(upbeat music plays) - Many parents worry about whether technology and digital devices have a negative effect on their child's health.

Are video games making them too aggressive?

Is late night screen time affecting their sleep?

Is television bad for toddlers?

We're going to get answers and some of them might surprise you.

If you've ever questioned your choices when it comes to your child's use of smartphones, tablets, TV, and video games.

This is an episode you don't want to miss.

IQ smart parent is next.

(upbeat music continues) - Hello.

I'm Darieth Chisolm.

Welcome to IQ smart parent.

Did you know that kids spend almost 11 hours a day multitasking with media?

That's more time than they're in school or even asleep.

21st century technology has become an important health issue and developing healthy media habits is our focus over the next half hour.

Joining me now is Dr. Michael Rich, founder and director of the center on media and child health at Boston children's hospital.

He is also an associate professor at Harvard medical school and is known online as the mediatrician.

Doctor, welcome to the show.

- Thank you.

- So good to have you here.

So you have to tell me what is a mediatrician?

- Well, just as a pediatrician, which is what my clinical practice is and my training is, is a trusted guide and overseer of a child's healthy development.

In the 21st century, when kids are saturated with media, as our environment now is you need to bring the same kind of scientific thinking and translating into parenting that you do with biological science as a pediatrician.

So what we're thinking is, if we can bring a knowledge of how we are changed positively, as well as negatively by the media we use and how we use them, we can raise kids to be healthy rather than being either afraid of and avoiding media or embracing it blindly.

- And this is really important to do in this day and age because kids are consuming so much media.

- Right.

And it's not just the amount, it's also what it is that they're consuming that will change them.

After all, it's not just Sesame Street, it's all media that are educational.

What differs between them is what they teach and how well they teach it.

So the reality is they are learning as much from Call of Duty as they are from Sesame Street.

It's just very different stuff that they're learning.

- I can imagine that.

So tell us what goes on at the center on media and child health.

How did it get started, and some of the work that you're doing there?

- Well, the idea was that we needed to give parents the same kind of good scientific evidence-based information on raising their children in a media saturated world, as we do on their nutrition or staying safe in a car or how to, you know, pursue an education to become good citizens.

But we had to do it in relation to the media.

And we were coming into an environment that was very polarized, where there were the people who said, media, scary media makes you stupid fat and violent, turn it all off.

And the other people were saying, freedom of expression, do what you want and use it for marketing, whatever they could to children.

Instead of sitting around together and saying, this is our society, how can we make it the kind of society, and build the kind of individuals we want for this society?

So we felt that we needed to bring that kind of light into the heat of this disagreement, the light of information so that parents could make their own decisions outside of this good versus bad environment.

- So as a father, and we'll, we'll take this a little closer, if you will, and kind of dive into what's happening in your home and what you see with your children or what you have seen with them in terms of their consumption of media and, and maybe some of the challenges that you may or may not face because you're so closely connected to media consumption.

- Interestingly enough, I have kids, four kids, two of which in different generations.

And the first two, who are now in their twenties, grew up in the age when we all believed, including myself, that the more educational TV you could put in front of them the better, the second pair, grew up in the period where we said, you know what the evidence seems to indicate that under the age of two screens are not helpful.

And I noticed a distinct difference between the two groups of kids in their work ethic, in their curiosity, in their willingness to read or to do other things as opposed to wanting to be passively fed information.

- Now is that because of what they were watching and consuming or the amount of time that they were watching and consuming, whatever it is they were watching?

- I think it's actually just that they were watching and consuming.

They were passively receiving information and entertainment and education, as opposed to going out and getting it and interacting with the world and finding out things.

- And that allows you, obviously with the work that you're doing at the center, to really be able to take your real world experiences and apply them and help out.

So quite interesting.

So you've got a quiz on your website and I'd love to take a few of the questions that come from there.

And one of them, one of the questions are, are you raising a digitally healthy child?

I thought these were some great questions that I know a lot of parents are struggling with.

So let's go to the first one.

Your elementary schooler constantly begs for more screen time, and you find yourself in battles nearly every day.

Should you: A - stop counting the hours, B - stick to your guns no matter what or C - give in now and then try and avoid a conflict later, what would be the right answer here?

- Well, surprisingly enough, I do not believe that screen time limits are useful or helpful in a day and age when there are screens everywhere, including in our pockets and they're all around us.

It's impossible for us to know how much time we spend in front of a screen.

Instead, what I advocate is that parents sit down with their children and look at their 24 hour day as an empty glass that they fill up from the bottom up with the things they need and want to do.

So you need this many hours of sleep.

You need to have at least one sit down meal with the family every day, which is by the way, not only nutritionally, but psychologically, one of the most protective things you can do for your child.

