Oscar Zegarra.

Carol Froisy.
ENG 111/09
17th Dec, 2010

Technology: Can technology help your kid?

Technology has become an important subject of discussion nowadays. While some

people still live by old traditions, the rest are now facing a new era of information and

technology based on new discoveries and new electronic gadgets available to everyone at any

electronic retail store. However, how exactly are these changes affecting our lives? Kids are

growing up technologically savvier than generations before. Kids can now have access to almost

anything through the Internet, and anyone can access the Internet through a cell-phone device,

personal computer, and even from a TV. With this amount of information and accessibility

available to our kids, experts are advising parents to make sure their kids can understand all the

possible risks that can be waiting for them.

Kids between 14-16 years old are already texting addicts. Video games are generating new levels

of violence in some groups of kids according to Dr. Craig Anderson, a professor of psychology

at Iowa State University and co-author of the new book titled “Violent Video Game Effects on

Children and Adolescents.” A recent study reported “Even if the game involves cute characters

and happy music, children were 40% more likely to exhibit aggressive behavior after playing

video games.”

However, there are other studies that show how educational video games play an important role

in a child’s brain development. Main reason is video games have a good base for interaction,

which generates new responses in kids as well as encourages active participation. Professor

James Paul Gee from the University of California says, “There might be two separate
educational systems operating today: one a traditional approach to learning; the other what Gee

calls ‘passion communities.’ The last one produces real knowledge. Video games, virtual-worlds

and online social networks provide environments in which these passion communities can form

and thrive. Both ideas have understandable points of view but, how much is exactly too much?

How can we determine what can be beneficial and what can become a serious issue in the future

of our kids?

It is important to understand and consider some of the genetics biases of the human brain. Doctor

Perry explains:

Our culture has evolved through social interactions, initially without written

language. The development of written language expressed new brain-mediated

capabilities that had previously been un-expressed. Nowadays, we can see how

technology might be doing the same thing through external symbolic

representations such as the written word, visual images on television, and

complex three-dimensional videography because they are all sensed, processed,

stored, and acted on by the human brain.

Dr. Perry explains: “We can see how newer generations are growing up with this new

background full of information, completely different from generations before us, society is

accepting these changes and adapting to them.”

Most of the common risks that technology presents are television misinformation and

educational videos that don’t meet educational purposes. There are several educational videos

being sold that don’t deliver the results that they were advertised for. Another issue is the recent

addiction for texting through cell phone devices. Recent studies indicate that kids between 8-18
year olds are spending an average of 33 minutes talking on a cell phone in a typical day. As far

as text messaging, almost half of kids between 8-18 years old engage in texting and is estimate

that they send an average of 118 messages in a typical day spending an hour and a half in

sending and receiving texts, according to “Media in the life‘s of 8-18 years old”, a Kaiser Family

Foundation study.

Another possible problem as mentioned before is the addiction that any kid can develop for

video games, either on a personal computer, video game system (Ps3, Xbox360, Nintendo Wii),

or any electronic device, and the negative effects that these video games can create.

The more important issue that parents may be dealing with is the social networking interaction

through the Internet. Sharing personal information, like videos and photos can have terrible

consequences if proper measures are not taken into consideration.

We define technology as kids being able to use a cell phone device, a video camera, a portable

computer, television, and some web-enable devices. Today, there are many independent research

groups trying to establish a model or several types of models in which some types of kids can be

classified to determine how these educational technologies are really helping each kid.

Unfortunately, the results are difficult to analyze for various reasons. Being the most important

one something that researchers cannot measure in a scientific way, which is the interaction that

each kid has with their parents and how much each kid is able to learn from them. Child

psychologists takes this subject very seriously in order to establish a relation between parents and

their kids to determine how much children learn and observe from their parents in their early

years. This is one of many reasons why studies related to technology and how they can affect a

child’s brain development is “As useful as asking how food in general affect their physical

development,” said Daphne Bavelier, a neuroscientist at the University of Rochester, New York.
Understanding that no actual thesis can be determined to evaluate how technology can have

positive or negatives effect on children, is the most important step that parents need to realize.

Parents should offer their kids the best available solutions when dealing with technology,

according to Elizabeth Vandewater, Ph.D., an assistant professor of human development and

family sciences and director of the Center for Research on Interactive Technology, Television

and Children at the University of Texas. Nobody else will give a kid a general overview of the

world outside his home better than their parents will. “Parents need to know and stay current on

actual changes in technology and how these changes can affect the development of their kids in

order to be able to guide them as well as assist them when they find trouble,” says Vandewater.

In conclusion, even though there have been many studies on how to assess how

technology can help a child's brain development, there are still some variables that need more in

deep research. Not every child is the same and as far as how many things a certain group of kids

may have in common there are always some kids that not meet the standards. Independent

research groups are currently working on this subject and parents need to stay current for any

future changes to be able to pass this information to our kids and future generations by letting

them know the risks and possible problems that technology can bring. Dr. Bruce Perry, an

authority on brain development and children crisis, says:

Children need real-life experiences with real people to truly benefit from available

technologies. Technologies should be used to enhance the curriculum and

experiences for children. Children have to have an integrated and well-balanced

set of experiences to help them grow into capable adults that can handle social-

emotional interactions as well as develop their intellectual ability.`

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