IPhones are good for a lot of things, but one of the most striking, and perhaps unexpected, is keeping toddlers happy. They might not know how those apps work, but we’ve all seen a fussy baby quiet down when their parent hands over their iPhone. As the New York Times puts it, iPhones turn out to be “the most effective tool in human history to mollify a fussy toddler.” In fact, so many parents are handing their phones over to their kids that psychiatrists are launching studies to judge the effect this whole new form of screen time on the tender minds of our kids.
Not surprisingly, most experts aren’t fans of the idea of using iPhones as a toy for developing toddlers. The phones might be bullet proof toddler bait, but there are a lot of reasons to keep them out of your child’s life. The biggest argument is much the same as the argument against using your phone while driving – if your eyes are on the phone, they aren’t on the world around you.
Tovah P. Klein, the director of Columbia University’s Barnard College Center for Toddler Development tells the New York Times, “Children at this age are so curious and they’re observing everything,” she said. “If you’re engrossed in this screen you’re not seeing or observing or taking it in.”
Even the educational apps that are teaching some little iToddlers to read and talk faster than their non-screen using friends may not be getting the same quality of developmental education that they would be if they were picking up words from their parents and the world around them.
But there are definitely times when it’s hard to argue with the simplicity of just handing your phone over to a fussy toddler and magically getting a calm, happy child back. Like all things in life, iPhone time, whether it’s for your kids or yourself, is probably best enjoyed in moderation.
