If your child spends hours on mobile phones or other gadgets, you might want to keep a check on the screen time. A psychologist has found a connection between too much screen time and autism in children. On Autistic Pride Day 2023, let’s find out if excessive exposure to screen can cause autism in children.
Many parents give tablets or phones to their little ones to watch cartoons or kid-friendly videos. While the kids stay entertained, the parents wrap up their office work or household chores. This might help the parents, but in the long run it might be unhealthy for the child. In fact, in 2018, Romanian psychologist Marius Teodor Zamfir came up with a phrase — virtual autism. According to ResearchGate, the psychologist found a connection between autism and too much screen time. He noticed that children aged between 0 and 3 years, who remained hooked to screens for more than four hours in a day, had “sensory-motor and socio-affective deprivation.” This, in turn, triggered behaviour that was similar to those that are found in kids who were diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). On Autistic Pride Day, which is observed to create awareness around autism on June 18, let’s find out the possible connection between screen time and autism.
