Parenting a toddler can have its challenges but a team of nurses from UBC is cautioning parents not to give into the temptation of giving them any screen time.

“We noticed in our practice that we were seeing a lot of use of screens in younger kids,” said Reda Wilkes, a public health nurse with Vancouver Coastal Health who co-authored a study of Vancouver parents. “During vaccination clinics, instead of holding their child and cuddling them when they got pain after a shot, they would be flashing their smartphone in front of them to try and distract them with a video.”

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Wilkes says, “We can sugarcoat it all we want, but screens are not recommended, and at a young age it’s not good for them. There’s nothing to support it. Young kids are supposed to be constantly moving and when you put them in front of the TV, that just stops.”

More than half of Vancouver parents in the survey reported allowing their young children to use electronic devices like smartphones and tablets, the team from UBC says. This is despite guidelines from the Canadian Pediatric Society that says children aged two and younger should not be given any screen time.

A large proportion (42 per cent) of the 242 parents who were surveyed at community health centres throughout the city said they don’t allow any screen time for their children under two. However, an almost equal number (40.5 per cent) allowed up to 30 minutes. An addition 17.5 per cent gave their children an hour or more a day of screen time.

The top three reasons cited included needing time to complete household chores, coping with a busy workday, and the belief that it helped with their child’s speech and language development.

The UBC team, led by UBC nursing professor Wendy Hall, says studies have shown that screen time can interfere with a young child’s language development.

“It’s unsurprising that parents use screens to distract children so they can get chores done and try to balance work and family life,” she said. “Nevertheless, we need to help parents appreciate that screen time can not only have negative effects on children’s language development, but it also interferes with children getting adequate amounts of sleep, even if the screens are not part of the bedtime routine.”