Do you know what parental “technoference” is? Behind this term that sounds straight out of a science-fiction film lies… a flaw of our everyday lives! It refers to all the interruptions in parent-child interaction caused by parents using their smartphone, or any other kind of screen, during times when they are looking after their children.
Parental technoference raises concerns about children’s emotional well-being and psycho-affective development, and also their safety.
A growing body of research is seeking to assess the effects of these uses, all the more so since parents’ attention and engagement in this situation seem greater towards the device than towards the child!
At such moments, less attention and less appropriate emotional and educational support are observed towards children. For example at mealtimes, when new foods are offered to 6-year-olds, those whose mothers use their mobile phone are less encouraged to taste, and ultimately have fewer new experiences with food. At the park, children whose parents use their smartphone receive less support in their motor or relational experiences. There is then less eye contact with the child, and fewer displays of affection.
Technoference phenomena are also associated with an increase in externalising behavioural problems in children, such as tantrums or displays of frustration.
Finally, a body of research shows that parents’ mobile use is correlated with an increase in children’s risk-taking behaviour: both behaviour aimed at attracting parents’ attention, and risky behaviour that parents do not notice, or notice late.
The research published on the subject thus seems to support the idea that the problem of mobile screens among young children is… above all how their parents use them!
It is urgent that prevention campaigns appear, like the excellent German campaign showing parents absorbed in their smartphones, indifferent to the baby beside them, with the following slogan: “How many times have you talked to your child today?”
- RADESKY JS, MILLER J, ROSENBLUM L, APPUGLIESE KL, KACIROTI D, LUMENG JC, Maternal mobile device use during a structured parent-child interaction task, Academic Pediatrics 2014; 15(2):238-244.
- LEMISH D, ELIAS N, FLOEGEL D, “Look at me !” Parental use of mobile at the playground, MMC 2019; 1-18; doi:10.1177/2050157919846916.
- KILDARE CA, MIDDLEMISS W, Impact of parents mobile device on parent-child interaction: A literature review, Computers in Human Behavior 2017; 75:579-593.
- BEAMISH N, FISCHER J, ROWE H, Parents’use of mobile computing devices, caregiving and the social and emotional development of children: a systematic review of evidence, Australasian Psychiatry 2018; 1-12; doi:10.1177/1039856218789764.
- McDANIEL BT, RADESKY JS, Technoference: Parent DistractionWith Technology and Associations With Child Behavior Problems, Child Development 2018 Janv/Feb; 89(1):100-109.
A physician and director of the André Boulloche Day Hospital for Children in Paris, she works in particular on the relationships young people have with screens, communication with young children, and autism.
