Inactive Children

November/December 2006
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Children and adolescents spend 45 hours each week watching television, working on the computer, playing video games or watching movies.
- Frank Booth, University of Missouri-Columbia biomedical researcher

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Time once spent on physical or outdoor activity has been replaced by television, computer and video game time.
- Coalition for Healthy Children

“I like to play indoors better because that’s where all the electrical outlets are.”
- San Diego fourth-grader

Human genes evolved to support a great deal of physical activity, yet in the last 20 years, physical activity has decreased dramatically in the United States.
- Frank Booth, University of Missouri-Columbia biomedical researcher

Research has shown that ‘mindless’ television or video games may idle and impoverish the development of the pre-frontal cortex, or that portion of the brain that is responsible for planning, organizing and sequencing behavior for self-control, moral judgment and attention.
- American Academy of Pediatrics, “Understanding TV’s effects on the developing brain,” Jane M. Healy, Ph.D., from May 1998 AAP News

American children and adolescents spend 22 to 28 hours per week viewing television, more than any other activity except sleeping. By the age of 70 they will have spent 7 to 10 years of their lives watching TV.
- The Kaiser Family Foundation

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