Wellness Wednesday

Are Electronics Taking Over Your Child's Life?

A recent open letter from the Apple's board of directors has called on the software giant to do more when it comes to kid's addiction to iPhone's and other Apple devices.

Electronic devices have become a normal part of society. Checking one's phone for text messages and emails has become almost as regular as checking the time on one's watch; that is unless you have a smartwatch and can check all electronic correspondence on your wrist anyway. A recent report released by Influence Central in 2016 reported that the average age of a child receiving their first smartphone was 10.3 years, and that 39% of children receive their first social media account at age 11. Along with an increase in younger smart device owners, the percentage of children who use their devices in a shared room in the household dropped from 85% in 2012 to 74% in 2016. A year following this report, the primary shareholders of Apple (JANA Partners LLC and the California State Teachers' Retirement System) have also noticed a rise in the number of younger users, and the "addiction" to the electronic devices that has developed as a result in the rise. 

The shareholders wrote a joint letter to apple recently pleading with the company to do more to fight the addiction. The shareholders teamed up with researchers at Boston Children's Hospital and Harvard Medical School Training Center along with a psychologist at San Diego State University to study just how much these smart devices might be negatively affecting children, instead of positively. These are the highlights of their research:

• Research from the psychologist at the University of San Diego (Professor Jeane M. Twenge) showed that children who spend more than 3 hours a day on electronic devices are 35% more likely to have  risk factor for suicide than those who spend less than one hour on social media, while those who spend more than 5 hours a day are at a 71% increased risk of having a suicide risk factor.
• Teens who spend more than 5 hours a day on electronic devices are 51% more likely to get less than 7 hours of sleep, and are linked to long-term issues like weight gain and high blood pressure compared to those who are on their devices less than one hour a day.
• A study of 8th graders who were heavy social media users had a 27% higher risk of depression, while those who exceed the recommended 60 minutes of daily exercise outside or through sports were much less likely to develop depression then or later in life.