A One-Eyed Invader in the Bedroom

[Jahness]

A One-Eyed Invader in the Bedroom
By TARA PARKER-POPE

Here’s one simple way to keep your children healthy: Ban the bedroom TV.

By some estimates, half of American children have a television in their bedroom; one study of third graders put the number at 70 percent. And a growing body of research shows strong associations between TV in the bedroom and numerous health and educational problems.

Children with bedroom TVs score lower on school tests and are more likely to have sleep problems. Having a television in the bedroom is strongly associated with being overweight and a higher risk for smoking.

One of the most obvious consequences is that the child will simply end up watching far more television — and many parents won’t even know.

In a study of 80 children in Buffalo, ages 4 to 7, the presence of a television in the bedroom increased average viewing time by nearly nine hours a week, to 30 hours from 21. And parents of those children were more likely to underestimate their child’s viewing time.

“If it’s in the bedroom, the parents don’t even really know what the kids are watching,” said Leonard H. Epstein, professor of pediatrics and social and preventive medicine at the School of Medicine and Biomedical Science at the State University of New York at Buffalo. “Oftentimes, parents who have a TV in the kids’ bedrooms have TVs in their bedrooms.”

Moreover, once the set is in the child’s room, it is very likely to stay. “In our experience, it is often hard for parents to remove a television set from a child’s bedroom,” Dr. Epstein said.

Dr. Epstein and his colleagues put monitoring devices on bedroom TVs and all the other sets in the house. In one two-year study, the devices in half the homes were programmed to reduce children’s overall viewing time by half. (Children had to use a code to turn on any TV in the home, and the code stopped working once the allocated TV time for the week had been reached.)

Although all the children in the study gained weight as they grew, relative body mass index dropped among those with mandatory time limits. The researchers found that cutting into TV time did not increase exercise levels. Instead, the children snacked less, lowering their consumption more than 100 calories a day. The study, published Monday in The Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, did not break down the data by bedroom television viewing.

But in 2002, the journal Pediatrics reported that preschool children with bedroom TVs were more likely to be overweight. In October, the journal Obesity suggested that the risk might be highest for boys. In a study among French adolescents, boys with a bedroom television were more likely than their peers to have a larger waist size and higher body fat and body mass index.

The French study also showed, not surprisingly, that boys and girls with bedroom TVs spent less time reading than others.

Other data suggest that bedroom television affects a child’s schoolwork. In a 2005 study in The Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent Medicine, researchers looked at the television, computer and video game habits of almost 400 children in six Northern California schools for a year. About 70 percent of the children in the study had their own TV in the bedroom; they scored significantly and consistently lower on math, reading and language-arts tests. Students who said they had computers in their homes scored higher.

Why a bedroom television appears to have such a pronounced impact is unclear. It may be that it’s a distraction during homework time or that it interferes with sleep, resulting in poorer performance at school. It could also suggest less overall parental involvement.

Another October study, published in Pediatrics, showed that kindergartners with bedroom TVs had more sleep problems. Those kids were also less “emotionally reactive,” meaning that they weren’t as moody or as bothered by changes in routine. While that sounds like a good thing, the researchers speculated that having a TV in the bedroom dampened the intensity with which a child responded to stimulation.

Another study of more than 700 middle-school students, ages 12 to 14, found that those with bedroom TVs were twice as likely to start smoking — even after controlling for such risk factors as having a parent or friend who smokes or low parental engagement. Among kids who had a TV in the bedroom 42 percent smoked; among the others, the figure was 16 percent.

“I think it matters quite a lot,” Dr. Epstein said. “There are all kinds of problems that occur when kids have TVs in their bedroom.”

So while many parents try to limit how much television and what type of shows their children watch, that may be less than half the battle. Where a child watches is important too.

well@nytimes.com

http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/04/he...cc7&ei=5087%0A

Copyright 2008 The New York Times Company

[tyydae]

Without going into too much detail, I banned the television set in my children's bedroom four years ago.