You like to play basketball.

So let's make some time in your day for basketball.

You need to do homework.

And by the time you fill that up with all the things you need to do, then see how much time is left for media.

When you give them a screen time limit, when you say you only have one hour, first of all, that's the first thing they do.

The moment they come home from school, it becomes the forbidden fruit.

And at the end of the hour, they never are the ones who say, okay, my hour's up, I'm turning it off.

It's always you that comes in 10 minutes after the hour and say, you know, your hour was up, oh, but this program isn't over.

I wanted to get to the end of this level, whatever.

And so you end up not only giving more time, but also in a conflict every single time.

When you have them develop their time budget, you are teaching them time management and they are owning their experience, their media.

- They get to be responsible with that.

You've given them the expectations and in some cases, the limitations and this allows them to think on their own, it's critical.

- Absolutely.

And, and they are on the same side of the table with you.

You're not in conflict all the time.

It's not always used saying don't don't, don't.

It's, let's figure out how to have a rich, fun, diverse life.

- Very interesting.

So one organization that rates and reviews children's media is common sense media.

They've shared this great ad with us, and I think this little girl might not be watching the healthiest show.

So let's take a look and we'll talk about it afterwards.

(suspenseful music) - Alright Alfonzo, I got your money.

Got your money right here, but you're not gonna get it, because you're a rat.

You think I wouldn't know?

You sold me out!

You're a snitch!

Louis take him out.

I said take him out!

- [Female Voice] Are your kids watching the right movies?

- So that's really interesting.

She's pretty animated (laughs) in that video, but, but what's your reaction to it?

- Well, my first reaction is she must be watching 1930s, James Cagney gangster movies, you know.

(Chisolm laughs) I, I sort of expected it to be all about characters that were pre named by commercial marketers of the various products.

So I was a little taken by surprise by, by the, the tough talk.

But what this really shows is that kids really do learn from media and they learn not just content, but how to behave.

They are looking constantly for what the world is like and how they're expected to behave in that world.

And they're looking for role models everywhere.

- Do you know?

It's interesting because what I find with children, especially young children, is some of them are animated and you could watch them play.

And you think that it's just the natural child behavior, but there is a thin line and sometimes kids cross it and it's like, you've watched too much TV.

You can almost tell, is it in fact because of that or that maybe their minds are a lot more sensitive.

What's going on with a child who is acting out what they've been watching on TV?

- Well, first of all, we have to understand that A - every child is different.

B - other kids are going to act out whether they've seen TV or not.

In other words, acting out as part of childhood and a big part of childhood is learning how to contain all of that energy, all of that creativity, all of that confusion.

- And some of it is imagination, - Absolutely - but when do we know that it's gone beyond that.

- Well I think what's interesting is that there is a difference between imagination that comes from within and imagination that is living out the fantasies created for us by a big media company or toy company, et cetera.

So that I am very much for kids being creative and, and creating their own scenarios and imagining, but when they are parroting behaviors that they have seen and are modeling other behaviors, We want to be sure that those are behaviors, we actually want them to model.

I'm not sure one would want one's three-year-old daughter being a tough gangster.

- Not necessarily.

Okay.

Let's get to another important question from your website.

Your child has been playing a game for more than an hour.

And so you tell him to turn it off.

And he says, he just has to beat this level, finish this pyramid, get to the castle, whatever.

So the best response would be: A - I've told you five times already to turn it off.

Do I have to come and take the batteries out?

B - You have 10 more minutes and then that's it or C - Okay, I'll cheer you onto the finish.

What's the right answer?

- Well, a variation on a couple of those, first of all, to extend this, you own your media time.

You budget your time.

You can say, okay, you can play this out, but understand that this has to then come out of your media time at another point so that they know that there's a cost to it.

Secondly, don't get into a conflict with them, sit down with them and say, can I play it with you?

Because this is a teachable moment in the sense that first of all, you are saying, teach me how to play your game for, you know, it's very rare that a child gets to be the master and the parent gets to be the student, and it's a wonderful role reversal and kids love it.

And you're showing that you respect them and care about them, but it also gives you the opportunity to enter that world, that they spend time in.

To understand what that world is like, and to decide for yourself whether it's what you want for them.

And if it's not, to discuss with them coming from your place of good mature executive function and understanding, you know, impulse control and future thinking, why it might not be the best thing to beat up the 14th guy in a row.

- And I love the fact that it gives you the opportunity to meet the kids on their terms, get involved with something that they clearly have spent a lot of time in and really start to create some respect there, if you will.

So we're going to ask you to hang with us.

We're going to take a break, but when we come back, we'll be joined by two parents who are looking for some advice from the mediatrician.

(upbeat music begins) (upbeat music ends) - And we have two parents joining us now on the couch and jumping into this intriguing conversation.

