'Genius' videos may hinder baby development: study

[Evo]

Recordings that claim to stimulate baby brain development may actually slow vocabulary development in infants if they are overused, U.S. researchers reported on Wednesday.

For every hour per day spent watching baby DVDs and videos, infants aged 8 to 16 months understood an average of six to eight fewer words than babies who did not watch them, Frederick Zimmerman of the University of Washington and colleagues found.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20070809/tv_nm/babies_videos_dc;_ylt=Aj2GDmNDPzJwhL1Ek5UPDQADW7oF

 

[chroot]

I'm pretty sure that simply interacting with and playing with your baby are the best possible ways of aiding their development. But I'm not a parent.

- Warren

 

[Evo]

I'm pretty sure that simply interacting with and playing with your baby are the best possible ways of aiding their development. But I'm not a parent.

- Warren

Why would you waste time playing with your baby when you can sit it in front of the tv and pop in a video that will talk to it and guarantees to make it smart?

Of course I'm joking.

 

[SpitfireAce]

does anybody else get the impression that all these surveys and double-blind studies (so and so reduces the risk of getting so and so) are based on nothing more than statistical flukes supporting near-random speculation... there's nothing scientific about them, they just seem like a waste of time and money

 

[Math Is Hard]

Baby brains are big business.
http://www.educationsector.org/analysis/analysis_show.htm?doc_id=469729

Over the past decade, it has become conventional wisdom in many education circles that sufficient stimulation in the first three years of life can go a long way toward hardwiring the brain for success. Bookstores are brimming with books with titles like Smart-Wiring Your Baby's Brain, states have launched Smart Start programs, and a booming, multi-billion dollar industry led by companies such as Baby Einstein and Brainy Baby has tapped into parental angst over doing enough for their kids with foreign-language classes for newborns, toddler day spas, and a host of other products and services aimed at unleashing a baby's inner genius.

That study is going to make some corporations pretty unhappy.

 

[Evo]

That was very interesting MIH, so why don't we see more about why these things are shams?

That study is going to make some corporations pretty unhappy.

It's disgusting how people take advantage of people's fears that they're aren't good parents or the dim wits that think they can buy intelligence for their kid.

A video or cd can't interact with a child, it can't tell if the child is paying attention or has fallen asleep, it's idiotic.

I remember when I had my first child, I was bombarded with advertisements telling me that a mobile had to have specific symbols/colors/shapes or my child would be brain damaged. The things were hideously ugly, no self respecting baby would look at one. I bought one with little stuffed animals because I liked watching it. :!)

 

[Astronuc]

I remember when I had my first child, I was bombarded with advertisements telling me that a mobile had to have specific symbols/colors/shapes or my child would be brain damaged. The things were hideously ugly, no self respecting baby would look at one. I bought one with little stuffed animals because I liked watching it. :!)

Somehow we missed all that.

We simply read to our children. First with picture books and then with words.

I liked the books by Dr. Seuss and P. D. Eastman, and Sesame Street books. I used to do the voices of the different Sesame Street characters. Bert's was somewhat challenging.

My kids started school reading well ahead of others by about a grade or more.

 

[Evo]

Richard Scarry books were the best. :!) :!) :!)

 

[Astronuc]

Richard Scarry books were the best. :!) :!) :!)

Yep. I forgot those. We had Busy Town and several others.

My son would search each page for Lowly Worm.

 

[Moonbear]

It's a shame the article doesn't discuss HOW the videos are used in each home. Of course, if you just plunk your kid down in front of a TV for all their waking hours, it doesn't matter what is on the TV, they aren't getting the sort of reinforcement and social interaction from their parents that they require for learning. But, that doesn't necessarily mean those videos can't be used as a learning tool when accompanied by a parent who is reinforcing the language development for names of a broader range of objects presented than you might encounter every day.

It does make sense that over-use would be bad. If you're substituting exploration of the actual world around them with videos, of course kids will have less presented to them to learn.

 

[Math Is Hard]

Getting ugly..

On August 13, 2007, Robert Iger, president and CEO of the Walt Disney Company, the owner of Baby Einstein, demanded that the University of Washington retract the press release, asserting that the study itself doesn’t support the claims made by the University’s public relations department.

On August 16, University of Washington President Mark A. Emmert rejected Disney's complaints, saying that the university stands behind the research and that the press release accurately reflected the paper's conclusions and the scientists' commentary.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Baby_Einstein

 

[Astronuc]

Baby Einsteins: Not So Smart After All
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1650352,00.html

The claim always seemed too good to be true: park your infant in front of a video and, in no time, he or she will be talking and getting smarter than the neighbor's kid. In the latest study on the effects of popular videos such as the "Baby Einstein" and "Brainy Baby" series, researchers find that these products may be doing more harm than good. And they may actually delay language development in toddlers.

Led by Frederick Zimmerman and Dr. Dimitri Christakis, both at the University of Washington, the research team found that with every hour per day spent watching baby DVDs and videos, infants learned six to eight fewer new vocabulary words than babies who never watched the videos. These products had the strongest detrimental effect on babies 8 to 16 months old, the age at which language skills are starting to form. "The more videos they watched, the fewer words they knew," says Christakis. "These babies scored about 10% lower on language skills than infants who had not watched these videos."

It's not the first blow to baby videos, and likely won't be the last. Mounting evidence suggests that passive screen sucking not only doesn't help children learn, but could also set back their development. Last spring, Christakis and his colleagues found that by three months, 40% of babies are regular viewers of DVDs, videos or television; by the time they are two years old, almost 90% are spending two to three hours each day in front of a screen. Three studies have shown that watching television, even if it includes educational programming such as Sesame Street, delays language development. "Babies require face-to-face interaction to learn," says Dr. Vic Strasburger, professor of pediatrics at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine and a spokesperson for the American Academy of Pediatrics. "They don't get that interaction from watching TV or videos. In fact, the watching probably interferes with the crucial wiring being laid down in their brains during early development." Previous studies have shown, for example, that babies learn faster and better from a native speaker of a language when they are interacting with that speaker instead of watching the same speaker talk on a video screen. "Even watching a live person speak to you via television is not the same thing as having that person in front of you," says Christakis.

. . . .

When I was an infant, we didn't have TV. I don't remember TV until I was about 6. My parents read to me, and I read to my kids.

I spent most of my time outside, and when inside, I listed to BBC or ABC (Australian Broadcasting Company) on my dad's radio/stereo.