving in traffic, packing, and getting oriented in a new environment.

Video Game Violence

Some activists are drawing connections between violent video games and school shootings. But the science is mixed. Some studies connect kids playing violent video games with them showing more aggressive behaviors. One even found that kids who played violent video games in the past year were four times more likely to report taking a weapon to school. But other studies determined factors like mental illness, certain personality traits, violence in the family, and peer influence affect aggression more than games.

Long story short, the science still isn’t settled. We can’t say that violent video games cause violent behavior, but we also can’t rule it out. Researchers will have to study this more to draw more definite conclusions.

Video Games and Addiction

Many parents worry that their kids might become addicted to video games, or that they already are. Internet Gaming Disorder is actually a diganosable condition under the International Classification of Diseases. And the truth is, there is a risk. Anything that feels pleasurable has the potential to become addicting for anyone.

However, the amount of risk varies depending on the child. Some kids have more trouble balancing short-term rewards with consequences, which makes them more prone to addiction. If you know that your child has a tendency towards addictive behaviors, watch for signs of a problem. But rates of pathological gaming in kids are actually lower than the rates of alcohol abuse in kids. If your child doesn’t have addiction risk factors, you probably don’t need to worry much – especially if you also enforce clear boundaries and limits about the amount of time they can spend playing.

The Bottom Lines on Video Games and Kids’ Brains

The science is pretty clear that video games won’t rot your child’s brain. In fact, a reasonable amount of time spent gaming can actually be good for them. Especially if you have a daughter interested in science or engineering, encouraging her to play some video games can help her bridge the visual-spacial skills gap between her and her male peers.

If you don’t want your child playing violent games, there are other options that provide benefits without the violence. Real-time strategy games like Civilization, Risk, Age of Empires, and StarCraft are great choices. These types of games often have war as an element, but focus more on things like construction, exploration, and managing an economy. LEGO games, Tetris, and open-world games like Minecraft are also good options.

One important key here: Don’t allow unlimited time playing video games. Just because some play has benefits doesn’t mean unlimited play won’t be harmful. A child who spends all their time playing games doesn’t have time for homework, taking care of their body with hygiene, exercise, and sleep, or socializing with their peers, all of which are also important for healthy brain development. Put reasonable limits on their technology time to protect their overall health and development.

How Social Media Technology Affects Brain Development

There are a lot of scary headlines about kids on social media. Predators are there seeking victims! Instagram isn’t safe! TikTok is so dangerous the government wants to ban it! But we all know headlines can get blown out of proportion. Are the dangers all exaggerated for internet views, or is social media so bad that you should make your kid use a social media-free phone until they’re twenty-seven?

As with all technology, there are benefits and harms. Social media can affect your child’s brain development and their future, so it’s important to know the facts.

What Social Media Does To and For Kids

Let’s start with the positive: Social media is important for social development, especially for teens. Most teens do at least some portion of their socialization online. This lets them feel connected and build relationships with their peers even when they’re not physically together. And social media helps teens build a wider network and express themselves. These are all important parts of teen brain development that this technology supports.

However, there are also a lot of downsides to social media. Depression and anxiety in teens are both correlated with higher social media use. Research has shown that Instagram specifically makes body image worse for a third of teen girls. And 6% of American teenagers with suicidal thoughts said those suicidal thoughts started on Instagram.

Social media also includes peer pressure, which can be dangerous. Some studies have found social media posts about alcohol can encourage teens to drink. There are also risks of social media challenges. For example, “the choking game” encourages kids to choke themselves until they pass out and upload the video to social media. Some kids have died participating in this “game.”

How Social Media Affects Children’s Brains

This technology doesn’t just have emotional and social effects. It can also affect brain development and thought processes. Getting likes, views, followers, and other forms of social approval on social media causes the brain to release dopamine. Children’s brains aren’t fully developed, and they’re generally less able to moderate and manage these dopamine spikes. And social media operates with intermittent rewards, just like a slot machine. You never know if you pull the slot machine lever if you’re going to win or lose; you never know when you open your social media app if you’re going to have no notifications or thirty new followers. This intermittent reward keeps people coming back. It also exponentially increases the potential for addiction.

This constant drive for social media dopamine has other affects, too. When a child becomes dependent on these small spikes of dopamine, they start to hunt for it constantly. This decreases their attention span, ability to focus, quality of sleep, and in-person interactions.

Frequently using social media has been shown to make kids more sensitive to peer feedback and criticism. However, we don’t yet know if that’s necessarily a bad thing. It might make them more sensitive to social cues, which would be helpful when interacting with others. But it also might make their self-esteem more fragile, which would be bad for their mental and emotional health.

The Bottom Line on Social Media Technology and Brain Development

If you want to protect your child’s brain development, use caution with social media technology. However, banning it outright might not be the best decision. The US Surgeon General has said that kids thirteen and under shouldn’t be on social media at all. But especially for older kids, the harm that banning social media could do to their social life could outweigh the benefits to their brains.

It’s also important to remember that kids don’t have fully functional frontal lobes yet. Their judgment, reasoning, decision-making, and thinking through consequences abilities aren’t the best yet. As a parent, part of your job is to help them make better judgments about technology while their brain is developing. Talk to your kids about the good and the bad of social media. And strongly consider monitoring their accounts for danger, discussing problems, and putting limits on what apps they use or for how long. All of this can help protect them and their brains.

Technology Tools to Protect Your Child’s Brain Development

Most of the recommendations for all of these different technologies have similar solutions to protect your child’s brain development. They boil down to: Monitor what they’re doing, and set limits on how long they can do it. If your child spends a lot of time on a lot of devices, this can feel like a lot of work on your end.

But it doesn’t have to be. Parental control software options exist specifically to help you protect your child’s brain development through the power of technology. These software allow you to set custom, granular rules for your child’s device usage. You can allow this social media, but not that one. Or you can limit games to only thirty minutes on school nights. And the monitoring options let you see what they’re doing, watching, and saying, so you can spot potential problems early.

Parental control software let you focus on your child, not the rules. Let the technology handle the details, and you can put your effort towards supporting your child as they grow and teaching them how to protect themselves.