Parents of small children understand that smartphones and tablets offer potentially strong developmental tools for their offspring, but may also lead to addictive behavior or expose the children to inappropriate content.
Even with several years of research available, the effects of mobile devices on very young children is unclear, according to a report from the American Academy of Pediatrics.
A problem - research, which was published today in "Pediatrics" finds - is that parents simply don't know how much their children use smartphones and tablets.
The American Academy of Pediatrics study found in the families surveyed, 35 percent of children ages 3-5 had their own tablets. And while it was surprising that such a high percentage of young children had their own devices, the study pointed out many of the children from the study were using devices well before they were 1 year old.
The study, "Young Children Use of Smartphones and Tablets," electronically tracked use by young children through an app installed on Android devices and through screen shots from Apple devices. The study compared the data to parents' estimates of their children's media use.
The study undertaken with 346 English-speaking parents and guardians of children ages 3-5, and done through email, online surveys and mobile device sampling.
Researchers found the average daily use for the 121 children who had their own devices was just more than 115 minutes. About 60 percent of the entire test group used their devices for more than an hour a day.
Eighteen children (about 15 percent) used their devices at least four hours daily.
The most commonly used applications were YouTube, YouTube Kids, Internet browser, streaming videos, and quick search or Siri.
Parents not only didn't know how much their children used the devices (about 36 percent underestimated use, while about 35 percent overestimated use), they did not know what the children were viewing.
The children in the test used hundreds of apps that included some apps intended for teenage or mature audiences, such as games, gambling apps and violent apps.
The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends access to media in all forms - including TV, computers and smartphones - be limited.
Children younger than 2 should only have access to media when an adult is available to co-view, talk about the media and teach lessons involved with the media, according to the organization.
Screen time should be limited to no more than one hour a day for children ages 2-5. Parents and guardians should seek out activities for children that are healthy for their development. When media is used, it should be interactive, educational and non-violent.
"Most apps advertised as 'educational' aren't proven to be effective and they don't encourage co-viewing or co-play that help young children learn," according to healthychildren.org. "Also, most educational apps target rote skills such as ABCs and shapes. Those skills are only one part of school readiness."
Impulse control, emotional management, creativity, cognitive skills and others are best learned through unstructured social play with family and friends, and are necessary for success in schools, the website states.
Overuse of media may lead to sleep deprivation, learning delays, behavioral problems and obesity.
Healthychildren.org offers these tips for parents, caregivers and families:
Do not feel pressured to introduce technology early.
Monitor children's media.
Turn off TVs and other devices when not in use.
Keep bedrooms, mealtimes, and parent-child play times screen-free and unplugged for children and parents.
Avoid exposure to devices or screens one hour before bedtime.
Avoid using media as the only way to calm children.
The Academy study was the first of its kind to use mobile device-based samples to examine electronic usage by young children. The data was more consistent than in previous studies, in which researchers depended on parents to provide information.
"Participating parents found the mobile sampling methods highly acceptable and were informed of how their child's data would be collected, handled and destroyed," the report said.
Researchers found even among small children with their own phones or tablets, there was a wide range in daily mobile device use. However, a limitation for the study was that the app used could not differentiate between users who may have shared the devices.
The report suggests mobile device sampling could be a powerful future data collection tool for research among any age group.
For Android-based devices, the researchers used Chronicle to collect data. Chronicle is a study app developed by OpenLattice Inc., in collaboration with the Comprehensive Assessment of Family Media Exposure Consortium. It collects data about app usage and transmits the data automatically to OpenLattice. Chronicle only collected app names, timestamps, and a "masked" device identification, but does not collect personal information.
"By using Chronicle, it is possible to define variables such as the number of checks of specific apps (such as social media) per hour, usage during time periods when family meals or routines might occur, or overnight usage," the study determined.
However, it would be helpful to combine mobile sampling with other methods to capture media use on other platforms like TV or video game consoles, it said.
"Given the limitations of parent reporting," the report said, "such objective measurement tools must be developed and refined so that health research (and evidence-based guidelines) can reflect the complex ways modern media are used."