Modern society has brought a whole host of new parenting challenges.
One that most of us are all too familiar with is the amount of screen time we allot our little ones.
Guilty as charged; that the majority of us will hand our child an Ipad or a phone to enjoy a meal in peace or to get bits and pieces done around the house.
However, this advice from a British scientist may make you want to reconsider the habit.
A senior research fellow at Oxford University, Baroness Susan Greenfield has issued a warning to parents around their children's usage on the devices.
Every time our kids are on social media or are playing video games, they receive a hit of instant gratification, according to the scientist.
This can have negative consequences on children's mental and emotional maturity, particularly impeding their independent thinking and communication.
“What I predict is that people are going to be like three-year-olds: emotional, risk-taking, poor social skills, weak self-identity and short attention spans,” she told The Telegraph.
The Baroness offered evidence to support her claim in a form of a study conducted by Harvard and Princeton universities.
The Ivy League schools showed that students would rather administer themselves an electric shock, than to spend 10 minutes with their own thoughts alone.
The desire to have continual stimulation from our surroundings impacts on our ability to think, said the researcher.
Before you go and destroy or ban all the devices, the Baroness said parents should offer their kids activities that have a beginning, a middle and an end.
These can include reading and sports.
The scientist is particularly fond of reading as it "gives them a better attention span".
To get you kick started, we have done the hard work and complied the 100 books every child should read.
It's tailored to your child's age group too, so you can't really go wrong.
