Screens: Time for common sense

Technology is responsible for many a wonderful thing — life-saving advances in industry and medicine, miracles of space exploration and scientific knowledge to benefit mankind, bridging loved ones separated by oceans.

Yet as life so often reminds us, nothing extreme is healthy. Technology has shortcomings which beg management, awareness. We must develop a common sense of these, then exercise it.

Case in point: screen time.

Especially among the young, eye-to-eye is being replaced by eye-to-screen. That goes beyond attention. Clinical psychologists note that while focused on screens, such as when texting, empathy goes down.

Kids, shake your heads now. Older generations not “getting” the young is nothing new; somehow civilization has survived past generational paranoias in the face of change. It’s never as bad as we think, right?

An astonishing study released in November by Common Sense Media, a nonprofit advocating balanced use of media technologies, found that U.S. teens aged 13 to 18 spend an average nine hours on entertainment media (TVs, computers, iPads, smart phones) per day. “Tweens” aged 8 to 12 spend six hours daily. Those figures don’t include school or homework-related media. They do include videos, games, social networking, browsing, texting friends and Skyping grandma.

Thinking back to that empathy drain, that’s a lot of “me.” While staring at this screen, I’m not paying attention to people in the room. Or the cat, as she regularly points out.

Screen use varies by individual, income, and gender. Low-income kids, with less access to devices and digital media, spend less time with screens than do wealthier peers. However, poorer kids who do have access tend to spend more time on their devices than do kids in wealthier families.

Teen boys average an hour a day playing video games, compared to girls’ seven minutes. Teen girls spend 40 minutes more a day than boys on social media (1:32 vs. 52 minutes). The preferred teen and tween time-passer is still entertainment programming (music and “TV” shows), but now nearly half is now on mobile devices.

The American Academy of Pediatrics warns too much screen time creates attention problems and difficulties in school. A 2014 UCLA study showed sixth-graders who spent time unplugged were better at reading human emotions, compared with children who spent more time with technology. Remember that empathy drain? Thus less screen time for anybody translates to better future relationships — better marriage partners, parents, bosses, and employees.

The phenomenon isn’t uniquely American, but consumption varies. According to media services giant ZenithOptimedia, worldwide daily screen time (age undifferentiated) averaged 8.2 hours in 2014. The region with the highest average is Latin America at 12 hours. The lowest is Asia (five hours).

Most, if not all, screen time is while the body is stationary, a likely explanation for a Canadian study published online this month and correlating more screen time with earlier onset of type 2 diabetes. Canadian pediatric health guidelines suggest a maximum of 2.5 hours of screen time daily; two-thirds of Canadian teens exceed that. The University of Montreal study found diabetes onset can be at least delayed, if not prevented, by a more active lifestyle in youth (and beyond).

Digital media use is so entwined with young generations it feels natural, even essential. It’s not going away, projected to increase each year. To better balance the good technologies bring against their associated risks requires parents, caregivers, teachers, the young and old to develop a culture of management. To put technology in its valued, but limited, place.

Hope abounds. In the Common Sense Media study, smaller categories of teens dubbed “light users” spent only 90 minutes per day on screens, and another set, “readers,” evenly split their mere three hours of screen time between reading screens and paper versions — printed books, newspapers, and magazines.

Campaigns can spread awareness. An Alberta group in 2011 started “Family Day Unplugged,” a whole day without phones, mobile devices, and social media. What began with 16 participating Canadian communities has grown to 30, with friendly competitions for who is most unplugged. They market little “sleeping bags” for mobile phones, and host special events and activities.

We’ve picked up on it south of the border with Reboot’s “National Day of Unplugging” from sundown March 4 to sundown March 5. The “unplug pledge” dumps screen time in favor of… whatever floats your boat. Salsa dance? Baseball? Staring lovingly into a partner’s rediscovered eyes? Fido votes for a Frisbee fest in the park.

Prepare to take the pledge with me in March. Let’s all unplug.

Sholeh Patrick is a columnist for the Hagadone News Network who wishes satellites stopped working during power outages, just for a while. That text just ruins the intimacy of a candle-lit Scrabble game. Commiserations welcome at Sholeh@cdapress.com.