Cynthia Mendoza, has three boys at home who are big gamers.

And Gene Walker has a tween son and a daughter at home.

Cynthia, let's start with you.

Were you surprised at all, Dr. Rich's response to those questions in the previous segment?

- A little bit, I was, I'm a gamer, so I play games with my son, sons at home.

So one of the things that really jumped out at me was talking about filling up their days with things other than gaming.

Not that we don't, we only do gaming, but I find it difficult sometimes, time to create those time budgets.

So what I would like to do eventually is make it so that my kids aren't so apt to always go for the game.

And I really liked that you were talking about creating spaces where your kids can play, but more importantly, creating spaces where they understand that playing isn't the only enjoyable thing to do.

So that was really interesting.

- And there are other ways to play than with an electronic device they can go out and throw a ball around, or, you know, build a Ford or, you know, various things.

However, I want to say that it's a wonderful thing that you game with your sons, in the sense that you are doing what many parents need to be convinced to do, which is that you are parenting them in the digital space.

Many parents basically say, I don't understand it.

They run rings around me.

I don't know how it works.

I'm checking out.

It's a battle I choose not to fight.

And I think that we're missing a huge responsibility to our children.

If we are not both teaching them and modeling for them, how to play and use media in responsible, directed, and focused ways.

Now, I think that you're right, that what is hard is creating a space for it because we have sort of evolved into using media as our default behavior.

You know, when, when I don't know what to do, we flip on a screen of some kind or another, and we can't tolerate doing nothing.

And I think we have to get back to the place where there are a menu of options for us to do at any one point in time.

And that it's not just flip on the screen, but it is, Hey, let's go for a walk or, Hey, did you see there this weird exhibit at the museum, let's go check it out, whatever, but to do something else in a way that makes, gives them a rich tapestry of experience.

- So Gene let's bring you into this conversation.

You have a tween son and a daughter that you told us about.

And you said that your son actually watches a lot of YouTube videos specifically about Minecraft and for anyone who doesn't know Minecraft, it's an electronic game of building sort of like Legos, you know, survival twists.

So Gene you're certainly uncomfortable with the amount of time that he's spending doing this.

- Yeah.

You know, my son Brady is, is a smart and intelligent kid.

And, you know, while Minecraft, you know, him playing the game, isn't my major concern.

What concerns me more is him watching the videos of other people playing Minecraft.

And so my fear is that he's losing, you know, time to discover himself and experience himself and he's wrapped up and experiencing others.

And I'm just not quite sure how to, how to go about redirecting that.

- Well Minecraft is one of the better games, in the sense that it actually has you able to create.

It allows you to create things and build things yourself, admittedly, in virtual space.

And it's good for kids to get out of the virtual space and into the real space once in a while and, and do other things.

But I think what's most interesting about what you said to me is that you're not so concerned about the total amount of time he's doing it, but how he's using that time that he's doing it vicariously through some of the somebody else's experience, somebody else's play and you want him to bring his own intelligence, his own creativity, his own imagination to bear on this.

And I think that's something that you, as a parent can say, you know what?

Let's just do it this way and maybe do it with him and model for him, how to do it as opposed to, you know, experiencing it second or third or fourth hand.

- Sure.

- Those were great questions.

And we have some other questions we'd like to get to that have come over from social media.

And let's get to the first one.

And that is, I'm worried about my teen daughter posting pictures of herself online and worrying so much about how she looks and who else is liking her pictures.

How can I talk to her about this?

Dr. Rich, what are your thoughts on selfies and kids really being consumed with taking photos of themselves and waiting for people to like them?

- Oh, first of all, we have to remember that being very self-conscious and self-aware is a normal part of adolescence.

Their bodies are changing.

Their emotions are changing.

Things are happening that they don't understand, and they want to be attractive.

They want to be accepted.

They want to be loved by their peers as well as by their parents, because part of their development is to move out of the nuclear family and become an independent individual out in the world.

So this self-awareness and self-consciousness is totally normal.

What is twisted or changed by this in many ways, amplified by this, is the concept of how the device amplifies that and can ultimately be kind of narcissistic in the way that they're focused on who they are.

And they are not yet developmentally able to understand that what they're doing is in fact, objectifying themselves, making themselves the most attractive objects of someone else's desire, as opposed to admiring and respecting and caring for the real them.

- Are they - it comes to mind that maybe what they're looking for as well is this, this ability to fit in with people they don't even know.

And I'm, I guess I'm speaking more so to posting photos on Facebook or on Twitter or Snapchat, that, that it's all about.

Well, make sure I'm getting a lot of likes and that I've got all of these friends when they really don't know some of these people.

- Well, they don't know most of these people and it becomes almost competitive.

