A study published very recently (January 2020) in the Bulletin épidémiologique hebdomadaire, signed by several academics from Rennes (Manon Collet, Bertrand Gagnière, Chloé Rousseau, Anthony Chapron, Laure Fiquet and Chystèle Certain) made a lot of noise in the media. It is an adaptation of an original article published in 2019 in the journal Acta Pædiatrica (Collet M., Gagnière B., Rousseau C., Chapron A., Fiquet L., Certain C., “Case-control study found that primary language disorders were associated with screen exposure”. Acta Paediatrica. 2019;108:1103-1109). This case-control study, conducted in Ille-et-Vilaine, aimed to assess the link between children’s exposure to screens (interactive or not) and primary language disorders. According to the neuroscience researcher Marie-Hélène Grosbras, interviewed by HuffPost: “this study has the merit of testing, with appropriate statistical models, the hypothesis of the effect of screens on a particular area”.
The study involved 276 children, aged 3½ to 6½. 167 were diagnosed with primary language disorders, while 109 had none. Questionnaires were passed on by doctors and speech therapists and completed by parents. The study showed that children exposed to screens in the morning, before leaving for school, were three times more likely to develop primary language disorders. More importantly, if this morning exposure is combined with rarely (or never) talking with parents about the content of the screens (the images watched), children would be six times more at risk of developing primary language disorders.
“The variable “screen exposure in the morning before school” remains statistically linked to primary language disorders, independently of the other variables. Average morning screen exposure was 20 minutes for children in both groups. It can be said that the very fact of being exposed to screens in the morning, rather than the duration of that exposure, promotes the onset of language disorders. This could be explained by the fact that being exposed to screens in the morning is an exhausting activity that makes the child less able to acquire knowledge and learn for the rest of the day.” (https://hal-univ-rennes1.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-01954032/document)
This study has nevertheless been criticised by some researchers, who point to the lack of an initial assessment of each child’s speech and language, as well as possible biases linked to data being collected from parents through a questionnaire. Moreover, since the study was carried out during the summer months, children’s habits may not have been the same as during the school term. Finally, it is always very important to remember the big difference between “correlation” and “causation”: the study shows a correlation between morning screen exposure and the onset of language disorders. There is therefore no cause-and-effect link, which means that these disorders may also arise because of other events.
However, this study can remind parents and professionals of what we at the 3-6-9-12 association have always said: even though it is necessary not to leave a child under 3 in front of a non-interactive screen, the most important thing is that a child’s screen use (at any age) be a limited moment, set at specific times of the day (not in the morning before school, nor in the evening before bed or during mealtimes, which are convivial moments when family conversation should be encouraged). In addition, it is essential that the child be accompanied by their parents in what they see through screens. Indeed, it is by sharing this content with them and making sense of the images watched that parents will best help the child understand the world, throughout their development.
We can thus stress here that it is not so much the length of exposure to screens that should be considered but rather the periods of exposure, and whether the screen becomes a barrier in the child-parent relationship. Let us make sure that young people are not left alone with images and that they can share with us what they like to watch, just as we like to share with them everything that excites us.
Olivier Duris is a clinical psychologist at the André Boulloche Day Hospital (CEREP-Phymentin) and in the PREAUT support unit (UDAP). He is also a lecturer at Université Paris Diderot and at the École des Psychologues Praticiens, and works in private practice. https://www.olivierduris.fr/
