Variability and patterns in children's media use and links with language development

Abstract

AimMedia use is widespread and rising, but how often and for what purpose young children use media varies, which has differential impacts on development. Yet little work has measured how and why children under 36 months use digital media or media's consequences for language.MethodsThe current study measures how and why 17‐ to 30‐month‐old children use digital media and associations with their language abilities. The amount of use, type of activity and caregiver reasons for children's media use were then compared to the child's vocabulary and mean length of utterance.ResultsAbout 17‐ to 30‐month‐old children are primarily exposed to TV/videos over other media forms, which are often used to occupy children. Video time (but not other activities) negatively predicts children's language. The negative impact of videos on vocabulary persists regardless of the reason for use, however, the effect of videos on expressive language may be tempered when videos are used for education or connecting.ConclusionChildren under 36 months are using digital media at high rates. What they are doing and why they use media is critical to predict the effect it might have on language development. Further research and anticipatory guidance on the consequences of videos are needed.

Social interactions offset the detrimental effects of digital media use on children's vocabulary

“…Caregivers completed questionnaires about family demographics (parent education, income, employment status, ethnicity, race), and their child’s digital media use. Because prior work has found that the majority of children’s digital media time at this age is spent with videos/TV and most children have some level of regular TV time ( Kucker et al, 2024 ), the average minutes/day spent watching videos/TV/movies from the Media Assessment Questionnaire (MAQ; Barr et al, 2020 ) was used as the metric for digital media use. Children’s expressive vocabulary was measured with the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory: Words and Sentences (MCDI; Fenson et al, 1994 ).…”

“…By the time children are 2 years old, they experience nearly 2 h of screen time per day ( Kucker et al, 2024 ); an amount that rises as children age. More media use by young children is associated with a smaller vocabulary size ( Madigan et al, 2020 ).…”

Measuring parents' regulatory media use for themselves and their children

“…Moreover, there may be various ways or contexts in which parents use media to regulate their child's emotional responses and behavior that have different implications for child development (e.g., occupying children during a daily routine vs. using media to soothe a distressed child). For example, reasons for using media with children may differ across different types of media such that videos are commonly used to keep children occupied, whereas books are used for educational purposes and less frequently for occupying (Kucker et al, 2024). Thus, it is crucial to consider child regulatory media use as potentially multifaceted.…”