The narrative around screen time seems to have been totally overthrown by the coronavirus. A year ago the health authorities were recommending limiting childrens’ screen time. Now at a public school in California our children have mandatory three hours of screen time per day.

It just goes to show that these recommendations are not really based on science. It’s more like they are based on guesses by reasonable people when the science isn’t really that confident one way or the other. My personal suspicion is that some forms of screen time, like video calls with family or educational apps, are good for kids. And some forms, like watching TV, are bad for them.