First it was that saucy Tinky Winky and his purse corrupting our nation’s youth. Now, this: A new study suggests watching “Baby Einstein” videos could actually harm infants and toddlers.
Hearing this news, horrified parents across the country wielded their expensive, lead-laced Thomas the Tank Engine trains and bludgeoned their tapes and DVDs.
Get real. Today’s kids are in more danger from sucking on those lead- based toys made in China than they are from watching harmless videos.
But Dr. Dimitri Christakis, a co-author of the study and pediatrics researcher at Seattle Children’s Hospital Research Institute, would suggest otherwise. The video manufacturers, he said, “make outlandish claims about the [educational benefits of the] videos without a scintilla of evidence.”
“Babies don’t learn from screens,” Christakis said. “We didn’t find benefit. We found harm.”
You mean TV isn’t good for you? If only someone had told me that before I invested thousands of hours of my youth studying “Leave It To Beaver” and “Brady Bunch” reruns. What a waste.
Researchers from the University of Washington in Seattle say that baby DVDs and videos, including the Baby Einstein series, are different from “beneficial” children’s programming because they have little dialogue, short scenes and disconnected pictures of “linguistically indescribable images such as a lava lamp.” Babies who watch them understood six to eight fewer words than babies who didn’t, according to the study.
“The jury is still out on whether they are harmful,” Frederick Zimmerman, the lead author of the study, said, slightly disagreeing with his co- author. “But they are not beneficial.”
Not beneficial? Zimmerman likely has never spent a day feeding, changing, rocking and chasing around a 1- year-old. When our now 5-year-old daughter was a toddler, she was mesmerized by “Baby Mozart.” Watching it gave all of us a very “beneficial” break.
Julie Aigner-Clark, a Colorado woman who struck it rich developing the videos in her basement, does say on the “Baby Mozart” tape that college students in a study performed better on tests while listening to Mozart’s music. It’s called “The Mozart Effect.”
Did I think my kid would be a genius because she listened to Mozart? Hardly. Did I cherish the little break? Of course.
In a world where images of war flash over our television daily, and sexy girls coo on command as they hawk beer to shirtless guys playing volleyball, I lose no sleep over the fact our children have watched images of puppets and lit candles or, as the study described them, “linguistically indescribable images.”
Aigner-Clark told The Denver Post last week that the videos were intended to be watched by parents and children together, to promote interaction. “You stay with the child and teach them,” Aigner-Clark said. “… You are looking at the screen with the baby and saying, ‘Look at the kitty cat.’ It is really about being interactive.”
I did that. And I also dozed off a few times. Yet so far, no harm. Our 1-year-old shows no interest in the videos, which is fine, too. It just means more chasing around the house.
Universities are filled with smart people doing wonderful, life-saving research, and I’m glad my tax dollars can occasionally help them out. But studies that tell parents that watching too much TV is bad for their kids are about as useful as the ones warning that bathtub-sized vats of movie popcorn can be hazardous to your health.
You don’t have to be Einstein – or even a Baby Einstein – to know that.
Dan Haley (dhaley@denverpost. com) is The Post’s editorial page editor.
