the idiot box
watching television does not make babies smarter.
duh.
now, i’m certainly not one to tell parents what to do – i fully recognise that we live in a world where television is a inescapable and pervasive medium. today’s childhood is not like it was when i grew up.
when i grew up, we had one television. it was black and white, and had about 7 watchable channels. the only children’s programming on offer at my house was “sesame street”, “the brady bunch” and a few mild cartoons. we didn’t get a colour television until i was 10. my television viewing was limited to the hours after my parents got home from work, and until i hit the teen years, i wasn’t even allowed to watch t.v. after 9pm. adult shows like “hill street blues” were off limits until i was about 15. my dad used to go so far as to put a lock on the television during the afterschool period so we couldn’t watch it until he’d made sure we’d done our homework and chores. certainly no surprise then, that we never had our own televisions, and we definitely never had cable.
and this was in the *70s and early 80s* – an era that looks positively innocent, nearly virginal really, by comparison with today’s standards.
i would never suggest that today’s parents be quite so draconian as my parents were, because quite frankly, these measures resulted in a lengthy period in my early adulthood when i was positively glued to the t.v. set, ingesting television like a starving man at a junk food buffet, as if to make up for lost time. moderation in all things, i say.
but my parents (and many others) knew back then what many of today’s parents have lived in denial of for far too long: t.v. is not good for the developing brain. we are, by nature, creatures who learn best through social interaction, and a brightly lit box simply cannot substitute for a parents attention and engagement. my parents generation called it the “idiot box” when they saw us sitting in front of it, gazing at it adoringly with glazed eyes – and they weren’t far off.
yes, i learned a lot of spanish through watching “sesame street”. but i learned a great deal more by reading and playing and creating and imagining. and my parents ensured that i did a lot more of the latter than i did of the former.
the “baby einstein” programmes and their ilk offer too many parents a panacea – assuaging their guilt at using the television as a substitute babysitter by convincing them they’re actually enhancing their child’s brain power. hopefully this study puts paid to that.
and though i don’t praise my parents often enough, let me give credit where credit is due. while you may have tried too hard at times, you never took the easy way out, and i benefited enormously from that – thanks mom and dad. you may have saved me a few extra i.q. points 
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Comment by Amity
5.03.2009 @ 22:41 pm
This is something I really struggle with. I agree that using tv as a babysitter isn’t something any parent should be doing too much of but it is unavoidable for some of us sometimes.
For example, when I am stuck on the sofa nursing the baby or working at the computer and my daughter is pulling at me, wanting me to play and then crying when I say I can’t, I don’t kick up a fuss when she turns the tv on and watches it for awhile. And sometimes I just need a mental health break and if the alternative to not allowing tv is me screaming at them, I’d rather my kids watch a half hour of CBeebies or Mary Poppins than have a fuming mother pretending to enjoy playing. I feel incredible guilt about the tv that my daughter watches and alternate between resolving to get rid of the thing and not putting too much stress on myself to be perfect.
It’s so hard being a parent and getting all of this conflicting information. If you don’t let your kids do certain things you’re seen as too coddling and overprotective and if you let them do too much you’re judged as lazy and permissive. It’s a tough balancing act and I hope I can find some balance on this particular issue soon. So while in an ideal world no one would let their young children watch tv, the reality is that some people are just trying to survive and in the grand scheme of things, too much tv isn’t probably going to rot kids’ brains as much as we sometimes think.
Comment by Jen
6.03.2009 @ 06:56 am
as i said, being extremely strict with tv backfired totally with me, so i advocate moderation in everything. tv is an important part of our daily lives – no escaping it, it just is.
but there are far too many parents who simply *don’t care* how much television their kids watch, all too willing to fool themselves that as long as it’s “educational”, it’s okay. i have a real philosophical problem with that.
will it rot their brains? no, they’ll probably still grow up to be pretty intelligent kids. but as the article said, it’s depriving them of other, more enriching experiences. in a world where kids are already deprived of a lot of the freedoms you and i grew up with, i find it very sad.