Comments by "Brenda Rua" (@brendarua01) on "3 fears about screen time for kids -- and why they're not true | Sara DeWitt" video.

I think she's wearing rose colored glasses. She has some good points. Devices can be an educational tool, but only one of many in a tool box. There are many risks in these things. She seems on the verge of making them a fetish. Sara uses early fears about TV and implies they were baseless, as an analogy to support her advocacy. But TV has known risks that bear out some of the concerns people had. I recommend Jerry Mander's "Four Arguments For The Elimination of Television" (1978) where he talked about the way TV can be a learning tool, but confuses us about the nature of the experience. He also talks about the risks of advertising and marketing, and how they were moving from being informative to being tools to create need. He overstated his case. Some things didn't pan out. But it is a good representation of those times and now. TED has had several presenters tell us about how the tech companies create products to hook people on using them. And you see this all around you. Just go outside and note how many people are checking their devices rather than actually talking to people or engaging in the world around them. Look at how devices restrict the varieties of social experience and put everyone in their own confirmation-bias bubble, and you have part of an explanation for the current problems with our culture and politics.
169
Beebs Yeah and I was glad for that. But it kind of only felt like a nod. That might just be me I guess.
2
Cards on the table: Both our kids were at a pc keyboard by age 4. We used them as tutors for math and reading skills, and to build problem solving skills. That kind of thing works. But screens do not offer experience of nature or of people. One makes a category mistake if they think they do. The experience is of staring at a screen. You lose input for all the other senses, and all of them contribute to experience. I believe that this mediation of communications contributes to the problems we currently have with polarized politics and with violence. I really worry about the advent of VR.
2
Showersofstardust I agree with much of what you have to say. Both my two kids were using pc tutorials by age 4, as a supplement to other fun and games and learning. When they hit 1st grade their reading and math was at 4th grade level. As they transition from high school to college, their ease around technology is amazing. But you kind of miss my point. While I agree with you that tech lets you meet a broader range of people and opinions than you might have without it, my point is that the experience is mediated. It is not direct contact with real people. And so the inputs and feedback that we evolved to use as communication are gone. Inflection of voice, body position and movement, eye movement, pheromones, and more, all inform communication. Depending on the medium, you lose one or more of these. The trade off comes at a cost which I think we see in the current polarization and devaluing of people. Mander was right about how TV would devalue and confuse us. We confuse watching a "Nature" program with being outside. It doesn't have the same impact and thus is easy to devalue against profit or development. Advertising on TV has confused people's real needs with a need to belong, to show status via image and life style. This creates demand well beyond reason, and partly explains the lack of savings people make toward retirement. These are all results of real experience being mediated. Substitution of texting, messaging, even video like Skype, and social media like Facebook, can be appropriate as a supplement to real interaction. We probably couldn't get rid of them anyway. But we should use them, not them use us.
1
Showersofstardust Thank you for this last. I think we're not really all that far apart in our views. I probably have more trepidation about things things can go wrong because I've seen the changes in behavior coming about. There is very evident addiction to the feedback devices provide, which people in the tech industry say is by design. And there is and the degradation of of both social and political civility. Sure, cyber tech enables new interactions between people who would never otherwise meet. I've conversed with people around the world and learned a lot. Both my kids maintain friendships made during study abroad. I wouldn't trade those experiences any more that you would trade yours. But cyber tech also provides a curtain of anonymity that emboldens people to bully, alienate and dehumanize, and act in ways they would probably never do face to face, or even in the same room. But as you say, most of this has been around in other ways, so it's a difference of degree. Let's hope the list in degrees doesn't capsize the ship.
1