PETALING JAYA, Jan 31 — Child experts discourage parents who use electronic gadgets to “pacify” their children as this will lead to social impairment and speech delay.
“Many adults use the devices as babysitters and this is not babysitting, this is proxy babysitting to keep the child quiet and perhaps learn something,” he said.
“But children need to interact with the environment as part of their learning process as they require development on both the receptive and expressive components.”
The National Early Childhood Intervention Council president said the long-term effect of exposure to gadgets would affect the social and speech development of children, as well as cause physical problems like obesity.
“There is an increase in cases of children with speech delay and it was found in those who were exposed three to six hours to devices daily,” he said.
He said it could also affect children’s behaviour, making them more hyperactive due to the fast-paced activities on the devices.
“The movement in games and videos on devices does not develop the child’s attention span and this leads to behavioural problems,” he said.
Commenting on Taiwan’s move to ban children under the age of two from using electronic devices, Dr Amar said it was a good move and he would recommend it for Malaysian families too.
“A lot of people think they spend quality time with their children but I prefer quantity over quality... parents need to spend more time to interact with their children,” he said.
“The problem these days is that parents are too busy, childcare in the country is a mess and this leads to parents outsourcing to someone who also exposes the children to devices.”
Taiwan recently passed a new law under which parents can be fined up to RM5,700 for allowing their young children to play with electronic gadgets.
It is part of the Protection of Children and Youths Welfare and Rights Act and follows similar rulings in China and South Korea that aim to keep time spent with gadgets to a healthy level.
National Association of Early Childhood Care and Education Malaysia president Datin Radziah M. Daud said the introduction of technology to the young ones at an early stage had changed the lives of young children, especially in the social aspect.
“Parents nowadays tend to use gadgets as a pacifier to keep their children quiet,” she said.
“But look at how children used to play 20 years back... by playing outdoors, climbing trees, and other physical and social activities.”
Radziah said though electronic gadgets could be used as learning tools for older children, there should be a balance on the use.
She said devices should only be used as accessories for learning and not as a complete medium to educate children.
“For example, parents and educators can use actual books to read from, but have the electronic gadget to do exercises to reinforce the learning activity,” said Radziah.
Asia Pacific Paediatric Association president Datuk Dr Zulkifli Ismail said the use of electronic gadgets should not replace proper parenting and as a distraction for parents to control their children, even if it could be an aid in upbringing children.
“Although children can learn more in a short period and have better eye-hand coordination by using such technology, they will have poor interpersonal social skills in their formative years,” he said.
“The use of electronic gadgets does not encourage human contact. In the case of electronic games, if there is no control in playing, the children will be disconnected between real life and virtual life.”
Dr Zulkifli said there were no studies on the long-term effects as the accessibility to affordable electronic gadgets had not been around for very long.
“We have to wait, but I don’t think we should over-expose our children to these gadgets just to see what kind of adults they turn out to be,” he said.
Early Childhood Care and Education Council president Dr Chiam Heng Keng said electronic gadgets could be addictive for both children and adults, therefore the usage must be controlled.
“Parents must monitor and supervise the use if they wish to expose their children to it. However, children under five years should not be exposed to it at all as it is unnecessary,” said Chiam.
She said children should be allowed to run around and explore their environment for the growth of their emotional and social well-being, instead of being confined to the use of electronic devices.
She said the use of Internet among children posed the risk of them being exposed to pornography and paedophilia as the children grew older.
“Due to the lack of boundaries on the use of gadgets and Internet among children, one out of five children below 18 years worldwide has been acquainted with paedophiles,” said Chiam.
“As long as the use of Internet is involved, there is a danger and parents are not well aware of it.”
The American Academy of Paediatrics recommends that children under the age of two not be introduced to television and other entertainment media as the rapid brain development requires human interaction.
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