Language Development and “Technoference”

A recent longitudinal study conducted in Australia, led by senior research officer Mary Brushe and published in the Journal of the American Medical Association Pediatrics, revealed concerning findings: excessive screen time could potentially deprive the average three-year-old of exposure to 1,100 adult words, 840 vocalizations, and 194 conversations each day. As an educator deeply committed to children’s development, this statistic raised serious alarms for me. The study highlighted the concept of “technoference,” where technology-based disruptions, such as prolonged screen usage, could hinder meaningful communication and interaction between parents and children, leading to a significant reduction in daily word exposure for three-year-olds.

This translates to three-year-olds hearing seven fewer adult words and speaking five fewer words themselves for every minute spent on screens. Typically, children encounter between 5,000 and 35,000 words daily, but with technoference, this exposure is significantly reduced. The implications are profound, as vocabulary plays a crucial role in reading comprehension, as indicated by research (Suggate et al., 2018). Suggate asserts that individual words in a text, along with background knowledge, are strong predictors of comprehension, contributing to the Matthew Effect, wherein initial advantages lead to further benefits (Smith et al., 2021).