How many friends or followers do you have on social media?

And I think there are two issues with that.

One is they're essentially marketing themselves.

It's like they're selling widgets or, or bottles of soda.

And, but they're selling themselves to as many people as possible.

The other thing is they don't realize how the internet is very fast.

It spreads very widely and things that they put on it are sticky in the sense that once they're out there, they're going to stay out there somewhere.

And they may someday want to apply to college or go to get a job.

And, you know, they can't plan pass this afternoon right now, but in the future, they're going to reap the results of what they do today.

And so we owe it to them to bring our ability, to think into the future and help them understand the consequences of their own reputation online.

- They are building reputations online.

They're building a resume of sorts with every post that they put out there.

Your reaction to that, your comments about that?

- Yeah.

I think, you know, in our house, we've been very conscious to not allow our kids to have Facebook or Twitter just yet.

I don't, you know, I don't want them, so caught up in what everyone else is doing that they forget to figure out who they are and what they're doing.

So from that instance, we've been fairly good, I guess.

- Awesome.

- But it is challenging because you get that from school, you get that from friends.

So-and-so, didn't like what I was wearing today.

So I can't ever wear that again.

It's very scary.

- Yeah.

And, and, and it is part of learning to respect themselves and to be themselves.

And who cares if they didn't like that flannel shirt I wore today?

- Well, speaking of social media, let's, let's head back to some more questions that we've received from parents.

And this one, I just found out that my son and his friends have been on social media during the wee hours of the night.

I'm worried about his lack of sleep and what they're actually doing at this hour.

And we found out that there's actually a name for this behavior it's called, vamping.

So certainly the term vamping, vampires, being up all night is, is what I assume that refers to.

But then there's also obviously the lack of sleep.

If you're up all night using devices, you're not getting good rest.

- Right.

And, and one thing to remember though, is that it's important for kids as they, individuate from their parents, as they step out and become autonomous individuals, that they do things that their parents don't know about, you know, and the importance is to build into them from very early on the ability to take care of themselves as much as they can.

But the sleep issue is huge.

We have to remember that adolescence is the second most rapid growth spurt of our life, except for immediately after birth.

And that kids in adolescents literally need 10 and a half or 11 and a half hours of sleep a night.

- Good, solid, sleep.

- Good, solid sleep.

And it's not just that staying up at night to text each other, to vamp, to go online, to do social media is shortening the amount of time that they sleep.

But because they often do it with leaving their cell phones on vibrate, under their pillows or beside their bed, they are not sleeping as deeply because they're waiting for that signal to go off in the middle of the night so that they can text with their friends.

And they're not getting to the deep sleep that allows us to move what we experienced today from short-term memory into our learning centers.

So they're often not able to recall what they learned the day before, because they weren't able to complete that cycle of learning.

- Well we certainly covered a lot of information here and we could talk for hours, I'm sure, about this subject, but, but give us really the bottom line for parents.

- The bottom line for parents is that media are powerful tools.

They can be used to learn and to promote really healthy, wonderful lives, and to expand our worlds, to see things we'd never see and experience things we'd never see before, but they are ultimately just tools.

They do some things very well.

They don't do everything very well.

So we need to use them in focused, mindful ways.

We don't want to use them as a default to fill in the space.

We want to allow time for other activities and frankly time for doing nothing, because let's remember that when Einstein was asked late in his life, how he came up with a theory of relativity while he was working as a patent officer in Switzerland, he said, it's because I was bored.

And he had the space in his mind to go where his imagination could take him.

- And you need time and space and quiet time in order to do that.

So well, we've run out of time, but we do appreciate you being here on the show, Dr. Rich, Cynthia, Gene, thank you for being a part of it.

And kids do spend more time with media than almost anything else, including sleep.

As we've talked about, as parents, we can help our children create a healthy, balanced media diet.

One important suggestion is to not make media and screen time the so-called forbidden fruit Technology is here to stay and it can be used in a very positive, rewarding way.

Avoiding it, isn't teaching your child to manage their time effectively.

Instead help your children find quality educational content.

And if they're going to be online, make that time count.

Think about establishing media free zones or times of the week when screen time is not allowed.

Everyone parents included will benefit from the break.

And by reconnecting with one another.

For more information and great resources.

You can visit our website at iqsmartparent.org and visit our Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest pages for parent tips and more information.

Let's continue the conversation there.

We'd love to hear what healthy media habits are working for your family.

Thanks so much for joining us.

(upbeat music begins) - Want to learn more about IQ smart parent, visit us online iqsmartparent.org for more episodes and additional tools and resources.

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(upbeat music continues) IQ smart parent is made possible in part by shady side academy and with generous support from the McCune foundation and the Grable foundation.