“Video games threaten kids' attention span” plus 3 more

Video games threaten kids' attention span
Do video games cause attention problems in kids?
Study: Too many video games may sap attention span
Kids Kamp, pool offer summertime fun at Lime Street Park

Video games threaten kids' attention span

Posted: 05 Jul 2010 10:41 AM PDT

Kids who watched TV or played video games for more than two hours a day were more likely to have attention problems in the classroom, the study found. (Associated Press)

Playing video games may make it harder for some children to pay attention in school, a new study suggests.

Watching too much TV has been linked to attention problems in children, but few studies have looked for a similar effect for video games.

In Monday's issue of the journal Pediatrics, U.S. researchers report that children who exceeded the two hours per day of screen time recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics were 1.5 to two times more likely to be considered above average in attention problems by their teachers compared to children who met the guideline.

The researchers followed 1,323 children in Grades 3 to 5 and 210 college students. For the children, parents helped log TV and gaming time over a year. The college students filled in reports on their TV and video game exposure and attention problems.

Teachers rated the children on school performance, aggressive behaviour and attention problems using a five-point rating scale.

"In just one year, we would see attention problems in the classroom getting worse related to how much time kids are in front of television and video games," said study co-author Douglas Gentile, an associate professor of psychology at Iowa State in Aimes, Iowa.

While the researchers did take into account earlier attention problems and gender, none of the participants were formally diagnosed with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder, or ADHD.

Statistically, the effects would be considered small to moderate in size. But public health concerns are often based on relatively small effects, particularly with issues that affect many people, like watching TV and video gaming, said the study's lead author, Edward Swing, a psychology doctoral candidate at Iowa State.

Screen-time limits proposed

"These studies demonstrate that the risk could be reduced if parents followed the recommendation of the AAP to limit children's exposure to television and video games to no more than two hours per day," Gentile and his colleagues concluded.

"Furthermore, there are theoretical reasons to believe that slower-paced educational, nonviolent content is less likely to cause attention problems, but more studies on this issue are especially needed."

The study cannot determine if using electronic media itself causes reduced attention, since other factors may also contribute that were not considered in the study, the researchers acknowledged in calling for longer-term studies.

For example, some children may stay up late gaming, which leads to attention problems from lack of sleep, or the screen time may mean children fail to get enough exercise, said Judith Wiener, a professor of school and clinical child psychology at the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education in Toronto.

A study earlier this year by the Kaiser Family Foundation found kids aged eight to 18 devote an average of seven hours and 38 minutes per day to entertainment media, or more than 53 hours a week multitasking with media.

The study was partly funded by Medica Foundation, Healthy and Active America Foundation, Fairview Health Services, and Cargill, Inc.

With files from The Canadian Press

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Do video games cause attention problems in kids?

Posted: 05 Jul 2010 11:53 AM PDT

NEW YORK (Reuters Health) – Long hours in front of the television, whether channel surfing or gaming, could make it difficult for kids to concentrate in school, psychologists said Monday.

While researchers are still divided on the issue, the findings jibe with most earlier work on the effects of television watching in kids, they said.

"What we don't know at this point is why TV and video games really would cause attention problems," said Douglas A. Gentile, who worked on the study.

Gentile, who runs the Media Research Lab at Iowa State University in Ames, added that too much screen time had also been linked to increased aggression and, perhaps less surprisingly, expanding waistlines.

He said the new study, published in the journal Pediatrics, was the first to follow over time how video games may impact kids' concentration skills.

While the research doesn't directly prove that long screen time causes the psychological issues, "we know that earlier television watching was not caused by later attention problems," Gentile told Reuters Health.

The researchers followed a group of more than 1,300 school-age children, who, assisted by their parents, logged their TV and gaming hours over a year. They then asked teachers to answer questions about how the children behaved in school -- whether they had difficulty staying on task, for instance, or often interrupted others.

Even after accounting for attention problems when children entered the study, those who watched a lot of TV or played a lot of video games had slightly more problems concentrating on schoolwork.

Specifically, those children who spent more than two hours per day in front of the screen -- the limit recommended by the American Academy of Pediatrics -- increased their odds of exceeding the average level of attention problems by 67 percent.

