Children who often sit on phones have a permanent change in brain structure. This conclusion was made by American scientists from the US National Institutes of Health. For 10 years now they have been observing 11 thousand children from 9 to 10 years old. By scanning the brains of schoolchildren, scientists have come to disappointing conclusions.
Screen time affects a child’s emotional development and mental health. For example, children who spend more than two hours at the screens of smartphones and tablets receive lower marks on thinking and language tests than their peers without phones.
Children who sit with gadgets for seven or more hours a day experience premature and irreversible thinning of the cerebral cortex. And here’s what it threatens: the cerebral cortex processes information from the physical world, this is important for cognitive functions such as perception, language, memory and consciousness. As we age, the cerebral cortex becomes thinner. Hence the memory problems.
A 2014 study showed a direct relationship between the thickness of the cerebral cortex and IQ score. For example, in smart people with a high level of intelligence, the cortex was thicker, and in people with a low IQ, it was excessively thinned.
By the way, earlier, Korean scientists found that teenagers who are addicted to smartphones are more likely to suffer from mental disorders, including depression and anxiety – another reason to remove children from screens.
And yet another study showed that smartphones make children … get fat! Adolescents who corresponded on the phone with friends before going to bed did not sleep well. Those who watched TV or played computer games for more than two hours, too. Gadgets shattered children’s biorhythms, adolescents began to seize fatigue – the production of the sleep hormone melatonin was disrupted. By the way, that’s why adults shouldn’t stick in social media feeds for too long.