Julieanne
09-29-11, 05:56 AM
Bryan Bedder/Getty Images for Nickelodeon SpongeBob Squarepants may be too much for little minds.
Parents may dote on the tragicomic adventures of SpongeBob SquarePants (http://spongebob.nick.com/), but researchers say that that the cartoon's fast-based scenes may make it harder for young children to pay attention and think.
"I would not encourage parents of a 4-year-old boy to have him watch SpongeBob right before he goes in for his kindergarten readiness assessment," Dimitri Christakis (http://seattlechildrens.org/medical-staff/dimitri-a-christakis/) told Shots. He's a child development specialist at Seattle Children's Hospital who wrote a commentary (christakis:%20http:/pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/09/08/peds.2011-2071.full.pdf+html) on the new study, which was just published in the journal Pediatrics.
But fans of the optimistic denizen of Bikini Bottom can take solace in the fact that the new study (http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/09/08/peds.2010-1919.full.pdf+html) comes with a boatload of caveats. Just 20 4-year-olds were tested after watching the popular Nickolodeon show, and they watched it for nine minutes. That's a very small sample size, and it hardly reflects the real TV-watching habits of young children, who commonly watch two to five hours a day of TV.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/09/12/140401099/spongebob-may-be-too-speedy-for-preschool-brains?ps=cprs
Parents may dote on the tragicomic adventures of SpongeBob SquarePants (http://spongebob.nick.com/), but researchers say that that the cartoon's fast-based scenes may make it harder for young children to pay attention and think.
"I would not encourage parents of a 4-year-old boy to have him watch SpongeBob right before he goes in for his kindergarten readiness assessment," Dimitri Christakis (http://seattlechildrens.org/medical-staff/dimitri-a-christakis/) told Shots. He's a child development specialist at Seattle Children's Hospital who wrote a commentary (christakis:%20http:/pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/09/08/peds.2011-2071.full.pdf+html) on the new study, which was just published in the journal Pediatrics.
But fans of the optimistic denizen of Bikini Bottom can take solace in the fact that the new study (http://pediatrics.aappublications.org/content/early/2011/09/08/peds.2010-1919.full.pdf+html) comes with a boatload of caveats. Just 20 4-year-olds were tested after watching the popular Nickolodeon show, and they watched it for nine minutes. That's a very small sample size, and it hardly reflects the real TV-watching habits of young children, who commonly watch two to five hours a day of TV.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2011/09/12/140401099/spongebob-may-be-too-speedy-for-preschool-brains?ps=cprs