Mommy or the Touchscreen? ABC News Puts "iBabies" to the Test

Here's a tough choice for a baby: Go to Mommy or go to a shiny, glowing touchscreen? An ABC News reporter put some babies to the test for a segment on ABC World News this week, positioning each baby across the room from both the baby's mom and an iPad or smartphone.

It turned out the choice wasn't so hard after all: The babies crawled straight to the mobile device every time, all but ignoring poor Mom. (See the full report and experiment below.)

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The news segment, titled "iBaby," took a quick look at the phenomenon of small babies — "the diapered set," as reporter Juju Chang called them — being given smartphones and tablets to use.

It cited a new study by Northwestern University, out this week, that found that 37% of parents who have smartphones or tablets say they are likely to use these devices to keep their children occupied. The same study showed that 54% of parents are concerned that mobile devices have a mainly negative effect on their children's physical activity. (A similar percentage felt the same about TV, computers and video games, by the way.) And yet 55% of those surveyed said they are "not too" or "not at all" concerned about their children's media use in general.

The ABC report is short (under three minutes), so it doesn't delve too deeply into the topic or draw many conclusions. It also seems to showcase parents on one end of the spectrum only — the end where giving an infant or toddler a touchscreen is part of everyday life.

The report began by showing a 10-day-old baby — yes, that's 10 days old — propped up inches from an iPad, staring at the screen. The baby's mother is shown saying, "I guess I just didn't think it was going to hurt, so why not give it a try, and he seemed to like it."

The segment later cuts to a mommy-baby playgroup, where a mother of a 13-month-old had this to say: "I feel kind of guilty when he's sitting there with it, but at the same time I know that I'm going to get him to eat dinner if I give him the iPad."

The iPad Stroller Mount

A lot of babies are eating meals with iPads these days. A trip to most restaurants will verify this. You see it even in strollers, where small babies are handed smartphones and tablets to stare into while parents or nannies feed them. You can even attach iPads to strollers now with devices like iStroll Kid or the iPad Stroller Mount (for mealtime or just general "use" by a strolling baby).

I've said it before, but it's worth noting again: No baby ever sat down for a meal with an iPad prior to three years ago, because iPads didn't exist. So the "it gets him to eat dinner" argument doesn't sit well with some folks — including many incensed viewers who commented on the ABC News report online. Sure, it works, but it's unsettling to think that some parents today might feel out of other options at mealtime. Long before iPads were created — even before TV was around, if anyone can imagine that far back — babies somehow managed to eat their dinners.

So yes, it can be disturbing to see so many babies staring into touchscreens — in playgroups, in museums, in libraries, in a beautiful park on a lovely, sunny day. But in reality, their caregivers are in the minority (for now, at least). The new Northwestern study, titled "Parenting in the Age of Digital Technology: A National Survey," showed that, by and large, parents are still much more likely to use books, toys or other activities to keep their children occupied than to use touchscreen devices. They're also still using TV more than touchscreens to keep their kids busy.

The same holds true when it comes to calming a child who's upset: Parents are more likely to use activities, toys or books (and yes, TV) than a tablet or smartphone, the study found.

It might surprise some that the vast majority of parents surveyed for this study — 70% — said they do not think smartphones and tablets make parenting easier. Only 29% said that they do. And a mere 10% of those who own a mobile device said they would turn to it as an "educational tool" for their child.

And it's parents' own styles when it comes to media that drive their children's use of screens, the study found — i.e., it's not the children pushing for screen time that's driving how much they get. It is parents who create the types of media environments their kids grow up in, the study found. Parents "set the tone and create a 'family media ecology' that permeates through the generations," the study reports.

The ABC segment doesn't dig too deeply into the many findings of this new study. It concludes with some basic recommendations from experts: Use touchscreen devices as teaching tools rather than electronic babysitters; interact with your child when he or she uses these devices. But the new Northwestern study is worth a closer look. Its findings were illuminating, even intriguing, in this age of mobile media and "iBabies" who choose the lure of the touchscreen over Mom.