Extreme cases of attention difficulty sometimes lead to a diagnosis of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), which between three and seven percent of school-age children suffer from. The researchers did not diagnose any kids with that condition, however.

They also tested undergraduate students, this time using psychological questionnaires designed to reveal ADHD, such as the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale.

In these students, exceeding two hours of daily screen time doubled their risk of landing above average in attention problems, although they weren't diagnosed with ADHD.

Gentile said the impact of TV and video games depended on lots of factors, and wasn't necessarily dramatic.

"Not every kid is going to be influenced to the same amount," he said. "No one thing causes our behavior. It's a combination of all the pushes and pulls that we get -- the media is just one variable."

Miriam Mulsow, an expert in ADHD who was not involved in the study, said she did not think TV or video games could cause attention problems or ADHD.

"There are parents out there who are doing the best they can, but are working multiple jobs and can't afford child care," said Mulsow, of Texas Tech University in Lubbock. "What worries me is that those parents will think they cause their children to have ADHD. I don't think that's the case, and I don't think those parents should feel bad."

However, she added, "if a child has a tendency toward attention problems then sitting in front of the TV not getting enough exercise would exacerbate it."

She said she agreed a child shouldn't be allowed to watch more than two hours of TV a day. "I didn't even allow my kids to watch that much," she told Reuters Health.

Gentile said the findings also send a positive message to parents whose kids are plagued by attention problems.

"This study perhaps gives parents a first line of defense because (screen time) is something they can control," he said. "The research suggests that parents actually are in a more powerful position to help their children than they realize."

SOURCE: http://link.reuters.com/baw75m Pediatrics, online July 5, 2010.

Pediatrics, online July 5, 2010.

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Study: Too many video games may sap attention span

Posted: 05 Jul 2010 01:17 AM PDT

(Health.com) -- Parents who believe that playing video games is less harmful to their kids' attention spans than watching TV may want to reconsider -- and unplug the Xbox. Video games can sap a child's attention just as much as the tube, a new study suggests.

Elementary school children who play video games more than two hours a day are 67 percent more likely than their peers who play less to have greater-than-average attention problems, according to the study, which appears in the journal Pediatrics.

Playing video games and watching TV appear to have roughly the same link to attention problems, even though video games are considered a less passive activity, the researchers say.

"Video games aren't less likely than television to be related to attention problems," says the lead author of the study, Edward Swing, a doctoral candidate in the department of psychology at Iowa State University, in Ames. "They were at least as strong as television at predicting attention problems."

However, the study doesn't prove that video games directly cause attention problems. It could be that kids who have short attention spans to begin with might be more likely to pick up a joystick than a book, for instance.

Health.com: Quiz: Do you have adult ADHD?

The relationship between video games and attention is probably a two-way street, Swing says. "It wouldn't surprise me if children who have attention problems are attracted to these media, and that these media increase the attention problems," he says.

Swing and his colleagues followed more than 1,300 children in the third, fourth, and fifth grades for a little over a year. The researchers asked both the kids and their parents to estimate how many hours per week the kids spent watching TV and playing video games, and they assessed the children's attention spans by surveying their schoolteachers.

Previous studies have examined the effect of TV or video games on attention problems, but not both. By looking at video-game use as well as TV watching, Swing and his colleagues were able to show for the first time that the two activities have a similar relationship to attention problems.

Health.com: Attention sappers: 5 reasons you can't concentrate

C. Shawn Green, Ph.D, a postdoctoral associate in the department of psychology at the University of Minnesota, in Minneapolis, points out that the study doesn't distinguish between the type of attention required to excel at a video game and that required to excel in school.

"A child who is capable of playing a video game for hours on end obviously does not have a global problem with paying attention," says Green, who has researched video games but was not involved in the current study. "The question, then, is why are they able to pay attention to a game but not in school? What expectancies have the games set up that aren't being delivered in a school setting?"

Experts have suggested that modern TV shows are so exciting and fast paced that they make reading and schoolwork seem dull by comparison, and the same may be true for video games, the study notes.

