Technology in Child Development
Technology in Child Development
Introduction and Outline
Technology has become an integral part of modern society as it influences people’s daily activities. Due to the profound technological advancements in recent decades, raising and educating children of the current generation has unique challenges. The 21st-century children are heavy technology users, surpassing any other generation in the past. The significant increase in technology use among children has elicited attention to its impact on child development, particularly regarding their physical, cognitive, and socio-emotional development. Therefore, parents and educators are responsible for ensuring that children interact with technology in the right ways. This research will explore the impact of technology on children’s physical, cognitive and socio-emotional development. It will address technology’s positive and negative impacts and areas for further research regarding technology use in child development.
Annotated Bibliography
Baharudin, H. H. (2021). The advantages of interactive whiteboard technology in the development of children’s learning. Turkish Journal of Computer and Mathematics Education (TURCOMAT), 12(3), 842-845.
This resource demonstrates the advantages of technology in child learning and development by outlining the benefits of using the Interactive Whiteboard (IWB) in early childhood education institutions. According to the author, the use of ICT in education has significantly expanded worldwide, with IWB being among the most applied ICT tools in modern classrooms. This technology’s advantages include active learning participation, improved literary skills, increased collaboration among children, and enhanced learning habits. As a result, technology enables children to improve their academic achievement. This paper is integral to the current research because it focuses on technology use in the classroom.
Strulik, H. (2021). Testing unified growth theory: Technological progress and the child quantity–quality trade-off. https://www.econstor.eu/bitstream/10419/242329/1/vfs-2021-pid-48370.pdf
This paper discusses the unified growth theory and its association with accelerating technological advancements. The author posits that technological progress enhances children’s education by promoting mass education and improving outcomes. However, the enhanced education system in a particular country has an inverse relationship with its fertility rates. Therefore, technological advancements increase investments in education and improve child education quality but reduce the general fertility rate. This strategy applies to countries or regions wishing to enhance education quality and control population growth. Thus, this resource is helpful because it describes the importance of technological advancement on the quality of child development.
Gottschalk, F. (2019). Impacts of technology use on children: Exploring literature on the brain, cognition, and well-being. Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 195(3), 45.
This resource is a working paper from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) detailing the effects of technology on children. According to the author, the increase in technology use among children in contemporary society has increased attention to the impact on children’s development. The resource bases its research on literature regarding technology’s effect on a child’s brain, social, cognitive, and emotional development. It also proposes areas for additional study and presents evidence-based quality guidelines. This paper is integral to this research because it offers a comprehensive outlook on issues such as child well-being, health implications of screen time among children, and policy implications of the resulting evidence.
Oswald, T. K., Rumbold, A. R., Kedzior, S. G., & Moore, V. M. (2020). Psychological impacts of “screen time” and “green time” for children and adolescents: A systematic scoping review. PloS One, 15(9), e0237725.
This paper centers its research on the psychological impact of “screen time” among children compared to “green time.” “Screen time” refers to the interaction with screen-based technologies such as smartphones, computers, and TV, while “green time” refers to the interaction with nature. The authors posit that low green time and high screen time may significantly impact children’s mental health and well-being. After analyzing multiple qualitative studies (186 different studies), the authors found that higher screen time levels correlated with unfavorable psychological outcomes, while increased green time resulted in better psychological effects. This resource is crucial because it informs children of the detriments of excessive technology use.
Hosokawa, R., & Katsura, T. (2018). Association between mobile technology use and child adjustment in early elementary school age. PloS One, 13(7), e0199959.
This paper focuses on mobile device use among children rather than the traditional mainstream technology. Thus, the study seeks to establish the relationship between device use among children and behavioral adjustment. The authors restricted their research to six-year-old children in the first grade. According to their findings, regular mobile device use was positively associated with childhood behavior problems compared to non-regular users. This resource is helpful to this research because mobile devices are becoming the most used devices by children because they are instantly accessible and portable. It also informs on the negative behavioral impact of excess technology use by children.
