Is Screen Addiction
Really Digital Heroin?
Addiction expert Dr. Nicholas Kardaras says in his book “Glow Kids” that iPads and smartphones are a form of digital drug and are addicting. He discusses brain imaging research that shows how they affect the brain’s frontal cortex. He further says technology is so arousing that it raises dopamine levels, the feel-good neurotransmitter, as much as sex.
Another expert in technology, Dr. Kristy Goodwin, also wrote a book “Raising Your Child in a Digital World,” and says there are scientific inaccuracies to this claim. She says it is fearmongering and click bait. As a parent it is hard to know what to believe. Is there enough research? The biggest study ever of teen brains and how screen time affects them is underway now. Researchers are following more than 11,000 children for the next decade, studying how dozens of factors, including drugs and alcohol, diet and exercise, screen time, academic and social stress, sleep patterns, sibling and parent relationships impact their brains.
While most parents can’t wait around 10 years to find out the results of the study, Dr. Goodwin advises parents to “be alert, not alarmed.” Goodwin says dopamine release does not automatically cause addiction. She and researchers admit that dopamine does play a role in addiction and in activating the reward pathways in the brain but it is not the sole causal factor. When it comes to addiction there are a host of sociological, biological, gender and psychological factors that also must be considered. At this stage, she says there just is not enough research to indicate exactly what happens to a kid’s brain with screen use. “Researchers don’t have a good handle on what constitutes a technology addiction,” she says. She suggests rather than demonizing technology, that it would be more fruitful to at least consider both sides to the argument. While there is no denying that some children have formed an unhealthy dependence on screens, Goodwin says this doesn’t mean that they are medically addicted to the screens.
“We need to focus on WHAT they are doing on the screens, WHEN they are using screens and HOW they’re using technology.”
Perhaps this 10 year study will help in the future but what can parents do now?
“We need to teach our kids to form healthy and helpful relationships with technology. We need to teach them how to use and how to switch off screens,” says Goodwin.
The Ellington Public Schools recently released the “EPS Healthy Home Habits for Technology.”
You can find this policy and links to information on the next page and on their website www.ellingtonpublicschools.net.
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