Find distance with screen

Our contemporaries are able to sit for hours at screens and monitors, with pleasure surrendering to the power of virtual reality. The cult film The Matrix is ​​an impressive metaphor for the power that streams of video images can acquire over us. And yet, as adults, we regularly get hung up on screens and then get frightened by how addicted we are to them.

How do television and the computer affect our children? Do all sorts of spidermen and cyborgs turn them into aggressive puppets?

“Here it is useful to recall the medieval physician Paracelsus, who claimed that everything is poison and everything is medicine, and only measure determines the difference,” says educational psychologist Galina Kucherova. “If the computer or TV is an integral part of our daily lives, we should establish the right distance between them and ourselves in order to maintain the ability to control emotions, the ability to think critically and the freedom to choose whether or not to watch, for how long and what exactly.”

Enchanting visions

Visual images are a powerful means of influencing consciousness, including through emotions, which are easily infected by viewers. Perceiving information actively, for example, when reading, the brain generates electrical potentials with a frequency of 14-40 oscillations per second (the so-called beta rhythm), and when watching TV, it goes into a slow mode of operation (alpha rhythm, 8-13 oscillations per second). ). This is a sign that we are relaxed, our attention is not focused.

“This effect occurs due to a sharp decrease in the activity of the left hemisphere, which is responsible for the analytical processing of information and logical thinking,” explains child neuropsychologist Nikolai Voronin. “Just like during a hypnotic trance, a person uncritically perceives information, absorbs it without thinking.”

The brain of a child is much more susceptible to direct screen impact, since the mechanisms and skills that “filter” information in children have not had time to form: the child absorbs everything from the screen like a sponge.

Turned to sight and hearing

When we watch TV, play games on a computer or tablet, sight and hearing seem to be separated from other physical sensations. In this case, body movements are actually reduced to nothing, and bodily tension imperceptibly accumulates.

The child at the computer plays with his hands, mentally projecting himself onto his double moving on the screen. But at the same time, it is worth remembering that children learn something only during real physical actions and manipulations. In addition, fascinated by the possibilities of his “hero”, the playing child runs the risk of not being ready to accept the features of the real physical world and overcome its limitations.

“An XNUMX-year-old boy told me that he doesn’t like walking because it hurts him,” says Claude Allard, a child psychiatrist and psychoanalyst. “After the examination, it turned out that walking seemed difficult to him and caused frustration compared to how he could move around on the screen.”

“In virtual reality, the child is used to being able to run upside down, crash into a cake, and then get up and run further – for him, the impossibility of such movements is not obvious,” confirms Nikolai Voronin. – In children who spend too much time in front of the monitor, hand-eye coordination may not be formed: they move around corners. There are also problems with audio-motor coordination – in order to localize the sound in space, to understand where it comes from.

Being carried away by the game, the child cannot control the time spent in front of the monitor. “In 73% of children, even a short work at the computer causes fatigue,” says Galina Kucherova. “Anxiety, absent-mindedness and fatigue begin to appear as early as the 14th minute.”

Sitting still can lead to myopia or weight gain. “In addition, with prolonged exposure to radiation, changes can occur in the body associated with the release of the hormone melatonin, which is responsible for regulating sleep,” adds Nikolai Voronin. “The child may not sleep well, and walk around sluggish and sleepy during the day.”

Discoveries and limitations

On the other hand, modern gadgets provide ample opportunities for intellectual development.

“There are many games that develop children’s speed of reaction, visual memory, attention, logical thinking – some of them are already used in kindergartens,” says Galina Kucherova. “For older students, a computer, the Internet is a great help in quickly obtaining the necessary information.”

Screens and monitors can become helpers for children, provided that we remember both the limits of their capabilities and their negative properties.

“If a child is often left alone with the screen, his independence and activity can be suppressed,” warns psychologist Elena Smirnova. – The monitor magnetizes his gaze, he looks without thinking, his imagination is turned off. And for the development of figurative thinking, it is useful for a child to learn to imagine something that he cannot see: the same aliens, a character in a book, a toy that is described to him.

In addition, the constant alternation of pictures makes it difficult to develop critical thinking and assess the nuances of what is happening. “The stream of video images leaves no pauses for thinking, working with information,” says Nikolai Voronin. “Through the visual analyzer, a direct non-stop flow of information goes to the child’s brain, an overload occurs.”

Conclusion: communication with a tablet, computer and other devices should be dosed. “It is better for children under five years old not to be at the computer at all, six-year-olds – to spend no more than 20 minutes a day, school-age children – no more than two to three hours with breaks,” sums up Galina Kucherova.

An obstacle to independence

A small child will hardly gain independence if he is chained to the screen. In the absence of a mother, a “television nanny” can compensate for his anxiety. But it also prevents him from learning to endure separation at the expense of his own strength, developing the presence of an “inner parent” in himself with the help of encouraging images and words that need to be invented in order to feel safe and comfortable.

In addition, television and game consoles are so addictive that children find it hard to put them down. At the same time, the child never experiences boredom … But it is precisely boredom that is a feeling necessary in order to make a decision to act actively. “The child dives into a computer or television reality and cannot switch to anything else,” says Elena Smirnova.

Artificial socialization

The monitor takes up time that can be devoted to real communication. Sitting in front of the screen, the child communicates with video characters, but such interaction is just a surrogate for the real. Video and TV heroes don’t need us, we need them.

“Children who are overly fond of computer games do not know how to communicate and play with their peers, except by discussing these very games,” says Elena Smirnova.

“In the virtual world, a child can feel like a ruler, controlling people and the elements,” says Galina Kucherova. “There he is not responsible for his actions and deeds, while in the real world he may be waiting for negative assessments and the need to change something in himself.”

In addition, virtual images and characters are often conceived and drawn so bright and attractive that, in comparison with them, the real environment may seem rather dull and uninteresting to children.