Technology And The Impact On Children Essay Sample

Albert Einstein once declared that “it has become appallingly obvious that our technology has exceeded our humanity” (Einstein, as cited by Makovsky). As technology develops at a celeritous pace, parents have articulated a growing concern about how early exposure to video games and iPads will impact children. Indeed, today children are being raised in a tumultuous digital age that starkly contrasts from their parents’ and grandparents’ generations. A litany of technologies are deployed in the workplace, home, schools, and offices. If used with sagacity, technology as well as the media can enhance childrens’ learning and mental acuity. Certain groups such as the American Academy of Pediatrics have stated that children young than two years of age should not watch television because their brain development requires that they interact with their parents and/or other caregivers. As the digital age progressed, over 90% of parents admitted that children were exposed to electronic media. Nonetheless, the academy still discouraged these young kids from engaging in screen time of any sort. The ubiquity of technology has cultivated a heightened sense of concern regarding the impact of portable interactive media (Rosin). Parents must navigate the murky terrain by allowing their children to become competent in digital media while also ensuring that their children do not use such novel forms of media too much. While some people argue that social interfaces and other forms of touch screen technologies will help prepare children for a successful future, others contend that such technologies render children addicted to mindless entertain, which stunts their optimal growth. While social interfaces and digital technologies do foster certain skills and competencies that this generation need in the future, they nonetheless alienate children from the real world that could have adverse ramifications on children in the future.
Some psychologists argue that media interactivity creates more possibilities for children to explore and try new things because touching a screen to explore something of interest does not require parents to teach their progeny this skill. Companies have increasingly pandered touch-screen products according to the aptitude of children, thereby including in their products apps such as finger painting. A survey conducted by AVS technologies polled mothers and children who were between the ages of two and five regarding internet access within the home. AVS found that the majority of children knew how to play video games than how to ride a bike, swim. Moreover, more pre-school children know how to use a smart phone while they could not even tie their shoelaces (Jones). Such trends are the result of companies such as Apple creating a social interface that is simple and easy to use while also remaining “intuitive and unmediated as possible—you touch what you’re interested in, which is a skill that no child needs to be taught” (Jones). As such, two year old children can use the iPad without help to accomplish basic tasks. The debate rages on regarding whether or not digital interfaces will further alienate people from one another or if they can be harnessed for good causes.
Other scholars, however, decry how technology has seemingly exceeded the limitations of humanity that has alienated children from the outer world. Moreover, screen time and smart phone use has cultivated new psychological issues for children if they cannot engage in social interface and screen time. Children must engage in the real, three-dimensional world in order to properly develop and undergo a process of socialization that eschews reclusiveness. Moreover, many people argue that technology hinders the development of creativity in children because they remain isolated from nature and the real world. Children and adolescents are so addicted to their smart phones that without them they feel as though “they have lost a limb” (Alleyne). Invoking the rhetoric of dependence, distress, and depression, young people have reported both physical and mental symptoms if they do not have screen time for a protracted period of time (Alleyne). It is thus unequivocal that children develop addictive behaviors that have real biological and psychological problems that may impact the quality of their lives in the future.

Works Cited

Allene, Richard. “The Young Generation are ‘Addicted” to Mobile Phones.” The Telegraph 19 Apr. 2011. Web. 12 Mar. 2015. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/8458786/The-young-generation-are-addicted-to-mobile-phones.html.
Jones, Thomas. “Techno-toddlers: A is for Apple.” The Guardian 18 Nov 2011. Web. 10 Mar. 2015. http:www.theguardian.com/technology/2
Makovsky, Ken. “Is Technology Exceeding Humanity?” Forbes 7 May 2012. http://www.forbes.com/sites/kenmakovsky/2012/05/07is-technology-exceeding-humanity/
Rosin, Hanna. “The Touch Screen Generation.” The Atlantic 2013 Apr. Web. 12 Mar. 2015. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2013/04/the-touch-screen-generation/309250/