ADHD and TV

[telophase]

Just ran across a study (re-analyzing old data from previous studies that came to opposite conclusions) positing a link between watching voer 2 hours of television a day as a young child and the incidence of ADHD.

Does Childhood Television Viewing Lead to Attention Problems in Adolescence? Results From a Prospective Longitudinal Study
Carl Erik Landhuis, BA, Richie Poulton, PhD, David Welch, PhD and Robert John Hancox, PhD

Dunedin Multidisciplinary Health and Development Research Unit, University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand

CONTEXT. There is controversy over whether childhood television viewing causes attention problems. The findings from cross-sectional and longitudinal studies have been mixed. To our knowledge, no longitudinal studies have assessed the impact of children's television viewing on attention problems in adolescence. The objective of this study was to assess this association.

DESIGN, PARTICIPANTS, AND SETTING. Study members were a general population birth cohort of 1037 participants (502 female) born in Dunedin, New Zealand, between April 1972 and March 1973. Parental estimates of children's television-viewing time were obtained at ages 5, 7, 9, and 11 years. Self-, parent-, and teacher-reported attention problems in adolescence were obtained at ages 13 and 15 years.

RESULTS. The mean of hours of television viewing during childhood was associated with symptoms of attention problems in adolescence. These associations remained significant after controlling for gender, attention problems in early childhood, cognitive ability at 5 years of age, and childhood socioeconomic status. This association was also independent of adolescent television viewing.

CONCLUSIONS. Childhood television viewing was associated with attention problems in adolescence, independent of early attention problems and other confounders. These results support the hypothesis that childhood television viewing may contribute to the development of attention problems and suggest that the effects may be long-lasting.

My big issue is not with the news that there may be a link, it's with the suggestion, "These results support the hypothesis that childhood television viewing may contribute to the development of attention problems and suggest that the effects may be long-lasting." Isn't it just as likely that kids with short attention spans prefer watching television because it fits better with their thought patterns? Correlation does not mean causation!

I bring this up because I've got anecdotal evidence that it doesn't have a damn thing to do with watching television: from the ages of 4 to 6 I was in the Serengeti National Park with no access to television whatsoever, and watched way less than 2 hours a day for the next few years because it took me that long to understand the concept of TV schedules. I'd just turn the TV on and hope that whatever I wanted to watch was on. (I don't think I started watching TV regularly until I was 9 or so, and then at the age of 15 we moved to the country and only got two channels, so I stopped watching it and didn't pick it up on a serious basis until I graduated college.)

Pfui.

I haven't read the full article yet, because it's not accessible online by my library at this point. They may address this point in the article, but it's certainly not in the abstract. (The other big problem is that the data is self-reported, not verified independently, so we can't really be sure of its accuracy. It's entirely possible that parents of children with attention problems may over-report TV viewing because they think it's part of the problem, or vice versa.)

Comments

[vom-marlowe.livejournal.com]

*sniffs disdainfully at journal*

I remember when I had to take a special antibiotic called Cipro. It was a neurotransmitter stimulant as a side-effect, and I suddenly had *zero* attention span. I watched a lot of Sesame Street just because it was the only thing I could handle. I'd get bored, sure, but two seconds later, the topic would change. It was very odd, but gave me a whole new understanding of chemically induced attention states.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Yup, sounds familiar. XD

Random anecdote: once my family was visiting friends in another city, who had a small child. We were all in the living room reading, talking, and doing whatnot, and had turned the TV on to Sesame Street to entertain the small child and keep her out of people's hair. About half an hour later, someone looked around and noted that every single person in the room except the small child was transfixed by Sesame Street, and the small child was off in the corner playing quietly with her dolls by herself.

[emtigereyes.livejournal.com]

*laugh*
Beautiful.

[cschells.livejournal.com]

I suspect that TV appeals strongly to people with ADHD based on how many of them (like my husband *cough*) are strongly drawn to computers and internet usage, as well. I think it's harder to vilanize computers because they're relatively more recent and less passive, and yet the attraction is very similar.

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Yeah, things that are new and that change constantly, like computers, fascinate me. :D And I know that once I solve a problem in coding, I tend not to want to do anything with that problem again - it's boring, and I want to try something new.

Which is a problem when part of your job is to fix the same problems that keep cropping up again and again. *twitch*

[tprjones.livejournal.com]

"Correlation does not mean causation!"

Indeed. Sloppy thinking on their part. C-

[telophase.livejournal.com]

Yup. I may not be any great shakes at formal logic, but correlation =/= causation is something I learned early on.

[celestriad.livejournal.com]

yeah, i hate it when people mix up correlation and causation. i definitely thought it was possible that perhaps children with attention problems were more likely to watch tv.