Zoom. Microsoft Teams. Messenger. FaceTime. Skype. You’re probably familiar with all these video conferencing platforms and since the COVID-19 pandemic, people have been using them more than ever before.
As we mentioned in a past blog, one 2021 survey shows that 54% of professionals now attend more (virtual) meetings than they used to pre-pandemic (in-person).
But how does communicating through a screen affect the brain, particularly in kids?
Until now, little research has been done on the impact of technology-enhanced communication on the social brain.
Recently a research team led by Guillaume Dumas, a professor at the University of Montreal wanted to answer the question: could technologically mediated interactions have neurobiological consequences that interfere with the development of social and cognitive abilities?
The Study and Results
For this study, Dumas and his research team compared brain electrical activity during face-to-face interaction and technologically assisted remote communication in 62 mother-child pairs in which the children were aged 10 to 14.
Using a technique called hyper-scanning, which can simultaneously record brain activity in multiple subjects, the research team found that interaction via a videoconferencing platform attenuated mother-child brain synchrony.
The study found that face-to-face interactions elicited nine significant cross-brain links between frontal and temporal areas of the brain, whereas remote interactions generated only one.
If brain-to-brain synchrony is disrupted, we can expect consequences for the child’s cognitive development, particularly the mechanisms that support social interaction and these are life-long effects.
Societal Impacts
Dr. Matsumoto is not surprised by these findings. Humans did not evolve to do 2-dimensional communication, such as through a computer screen. On the contrary, we have evolved our perceptual senses to live in a 3-dimensional world and our sense of reality is grounded in that fact.
According to researcher Dumas, the study’s findings can also be extrapolated to adults and may explain the widespread “Zoom fatigue” following the rise in videoconferencing during the COVID lockdowns.
Since online interactions produce less brain-to-brain synchrony, it is understandable that people would feel they have to expend more effort and energy to interact, the interactions seem more laborious and less natural.
Dumas believes the study confirms that social relationships are critically important to humans and that inter-brain mechanisms are linked to the development of the social brain.
It seems like humans are interconnected by a technology more potent than Zoom or Teams: our brains.
Harmful Effects of Screens
Dumas’ latest research adds to the growing body of evidence regarding the harmful effects of screens.
A longitudinal cohort study out of Singapore suggests that greater exposure to screen time during infancy was linked to poor self-regulation and brain maturity at age eight.
Another study has suggested that soothing a child with digital devices may lead to more problems with emotional reactivity down the road.
In the study published in the JAMA Pediatrics, researchers looked at 422 parent and caregiver responses.
They found that parents and caregivers who frequently using digital devices to distract from unpleasant and disruptive behavior like tantrums was associated with more emotional dysregulation in kids — particularly boys and children who were already struggling with emotional regulation.
Dr. Jenny Radesky, associate professor of behavioral sciences at the University of Michigan Medical School says,
When you see your 3- to 5-year-old having a tough emotional moment, meaning they are screaming and crying about something, they’re getting frustrated, they might be hitting or kicking or lying on the floor. … If your go-to strategy is to distract them or get them to be quiet by using media, then this study suggests that is not helping them in the long term.
Other Alternatives to Screen Time
Instead of distraction, Radesky recommends taking tantrums and emotional dysregulation as opportunities for adults to teach children how to identify and respond to emotions in helpful ways. Here are some of her tips:
1. Get Comfy
Instead of punishing their expressions of frustration, anger or sadness with a time-out, it can be a good idea to set up a comfy place for kids to collect their feelings — maybe something with beanbags or blankets or a tent.
2. Name the Emotion
It can be helpful for caregivers to help kids name their emotions and offer solutions when they are responding inappropriately to those feelings.
3. Use Color Zones
Sometimes talking about emotions are too abstract for preschool-age kids, and in those cases Radesky recommended using color zones to talk about emotions.
Calm and content can be green; worried or agitated can be yellow; and upset or angry can be red, using graphics or images of faces to help kids match what they’re feeling with what color zone they are in. To reinforce it, adults can talk about their own emotions in terms of colors in front of their kids, Radesky said.
You and your child can go through the colors together and write down calming tools for the different zones, she added.