As a long-time opponent of monarchy in all its forms, I was surprised to discover that it was the wise words of a princess that forced me to be a better parent.
Catherine, the princess of Wales, co-wrote an essay a number of months ago in which she lamented the role of screens in creating an “epidemic of disconnection” between family members. Writing alongside Prof Robert Waldinger from Harvard Medical School, she made the observation that family members might be “physically present but mentally absent”.
My immediate response to this was reactionary and defensive. I reposted her words on social media, commenting that this was a typically entitled view from a parent in her position. I argued it was all very well to pontificate on screen time when you have an army of nannies at your disposal, but spare a thought for the rest of us who throw on the telly to get a moment’s respite from the chaos.
It wasn’t until a few days later, when I tried to drag my three-year-old’s attention away from a screen, that her words finally hit home. My daughter was glued to Bluey, and as the egregious autoplay function on Netflix rolled over to a fourth episode of the enormously popular Australian animated series, I simply couldn’t get her to hear me. I realised in that moment that screens could have a frighteningly deadening effect, nullifying my child into a stunned torpor. She was completely disconnected from her physical surroundings.
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I spoke to Wicklow-based Dr Rebecca Quin, a clinical psychologist, about this and she made it clear to me that children are particularly vulnerable to the allure of TV. “It combines fast-moving visuals, sound, and story that strongly activate children’s attention and reward systems before self-regulation is fully developed,” she says.
Surely this is why autoplay is so sinister when it comes to children’s content? No three- or four-year-old is going to self-regulate when yet another episode of Peppa Pig rolls over without even asking it to. When I was a child, regulation was built into the television experience. Dempsey’s Den was regularly interrupted by a commercial break. While we hated them at the time, ad breaks trump autoplay every time because they push a child’s attention away from the screen and into the real world again. They offer respite.
It was after that numbing experience with Bluey, and other similar episodes, that my wife and I decided to carry out an experiment.
We introduced a ban on television and screens for a month.
No more telly.
Cold turkey. Nada. Faic.
That was four months ago. And we’re not turning back any time soon.
Too often, the debate around screens and children revolves around how devious children become to take advantage of these devices. I would argue that the parents need to take much more of the blame. The Princess of Wales’s essay, and my sad epiphany during an episode of Bluey, made me realise that the responsibility for all this lay with me. I reflected on my own parenting shortcomings and realised it wasn’t always them who were reaching for the TV remote or the iPad, it was me.
When things became chaotic, it was I who reached for the tranquillising effect of a screen, just to get them to be quiet for a few minutes. But it was never just “a few minutes”.
I was the problem.
So I had to consciously decide to make an extra effort to be a more creative parent. Screens are often used as a way to outsource parenting, a method of “taking care” of a child’s need for attention. This explained why I had become so defensive after the princess’s comments. I took them personally, because they were true.
I distinctly remember the first Saturday of the experiment. While my wife was having a well-deserved lie-in, the children dragged me downstairs at 6.30am, demanding we switch on the television. It was so tempting. But somehow I found the necessary resolve and the three of us ended up making a giant Brazilian flag out of crepe paper, to celebrate their mum’s heritage. We laughed. There were tears of frustration. The colours weren’t all in the right place. The scissors nearly took a finger off. But we got it done and we spent time connected with each other. Without Bluey.
I never imagined I would become a parent who banned something I love so much. This isn’t dogma and there must be room for improvisation and flexibility. TV isn’t bad for kids in and of itself.
“Screens are not inherently harmful,” says Quin. “It’s our relationship with them and what they can sometimes replace that we need to be mindful of.”
We have tried to be as nuanced as we can with the ban. We don’t want to bring up children who are illiterate when it comes to popular culture and what the latest TV show is. Quin describes TV programmes as a form of social currency, which allows kids to communicate and play with each other.
One of the best things we have introduced during the ban is a movie night on Saturdays. I dusted off the old DVD player and hooked it up to a projector. I even got them to watch my own favourite childhood film: Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. It was all going swimmingly until an animatronic spider ultimately gave them nightmares, meaning that particular DVD is now also banned.
The beauty of analogue tech like DVDs is that there isn’t a sniff of autoplay to wreak havoc on an evening’s entertainment. There is a finite end in place. What is essential is that the movie night is a shared experience, with parents and children together. It’s an event that we look forward to, rather than a passive and disposable encounter where nothing is being achieved other than distracting a child for a few minutes.
“Family movie nights, discussed and shared, look very different psychologically from a child watching alone while adults are elsewhere,” says Quin.
While it certainly isn’t always easy, the rewards from the ban on screens has been enormous. What I’ve learned is that screen content fills the gaps which would otherwise be imbued by their own imaginative sense of play. When there’s “nothing to do” they eventually find something, whether it’s building a fort or setting up a hair salon in the bathroom.
There’s a price to pay, though … the house is turned upside down every day. But that’s all right.
It’s better than bringing up screen zombies.