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It's unclear from this study whether that's the case, however, because Swing and his colleagues didn't look at the specific games the kids were playing.

"We weren't able to break [the games] down by educational versus non-educational or nonviolent versus violent," says Swing, adding that the impact different types of games may have on attention is a ripe area for future research.

The study also suggests that young kids aren't the only ones whose attention spans may be affected by video games.

Health.com: Too much TV linked to earlier death

In addition to surveying the elementary school kids, the researchers asked 210 college students about their TV and video-game use and how they felt it affected their attention. The students who logged more than two hours of TV and video games a day were about twice as likely to have attention problems, the researchers found.

These attention problems later in life may be the result of "something cumulative that builds up over a lifetime" or "something that happens early in life at some critical period and then stays with you," Swing says. "Either way, there are implications that would lead us to want to reduce television and video games in childhood."

The American Academy of Pediatrics, the leading professional organization for pediatricians and the publisher of Pediatrics, recommends that parents limit all "screen time" (including video and computer games) to less than two hours per day.

Health.com: The 10 habits of healthy families

For his part, Green says that how much time kids spend playing video games should be a matter of common sense and parental judgment.

"A hard boundary, such as two hours, is completely arbitrary," he says. "Children are individuals, and what makes sense for one won't necessarily work for another."

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Kids Kamp, pool offer summertime fun at Lime Street Park

Posted: 05 Jul 2010 01:42 PM PDT

School's out for summer, and you're not sure how to keep your kids busy. They can always sleep in, watch TV and play video games all day, but you want them to do something more active. The Hesperia Recreation and Park District has several options for you just at Lime Street Park alone: Kids Kamp, open swim and swimming lessons.

Kids Kamp, available Monday through Friday from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., provides parents with an opportunity to drop off their kids for the day when they go to work. Children ranging from 5 to 12 years old participate in various activities during the camp, including arts and crafts, indoor and outdoor sports, games, supervised play, quiet time and even field trips to places such as Power Play Skate Center and Scandia Amusement Park.

Lenamarie Ortiz, 11, who is not afraid to frequently say, "I'm awesome!" to those she meets, said she has been a faithful Kids Kamp member since she was 5 years old and has never been disappointed with camp.

"We meet new leaders," she said. "That's really fun. We play a lot of games."

While playing with the kids on the playground and sporting his tie-dye staff shirt, Craig Garcia said there has yet to be a dull moment during his first summer of being a Kids Kamp leader.

"It never gets boring. You're on your toes constantly," Garcia said, laughing. "You can't close your eyes for one second."

Children involved in Kids Kamp also get to play in the Lime Street pool, which is the only public pool available in Hesperia. But they aren't the only ones who use it. The pool is also available for open swim and swim lessons from Memorial Day to Labor Day.

According to Lindsay Woods, administrative operations manager for the Hesperia Recreation and Park District, the Lime Street Park pool has been open to the public since around the late 1960s and has seen a few generations of swimmers splash around in its chlorine-filled waters. Open swim, including late night swims on the first and third Saturdays of every month, is offered for $2 per person. Parents can register their kids for swim lessons online for a two-week session or for a four-Saturday session. Classes are based on varying swimming skill levels.

"We focus on trying to teach the kids in the community how to swim, so that's a priority," Woods said.

Jonathan "Peatry" Jordan, who has been a swim lesson instructor for three years and a lifeguard for four years, said he teaches his swimmers "familiarity with the water, improvement in their form and, for the higher levels, endurance."

Jordan also said that from his experience life guarding and teaching, he enjoys being an instructor the most.

"It's always just being in the pool and not having to sit down all day," he said. "Life guarding has its ups and downs, but teaching is always eventful."

Four-year-old Adrian Lopez, one of Jordan's Level 2 students, said he has had fun during his second year of taking lessons.

"I like being in the water," he said. "I like swimming."

Further possibilities for recreation at Lime Street Park could become a reality in the form of a requested $5 million grant sent to the state of California by the Hesperia Recreation and Park District. Woods said the grant would provide for a variety of improvements, such as relocating the equestrian center, as well as additions to the facility, including a skate plaza and a gymnasium.

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Kids Games

Tuesday, July 6, 2010