Hi I'm Dr. Mary Barbera, Autism Mom and Board Certified Behavior Analyst. I
recently got a question from a speech pathologist on one of my private
Facebook groups asking how she could support a family in reducing or
eliminating screen time for their two-year-old with autism who was
watching up to four hours of TV a day. Before I get into my stance on screen
time I just want to remind everyone that all of our leisure skills are automatic
reinforcement so shooting basket ball into a net until you get the score
and the baskets, that's a leisure activity and it's a form of
automatic reinforcement. Also playing the violin by yourself until you can get the
right notes and it sounds good and watching reality TV or reading a book
are also leisure skills that are automatically reinforcing. So when we're
thinking about a child with autism who lacks language skills, probably lacks
play skills and lacks leisure activities, it becomes really tricky to reduce
or eliminate screen time. I remember when Lucas was first diagnosed and he was
three years old and we started with ABA therapy and our Lovaas ABA
consultant came in and my husband right away the first thing out of his
mouth basically was "how do we get you know Lucas to stop watching so
much TV, he's just obsessed with watching Barney
and it's hours and hours a day." And our consultant said something that really
caught my attention. She basically said that this was Lucas's form of stimming.
And that if we took away the TV without replacing that behavior and that time
with some other skill we might have more problem behaviors
and different problem behaviors because he was going to need to fill his time
somehow. So it was either watching Barney or if we totally you know turned off
Barney and he didn't have the play skills or the language skills to fill
his time he might start leaving the house, writing on walls with a pen,
climbing on furniture, all of things that he did do when he wasn't engaged with
something. So she really kind of planted the seed that perhaps screen time wasn't
as bad as my husband was thinking it was. And over the years both as a parent and
professional I see families really struggling with this and now not we're
not only dealing with TV but we're dealing with iPads and computers and
iPhones and iPods and kids in general are watching a lot of screen time. I
don't necessarily think it's necessary to reduce or eliminate screen time right
away with children with autism before a full assessment and plan are developed
because, like I said that, time will be filled with other things. I've had
clients who have very poor leisure skills and no play skills who are
rocking or banging their head on hard surfaces, I had one little boy who was
only 2 who banged for 3 hours a day and had an open lesion on the back of his
head when I first went in. I mean that's how understimulated he was and so we can
go from that low level stim to children who are keeping themselves busy but just
repetitively putting straws in a bottle or building blocks repetitively for
hours. So if I had my choice between having a child who's 2 or 3 build
repetitively the same things over and over again
for an hour or watch an episode of a children's TV show I'd actually pick the
screen time because I think there's more language involved, there's potentially
imitation, there's potentially learning the characters names. If you can watch TV
with the child, if you can engage with them with iPad apps that are
developmentally appropriate, that's great too. And I know as a parent there are
times when you have to get things done, you have to get a shower, you have to put
a load of washing, you have to turn your back and and cook or do something like
that. And you need something to engage your child so that they aren't
getting into dangerous situations or doing repetitive behaviors, either motor
behaviors like hitting their head or rocking or repetitive play behaviors
that are just going to get them kind of stuck. So I'm not advocating that
two-year-olds watch four hours of TV but I am realistic to know that screen time
isn't all bad, especially for our kids with autism before we can teach them the
skills they need to replace that screen time. Hope you enjoyed this video blog
and I'll see you next week.