With poll: Study: 70 percent of children at home day cares watch TV daily

Children in home-based day cares across Michigan may be spending as much as two hours per day watching television instead of playing, according to a study published today.

From an AP story:

When added to the two to three hours many parents already admit to allowing at home, preschoolers in child care may be spending more than a third of the about 12 hours they are awake each day in front of the electronic baby sitter, said Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a pediatrician at Children's Hospital and Regional Medical Center in Seattle and a researcher at the University of Washington.

That's double the TV time he found in a previous study based on parental reports of home viewing, according to findings published Monday in the journal Pediatrics. The study is the first to look at TV watching in child care in more than 20 years.

The figures come from a telephone survey of 168 licensed child care programs in Michigan, Washington, Florida and Massachusetts. Christakis said he thought television use was probably underreported.

Of the child care programs surveyed, 70 percent of home-based child cares and 36 percent of centers said children watch TV daily. The children were watching TV, DVDs and videos. The study did not track what kind of programs were shown.

The State of Michigan's licensing rules for family and group child care homes states that children may watch up to two hours per day.

Television, video tapes, movies, electronic devices, and computers shall be limited to not more than 2 hours per day and to programs designed for children’s education and/or enjoyment. Other activities shall be available to children during television/movie viewing.

The American Academy of Pediatrics, however, says children under age two shouldn't watch any TV at all, and that children over 2 shouldn't watch more than 1-2 hours of TV per day.

Under age two, talking, singing, reading, listening to music or playing are far more important to a child's development than any TV show.

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