Have you seen the latest in the Wall Street Journal?
- "Parents should ban electronic media during mealtimes and after bedtime as part of a comprehensive "family media use plan," according to new recommendations from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
- Children ages 8 to 18 spent an average of 7 hours and 38 minutes a day consuming media for fun, including TV, music, videogames and other content in 2009, according to a 2010 report from the Kaiser Family Foundation.
- A new report from Common Sense Media, a child-advocacy group based in San Francisco, found that 17% of children 8 and younger use mobile devices daily, up from 8% in 2011.
Here's a little more common sense: Rates of obesity and chronic disease, heretofore primarily exclusive to adults, will drop down to impact kids and adolescents. The rates will skyrocket over the next decade.
As big a public health issue as obesity may be, we haven't seen anything yet. Why? Three reasons:
- Mindless eating
- Even greater reduction in physical activity
- Under-developed muscle mass and the reduction of caloric burn at rest that it causes.
Mindless eating? Yep! I see it all the time. A couple of nights ago I was at a local Mexican cafe and two kids at the table next to me, both obese, were working on their gadgets. No one was talking. When the food arrived, the kids acted perturbed, but went on unabated. Who knows, they could have been texting each to other.
The parents sat there seemingly content that they didn't have to deal with their kids.
And that's just the tip of the iceberg. Social and emotional distress and the behaviors they provoke will be massive. These devices should carry a warning:
Warning: When used as recommended this device can cause loss of social and emotional development, impaired communication and social skills. It may lead to a number of chronic disease symptoms: obesity, low heart stroke volume, high blood pressure, hypertension, muscular weakness, posture and orthopedic disorders and reduced oral communication skills.
Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with the devices themselves, but mix them with a culture that generally ignores the dynamics of hypokenetic disease and family systems theory and you have a recipe for massive dysfunction.
I can see an entirely new category of 12-step programs in the making: "DOA" Device Overuse Anonymous."
Da Coach