Does digital media use increase risk of social-emotional delay for Chinese preschoolers?

ABSTRACT

Many studies have shown a relationship between preschool-aged children’s digital media use and their cognitive and physical development. However, the relationship between preschoolers’ digital media exposure and social-emotional development is under-researched both in and outside of China. The current study explores associations between both the amount and content of digital media, as well as parental mediation and other demographic variables, and Chinese preschoolers’ risk of social-emotional delay. Nine hundred and forty-four parents of preschoolers aged 42 to 72 months completed the Ages and Stages Questionnaire: Social-Emotional II (ASQ: SE II) and a media diary. Results indicate that time spent on digital media is positively associated with preschool-aged children’s risk of social-emotional delay, particularly for children from affluent families. Children were less likely to be at risk with increased restrictive mediation while more likely to be at risk when parental co-use increased. We did not find a relationship between digital content type and social-emotional development, which may due to our focus on the interactive conditions of the content rather than the social-emotional lessons in the content. The present study suggests possible predictors of preschoolers’ social-emotional delay related to digital media usage and parental mediation.

IMPACT SUMMARY

• Prior State of Knowledge: Recent studies have shown associations between inappropriate digital media use and children’s social-emotional problems such as interpersonal skills, emotional understanding, and self-regulation.

• Novel Contributions: This large scale study is the first to reveal a positive relationship between increased digital media time and preschoolers’ social-emotional delay within a Chinese cultural context, which additionally identifies affluent families as an at-risk population.

• Practical Implications: These findings provide valuable insights for parents implementing evidence-based parental mediation strategies for children’s digital media use with a consideration toward social-economic status and cultural background. These exploratory findings also inform the direction of future studies investigating such evidence-based strategies.

KEYWORDS:

• Young children
• preschooler
• digital media
• social-emotional development
• parental mediation

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. According to the different education systems in many countries, preschool and kindergarten may refer to different stages of childhood education. In China, young children aged between 3–6 years enter kindergarten 5 days weekly as preparation for elementary education, they are referred to as preschoolers. Preschool education in China is not compulsory, but very few age-appropriate children do not go to preschool in urban districts (85.2% enrollment rate nationwide in 2020 according to statistics from the Chinese Ministry of Education).

2. Both public and private kindergarten were included in the sample. These kindergartens were at the local average in size and tuition fee.

3. Educational tablet refers to a certain kind of digital product for early education purposes only. It helps parents set time limit rules and turns off after a period of time of using. It also claims to be no harm to children’s eyes and prompts children if they are too close to the screen.

4. 1 = no more than 50,000 CNY (equal to 7740 USD approximately) yearly; 2 = 60 thousand to 100 thousand CNY yearly; 3 = 110 thousand to 200 thousand CNY yearly; 4 = 210 thousand to 500 thousand CNY yearly; 5 = more than 500 thousand CNY yearly.

Additional information

Funding

This research was supported in part by grants from the Social Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province [grant number 19SHC008] and the China Postdoctoral Science Foundation [grant number 2020M671567].