The AHA recommends children get between 1 to 2 hours of screen time each day. Although television viewing among children and teens has declined, the use of smartphones and tablets have surged.
"Although the mechanisms linking screen time to obesity are not entirely clear, there are real concerns that screens influence eating behaviors, possibly because children ‘tune out’ and don’t notice when they are full when eating in front of a screen," said Tracie A. Barnett, a researcher at the INRS-Institut Armand Frappier and Sainte-Justine University Hospital Research Center in Montreal, in a statement.
Barnett, one of the authors of the statement, also urges parents to keep screens out of kids' bedrooms, raising fears too much screen time can affect sleep.
Google and Apple, who make the Android and iOS mobile platforms respectively, plan to introduce new tools to devices to help users cut back on screen time.
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