Four-year-old Sadman can neither talk nor pronounce any word except addressing his parents. He remains silent when asked to talk. Sadman started to be very overweight when he was two years old. Sadman’s father is a service holder and so is his mother. They can not devote adequate and quality time for their child. For this reason, whenever their kid cries or does not want to eat, smartphone comes to their rescue. Days of Sadman are passing by watching cartoon and rhymes over the phone for hours and playing games.
Sadman does not have any opportunity to work out, play outside or entertain. The child is entirely dependent on smartphone who otherwise can be called phone addict.
Ehsan is another child like Sadman. Although he is five-year-old boy but his parents were embarrassed as he could not talk properly, remained silent and used to cry whenever any outsider crosses his way. Later, his parents had recourse to the doctor who informed that the child has become sick physically and mentally due to excessive addiction towards smartphones.
Mother of Ehsan said that he looks for smartphone immediately after waking up. Ehsan starts crying if the smartphone is not given to him. He eats and falls asleep while watching things over smartphone. Now, he is entirely dependent on smartphone and laptop due to the commencement of online classes. Ehsan starts to cry loudly whenever he is asked to stay away from smartphone.
Not only Sadman or Ehsan, doctors inform that number of such children is increasing rapidly every day. According to the doctors, every day they are having patients between the ages of 3 to 5 years whose parents complain that their child is not attentive and cannot talk.
Doctors inform that most of these children are addicted towards smartphone. Talking to the parents of these children, it has been learnt that these children are provided with mobile phones whenever they do not want to eat. They started to watch movies, songs and rhymes on the phone which turns into a habit and later into addiction.
Parents seem relieved as their children go calm after having mobile in their hands. However, as per experts, such comforts of the parents turn into the biggest discomforts in their lives at a later date. According to them, these children are growing up as dumb and mentally handicapped with their parents remaining in total darkness about such consequences. Experts said that children used to have different types of devices in the past but for a particular period of time. However, due to coronavirus pandemic, children are passing out their time at home without any extracurricular activity like going to the dance school, attending recitation session, drawing classes or going to any friend’s birthday. In addition, they have to attend online classes for hours. Children are passing their time in playing games over mobile or computer and gossiping with friends through video calls using Messenger. In consequence, physical and mental health of these children are at stake with many of them plunging into depression and devoting more time to the screen.
Upazila Health and Family Planning Officer Dr. H.M. Zahirul Islam told the Business Post that children attain complete maturity of their nervous system within the first eight years. Their nervous system matures through their exposure to the surroundings. However, children addicted towards cell phone are deprived of such opportunities and cannot learn how to talk and also becoming mentally handicapped.
Children using cell phones become more vulnerable towards brain tumor and cancer by the microwave radiation emitted from cell phones. For this reason, network of cell phone must be switched off with the aero plane mode turning on when phones are given to the kids. Even, we should not take the kids on the lap when the cell phone is around and even should not talk over mobile phones while keeping kids beside at least up to the age of ten.
According to the experts, mental development of children takes place very rapidly between the ages of zero to three. For this reason, children should be provided with an appropriate environment as they learn by way of imitating. Experts are blaming excessive screen time of the parents and the screen dependency of their children.
Public health expert Juwel Rana said parents hand over their electronic devices to their small kids during their mealtime or when they cry. Although it works but mental and physical developments of children are hampered due to passing more time on the screen. Even those children may become physically and mentally handicapped permanently. Intellectual development of children gets hampered when they become dependent on screen instead of their family members. Although they learn many things from the screen but it is not helpful for their mental development.
When children pass more time on screen, scope of their attention narrows down. In consequence, they neither understand their surroundings nor learn from the same and thus results into a decrease in their learning abilities. Children become impatient. They do not have the capacity to control their frustration and become unable to understand the emotion of others.
Juwel Rana said that one of the recent surveys has revealed the fact of belated mental development in 27 out of 100 children between the ages of three to four years.
Children are the late learners of languages as their parents cannot dedicate time and talk to them owing to their busy schedule. Even in consequence these children may lose their abilities to talk. According to this expert, there is a possibility for the child with normal mental development to become intellectually handicapped.
Research reveals that kids do not learn much from the electronic devices. Brains of those children having more than seven hours of screen time gradually lose efficiency. Moreover, longer exposure to those devices adversely affects physical development such as reduction in height, not able to attain human qualities and inability to tolerate other children. These children cannot be attentive towards their studies later on.
For this reason, World Health Organization advices not to provide screen time or electronic devices to children below two years and allowing children between the ages of two to four years maximum one hour with the electronic devices.
Experts opine that some of the programmes of YouTube may be beneficial for children and help in their mental development. However, parents have to sit with their children while watching those programmes and help their kids to understand the same.
Eye specialists are having more minor patients in the last few months. Most of the patients are complaining redness of eye, running water from the eye, burning sensation, headache etc. Most of the complications are arising due to passing more screen time. As a result, children are becoming myopic thereby not able to view distant objects clearly. According to doctors it is indeed a danger for the future generation.
Retina Surgeon and Assistant Professor of Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujib Medical University Dr. Md. Afzal Mahfuzullah said there has been a huge change in our life during the past six months. Factors like lockdown and sanitization have become indispensable part of our life. In addition, there has been an increase in the dependency on screen.
Children are facing multiple problems as a result of looking at the screen of mobile and laptop for hours. They like their smartphone most for passing their time including online classes. Dr. Afzal thinks adherence to some rules and exercise may reduce the damages to some extent.
According to this physician, children have to sit properly in front of the screen by keeping their neck and head upright. It is better to keep the eyes and screen at the same level with a distance of 18 to 24 inch in between. Moreover, it is necessary to take a break for 20 seconds in every 20 minutes by looking at something at a distance of six feet from the computer or device.
It is better to have a larger screen preferably that of the laptop or computer instead of mobile phone. Brightness of the screen must be low and a habit of looking at the distant sky for 10 to 15-minute everyday needs to be developed.
aa/wi
