WICHITA, Kan. (KWCH) -“Whatever you want to label it, the implications are that it is damaging and can be harmful if it isn’t regulated and moderated in a meaningful way,” said Marcy Johnson, President and CEO of Prairie View.
Prairie View is a local community mental health center and behavioral health clinic. Johnson says addiction can be especially harmful to children, as they are still building neural pathways in the brain.
“The impact of social media and technology can really impact the neural pathways, and actually it’s been shown to reduce the grey matter in brains that serve to control impulses and emotion management,” Johnson said.
Johnson says a lot of addiction can be pointed back to the instant gratification of social media.
“You can very easily get pulled into and sucked into the grasps of social media and all of the information that it has to offer to you,” Johnson said.
While some believe it might be too late to fix the problem, Johnson disagrees, but says you can expect certain withdrawal reactions.
“Younger kids you’ll see tantrums, like physical behavioral tantrums, older kids you might see verbal lashing out, frustration,” Johnson said.
When cutting down on social media usage, it is a good idea to supplement the time you’d usually be spending online with other activities. A great place to start doing that is here at your local library.
“We have dedicated play spaces for children to kind of play, we have toys available to have some tactile play available, we offer some puzzles, those sorts of things,” said David Garcia, the senior communications specialist for the Wichita Public Library.
Garcia says the library is a great place for kids to unplug and be immersed in what’s around them in the real world.
“Once they see kind of the books, the materials, the colors, everything we have in store, it kind of opens up their eyes,” Garcia said.
This is why they are hosting a screen free week later this spring.
“We’re putting on some programs to specifically kind of address the issue that a lot of families are maybe facing or trying to think through different ways, which is the screen epidemic,” Garcia said.
Johnson says it will take time if you want to see significant neural changes in children, from four weeks up to five months.
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