Determination of mothers’ attitudes and behaviors about the effects of TV-watching upon the health of children aged 1-6 years

Abstract

INTRODUCTION: The study was descriptively undertaken in order to determine the negative effects of TV-watching upon the health of children aged 1-6 and to explore mothers’ attitudes and behaviors about TV-watching. METHODS: The population of the study consisted of 4377 children aged 1-6 who were registered to Farabi Family Center and Horasan Family Center located in Horasan county of Erzurum Province in 2013. The sample of the study was composed of 353 mothers who had children aged 1-6 years. The data of the study were collected using an information form. For the data assessment; t test, Mann Whitney U test were used for the independent groups while one way variance analysis, Kruskal Wallis Analysis, Pearson and Yates corrected chi-square analysis were used for the independent groups. RESULTS: It was found out that most of the children watched TV for ≥ 2 hours and 61.2% of them had health problems in case they watched TV for long hours. It was seen that there was no difference in mean attitude scores of children aged 1-6 years in terms of TVwatching as far as mothers’ age groups were concerned (p>0.05) while significant difference existed in terms of mean behavior scores (p<0.001). It was revealed that there was significant difference in mean attitude and behavior scores of the children aged 1-6 in terms of TV-watching as far as mothers’ educational status, employment status, economic status, family type, the number of the children aged 1-6 and children’s gender were concerned (p<0.001). DISCUSSION AND CONCLUSION: It was understood that children watched TV more than the time interval recommended and had health problems-particularly; eye and sleep problems- in case they watched TV for a long time. It was seen that mothers’ educational status, family type, the number of the children they had, employment and economic status were important factors on children’s TV-watching. It will be useful to organize training programs that will make mothers aware of the fact that TV may have important psychosocial, mental, physical effects upon children.