At first it was a fight, because my mother-in-law brought the set, and because I wanted to respect my elder allowed it to stay in there after she purchased it. About a month later, I was sitting out in the living room, and suddenly I snapped (it was sudden too). I went into the girls room, took the cord out of the wall, and put it in my shed. It remained there until last year when I gave it away.

I am currently involved in another fight about the television in my home, but it's not with my children.

[Jahness]

Originally Posted by tyydae

Without going into too much detail, I banned the television set in my children's bedroom four years ago.

At first it was a fight, because my mother-in-law brought the set, and because I wanted to respect my elder allowed it to stay in there after she purchased it. About a month later, I was sitting out in the living room, and suddenly I snapped (it was sudden too). I went into the girls room, took the cord out of the wall, and put it in my shed. It remained there until last year when I gave it away.

I am currently involved in another fight about the television in my home, but it's not with my children.

Greetings tyydae!

Continue to stand strong Queen because you know what is right for your children. It's the hard decisions we must make on a daily basis to let the masses know we won't just do what the Jonses are doing, but rather we would do what is in their best interest.

Being a good and strong mother or father is one of the hardest jobs we will ever have to do, but it's worth it. We have to love our children enough to teach them what is the right things to do especially when it comes to disciplining them and their proper development.

Thank you Queen for sharing on this important issue.

Peace & Blessings!

[Sourakhata]

Originally Posted by Jahness

Greetings tyydae!

Continue to stand strong Queen because you know what is right for your children. It's the hard decisions we must make on a daily basis to let the masses know we won't just do what the Jonses are doing, but rather we would do what is in their best interest.

Being a good and strong mother or father is one of the hardest jobs we will ever have to do, but it's worth it. We have to love our children enough to teach them what is the right things to do especially when it comes to disciplining them and their proper development.

Thank you Queen for sharing on this important issue.

Peace & Blessings!

I don't have children yet but I swear they'll never ever have a TV set in their bedroom.
TV when used properly can be a powerful mean to teach many things to children & one out of many way to entertain them insofar parents assist them to understand what they're watching by explaining, progressively helping them to understand the mecanism of it, sight-reading and deciphering it..! But left alone in front of it they become victims of the tremendous & pernicious mind control that TV conveys, a mind control which starts at an early age & conditionning them for the rest of their adulthood, we can't let that go on..!
Indeed being parent is a though job, hope I'll be strong enough to give them an inquisitive mind!

Peace

[Jahness]

Originally Posted by Sourakhata

I don't have children yet but I swear they'll never ever have a TV set in their bedroom.
TV when used properly can be a powerful mean to teach many things to children & one out of many way to entertain them insofar parents assist them to understand what they're watching by explaining, progressively helping them to understand the mecanism of it, sight-reading and deciphering it..! But left alone in front of it they become victims of the tremendous & pernicious mind control that TV conveys, a mind control which starts at an early age & conditionning them for the rest of their adulthood, we can't let that go on..!
Indeed being parent is a though job, hope I'll be able strong enough to give them an inquisitive mind!

Peace

Greetings Sourakhata!

TV has it's usefullness. But too many times people make it the babysitter for their children. Besides that due to the overly nonsensical approach to TV programming children are bombarded by too many negative images not to mention the violence. Parents have to seriously monitor TV time for their children.

Thank you for sharing your valuable comments.

Peace!

[MsLioness]

I think the problem lies in the stressful tv programs. Lots of things on tv is just stressful. Also, to fall asleep with stressful music on or certain movies, promotes a very busy sleep.

I don't think my children will have a tv in their rooms.

[Mamazen]

I don't even have a TV in my bedroom...why should my sons?

I have 1 TV in the entire house...and I told my sons they were lucky I bought it.

[SoularFlarez]

alot of tv programs are negative, openly or on the low....

and alot of it is jus sum boolshit... aint bout nuthen...corny and fake

after a long day on the plantation people just wanna zone out but da mind is absorbing EVERYTHING wether we aware of it or not....

and children are the most succeptible to playing out what they see/hear without really digesting the meaning or reason for whats hapnen...