Negative Effects of Technology on Young Children

Introduction: Technology and Young Children in the Digital Age

The advent of the Digital Age has altered the way individuals interact, shop, educate, and entertain themselves. For young people especially, the Digital Age has presented both opportunities and threats. Whereas adults grew up in a world before the iPhone and nearly universal access to the Internet, live streaming, social media, hyper-realistic video games, and tablets, today's children are growing up without knowing a world before these technologies existed. For that reason, they are exposed to more advanced technologies than their parents were. And though computers and other types of technology can certainly be helpful in some respects — such as when used in moderation to help children develop academic skills (Subrahmanyam, Kraut, Greenfield, & Gross, 2000) — there are many negative effects that technology can have on young children. Those negative effects can include health problems, a loss of social skill development, and safety risks. This paper describes and discusses these negative impacts and threats that young children face as a result of their exposure to technology in the Digital Age.

Health Risks: Physical Inactivity, Poor Diet, and Radiation

One of the major problems of technology for young children is overexposure. Too much technology in the lives of children tends to lead to less physical activity in their daily lives. Instead of running around and playing sports outdoors, children are playing games on game consoles, using iPads or tablets, browsing the Internet, or streaming shows online. Such a stationary lifestyle at such a young age can cause health problems due to a lack of exercise. Compounded with poor eating choices — excessive snacking while sitting and using technology — this can cause obesity in young children, which in turn can lead to diabetes. As Rosen et al. (2014) found in their study of the effects of technology use among children, pre-teens, and teens, "total media consumption predicted ill-being while for pre-teens specific technology uses, including video gaming and electronic communication, predicted ill-being. For teenagers, nearly every type of technological activity predicted poor health" (p. 364). In other words, too much daily video game time and other electronics usage is a clear indicator that a young person will have poor health. The reason is straightforward: human bodies are meant to be exercised, and for young people especially, physical activity is necessary to help the body develop and grow properly.

Moreover, it is not just that technology use among children causes inactivity; it also facilitates the development of other bad habits — such as excessive snacking. Children sitting in front of a television or a video game console may drink more soda, which is loaded with sugar, and indulge in fatty snack foods. Excessive technology use among children is an indicator that they are also likely to have poor dietary habits alongside their poor physical activity habits (Rosen et al., 2014). The end result is that children harm their bodies by relying too much on technology as a source of entertainment and pleasure.

Other health risks that can arise include cancer-causing radiation from cell phone usage — especially for young children who routinely hold mobile phone devices up to their heads. Numerous researchers have shown that cell phone usage presents a clear and present danger for developing children, their brains, and their biological systems (Nylund & Leszczynski, 2006; Gandhi et al., 2012; Kesari, Siddiqui, Meena, Verma, & Kumar, 2013). Cell phone radiation can also affect fetal development, which means that even unborn children are not safe from the negative effects of technology use. The mere availability of a technology does not mean it is free from side effects and harmful risks for children.

Social Skill Development and the Dangers of Digital Dependence

Another major problem that technology poses for young children concerns social interaction development. Young children who are given access to mobile phones, social media, and computers tend to lack the real-world experience of social interaction and the concomitant social skills needed to communicate effectively face-to-face in actual society (Pea et al., 2012). Social skills are especially important for children to develop, as they are what allow relationships to be built, friendships and acquaintances to be formed, and positive contributions to social circles to be made. Without practice in developing social skills, children can feel isolated, withdrawn, cut off, marginalized, and depressed. This, in turn, can lead them to rely more and more on social media friendships and Internet-based socializing. In other words, a negative feedback loop is established when young children become too reliant upon social media and communication technology for their personal socialization needs. Instead of interacting with real people directly and in person, they depend upon distance-based relationships that do not involve picking up on social and emotional cues, signals, or non-verbal gestures that enhance an individual's social and emotional intelligence.

Part of what makes communication meaningful, and part of what helps adults to be good leaders, is the ability to demonstrate social and emotional intelligence. Yet young children who spend all their socializing time online or using cell phones to communicate via social media posts are missing out on a critical stage of social development. As Pea et al. (2012) point out, "negative social well-being was positively associated with levels of uses of media that are centrally about interpersonal interaction (e.g., phone, online communication) as well as uses of media that are not (e.g., video, music, and reading)" (p. 327). They also found that while "video use was particularly strongly associated with negative social well-being indicators," "face-to-face communication was strongly associated with positive social well-being" (Pea et al., 2012, p. 327). In short, the more attached to their phones and video screens young children are, the less inclined they will be to communicate in face-to-face situations or know how to conduct themselves in real-world settings where they are obliged to interact with other human beings. The danger, therefore, is that technology-reliant children will be cut off socially from the reality of existing in a human society, which will limit the extent to which they can participate in that society — whether academically, professionally, or personally.

Conclusion: Protecting Children from Technology's Harmful Effects

Technology is not without its risks for young children, and thus they should not be left for too long with too much technology, as it can have negative effects on them in numerous ways. From health-related issues — such as physical inactivity that can cause obesity or cell phone radiation that may cause cancer — to social skill development deficits, to safety and security concerns, there exists a wide range of factors that parents must consider before exposing their young children to technology indiscriminately. To protect children from the harmful side effects of too much technology in their lives, it is important that limitations be placed on the extent and manner in which electronic devices are used by the young. In the Digital Age, where technology is everywhere, it is crucial that children be protected from the dangers inherent in its unchecked usage.

References

Gandhi, O. P., Morgan, L. L., de Salles, A. A., Han, Y. Y., Herberman, R. B., & Davis, D. L. (2012). Exposure limits: The underestimation of absorbed cell phone radiation, especially in children. Electromagnetic Biology and Medicine, 31(1), 34–51.

Kesari, K. K., Siddiqui, M., Meena, R., Verma, H. N., & Kumar, S. (2013). Cell phone exposure on brain and associated biological systems. IJEB, 51(3).

Nylund, R., & Leszczynski, D. (2006). Mobile phone radiation causes changes in gene and protein expression in human endothelial cell lines and the response seems to be genome and proteome dependent. Proteomics, 6(17), 4769–4780.

Pea, R., Nass, C., Meheula, L., Rance, M., Kumar, A., Bamford, H., … & Zhou, M. (2012). Media use, face-to-face communication, media multitasking, and social well-being among 8- to 12-year-old girls. Developmental Psychology, 48(2), 327.

Rosen, L. D., Lim, A. F., Felt, J., Carrier, L. M., Cheever, N. A., Lara-Ruiz, J. M., … & Rokkum, J. (2014). Media and technology use predicts ill-being among children, preteens and teenagers independent of the negative health impacts of exercise and eating habits. Computers in Human Behavior, 35, 364–375.

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Subrahmanyam, K., Kraut, R. E., Greenfield, P. M., & Gross, E. F. (2000). The impact of home computer use on children's activities and development. The Future of Children, 10(2), 123–144.