Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2021 Jul:120:106762.
doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2021.106762. Epub 2021 Mar 1.

Tantrums, toddlers and technology: Temperament, media emotion regulation, and problematic media use in early childhood

Sarah M Coyne  1 , Jane Shawcroft  1 , Megan Gale  1 , Douglas A Gentile  2 , Jordan T Etherington  1 , Hailey Holmgren  1 , Laura Stockdale  1
Affiliations

Tantrums, toddlers and technology: Temperament, media emotion regulation, and problematic media use in early childhood

Sarah M Coyne et al. Comput Human Behav. 2021 Jul.

Abstract

Parents regularly use media to help regulate their child's difficult emotions, particularly for those with a more difficult temperament. However, no research has examined how this may be related to the development of problematic (or addictive-like) media use in early childhood. The purpose of the study was to examine associations between temperament, parental media emotion regulation, and problematic media use in young children, using both questionnaires and observational data. Participants included 269 toddlers (2-3 years old) and their parents, who completed several observational tasks and questionnaires. Analyses revealed that higher levels of media emotion regulation was associated with more problematic media use and more extreme emotions when media was removed in toddlers. Additionally, temperament (specifically negative affect and surgency) was related to problematic media and extreme emotions and was mediated by media emotion regulation. Parents should avoid using media as a primary way of regulating their children's emotions as this may be related to the development of problematic media strategies during infancy.

Keywords: Infancy; Media emotion regulation; Problematic media; Screen media; Temperament; Toddler.

PubMed Disclaimer

Figures

Figure 1:
Figure 1:
Path analysis of temperament, media emotion regulation, problematic media use, and emotional reactivity Notes: Standardized values are shown. Additionally, error terms for endogenous variables and covariances are not shown. Solid lines represent significant effects while dashed lines represent nonsignificant effects. Control variables (child age, parental media use, education, and marital status) are not included in the figure. Additionally, main effects between temperament and endogenous variables are also not shown in the figure. Additional statistics can be obtained in the supplemental information. *p < .05; **p < .01; ***p < .001.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. Barr R, & Linebarger DN (2016). Media exposure during infancy and early childhood. New York: Springer.
    1. Brand M, Young KS, Laier C, Wölfling K, & Potenza MN (2016). Integrating psychological and neurobiological considerations regarding the development and maintenance of specific internet-use disorders: An interaction of person-affect cognition-execution (I-PACE) model. Neuroscience & BiobehavioralReviews, 71, 252–266. - PubMed
    1. Bronfenbrenner U, & Evans GW (2000). Developmental Science in the 21 st Century: Emerging Questions, Theoretical Models, Research Designs and Empirical Findings. Social Development, 9(1), 115–125. 10.1111/1467-9507.00114 - DOI
    1. Bronfenbrenner U, & Morris PA (2006). The bioecological model of human development. In Damon W (Series Ed.) & Lerner RM (Vol. Ed.), Handbook of child psychology: Theoretical models of human development (pp. 793–828). New York, NY: Wiley.
    1. Bronfenbrenner U, & Morris PA (1998). The ecology of developmental processes. Handbook of Child Psychology, 1(5), 993–1028.