Are Your Children Television Addicts? (graduate marketing jobs)
No commentsBy Marlin Rollins
For most of us, hearing about different types of addiction is a common occurrence. Even more difficult to bear is that most of us are close to someone affected by an addiction. When addictions are related to the abuse of a substance such as alcohol, our understanding that there is a problem may be rooted in clear and serious signs of a life out of control. But what about an addiction related to something more subtle? Could a behavior as seemingly normal as watching television become an addiction? You bet it can!
I believe television can be a “drug” because it is literally a mind-altering experience. Like any drug, it has the potential to be used responsibly or abused. Did you know that the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no television for children under two years of age, and no more than two hours of television per day for older children? Here’s why. It is not only because of the potential for inappropriate content. In fact, for young children especially, it is the incredible stimulation that TV provides that makes it so potentially damaging. All of the flashing bright colors, loud sounds, and frequent fragmentation of reality that television encompasses is far too much stimulation for most young minds to manage. At the same time, children are like a magnet for this type of gratification, and as most parents know, can become addicted to the neurological stimulation of television very quickly. Although some people have tried to justify overexposure to electronic media by claiming it makes children smarter, those theories are little more than rationalizations for indulging in what science indicates is bad for us.
What’s the effect of repeated exposure to television stimulation? Just like what happens when a person is exposed to any drug, repeated exposure to television has the effect of dulling a person’s senses. This is precisely what we as parents experience when we ask our kids to tear themselves away from the television and in return get a blank stare or grunt and shrug! With younger children, requiring them to make a transition away from a stimulation source to which they are “hooked” often results in an instant melt-down. Noticing your child’s ability to transition between watching television and attending to the environment around him or her is a good way to determine if she or he is over-stimulated, or even possibly addicted. Kids who are addicted to television care increasingly less about the content of what they are watching, and more about getting another “hit” of electronic stimulation. The brain is an organ that is unique in that it develops in response to its environment - and if you’re continually “blasting” a young, developing mind with rapid-fire images, you may be creating a mind that craves high level stimulation but lacks the ability to focus its attention - sound familiar?
Here’s What You Can Do:
1) Make television a family activity. Discuss what you and your child are watching together. Turn down or mute the volume during commercials to ensure you are sustaining social contact. And relate events on television shows to real events in the life of your family.
2) Limit television watching to a specific period of time and to specific times of the day. Kids do better when they are required to do things before they watch TV, such as getting dressed, teeth brushed, breakfast eaten, etc., before the television set goes on. Don’t let television become the constant background to family life. Turn the TV on to watch specific shows, and then turn it off when the show is over.
Discuss alternatives to television with your children. Kids do much better accepting that they can only watch a limited amount of TV when they know you are prepared to spend time playing a game, going to the park, or helping with homework instead. When we use TV to occupy our kids so we can get other things done, we are inadvertently becoming enablers of their addiction.
3) Not all television is created equal. Look for shows that are paced appropriately for children. There are great programs for kids that don’t rely on seizure-inducing graphics to keep their attention. Don’t be afraid to censor shows; if you start when children are young by simply saying, “this show isn’t good for your brain, and I’m proud of what a smart girl (or boy) you are,” you’ll get them on the right track.
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Childhood Fears And Anxieties
By Marlin Rollins
As a parent it is important that we understand what potential problems our child has. Most children have certain things that they worry about or even fear. In this article, I write about the types of fears that this might be and about how we can help our children to cope and to get through life in the best possible and stress-free way.
Many children are able to pick up on what their parents are worrying about. They may hear arguments about money and can then start to worry themselves about the financial situation their family may be in. I am a parent myself and try where possible to only discuss serious issues with my partner when the children are out or are asleep. If I believe that one of my children has overheard a conversation which I would have rather they hadn’t, I then talk to them to attempt to reassure them that everything is OK.
Children may also worry that their parents may break up and that they will end up living apart. They will no doubt hear that this has happened to their friends and may wonder and stress about how their lives would change if this happened to them.
My children have told me that they worry and that they fear that one of their parents may die in the near future. It is quite difficult to explain to them that this is unlikely to happen as it obviously could. I try and laugh it off which may not be the best policy, by stating that I am still very young and that I have no plans to leave this planet in the near future. I explain to them the age that the average male will live to in our country and that normally, I hope, makes them feel better.
School can be another area of stress for some children. Will they be able to cope and understand the work? Will they be able to obtain a good examination mark and a good report? Will they be able to make their parents proud of them? I have told my own children not to worry about these issues and to just try their best.
Socialising and meeting friends can also bring its own tensions. Children make and break friends at regular intervals, especially during the early teenage years. When friends fall out this can be a very stressful time for any child. When this happens to my children, I make a point of saying that it has been the fourth time in a month that you and Amy as an example, have had a falling out. Your sure to make friends again in the near future.
As children get a bit older there is then the challenge of meeting a member of the opposite sex. We all know the problems and strains that this can bring. At this time I think it is just a matter of being there for your children and getting them through these difficult years the best and easiest way possible.
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Forex Trading can be gambling rather than investment
By Peter McNamara
Everybody is totally different and has a different take on things. Something you find endlessly exciting or stimulating, as well as the joy prospect of earning extra money, may be quite boring to somebody else whose interest you’re attempting to raise, no matter what your intentions or motives. These may embody encouragement - even promotion - to others or bolstering and maybe justifying your own enthusiasm for a particular activity or pastime.
Common pursuits nowadays clearly embrace ‘online’ activities. Every day around the planet, more and a lot of folks get connected to the Internet. Computers have become part of everyday life, in homes, offices and schools even in semi-developed countries. Reliable Web connection availability to the whole population might still be a long off in a number of them, but the goal is there. The net provides knowledge, education, entertainment, national and international communication and most importantly, global business opportunities for nearly anyone, anywhere.
Online Forex trading is a typical example. Previously available only to professional market traders and banks, forex trading is currently very popular with people, and is available to anyone who can open a trading account with a broker or bank, typically with a credit card with amounts starting from twenty-five dollars to a few or even hundreds of thousands.
For the uninformed, forex trading involves investing a relatively tiny quantity of cash for a short amount of time and hoping for movement of the exchange rate between a pair of currencies like the US dollar vs. the British pound. Opt for the proper direction of the movement and you may create cash; opt for the wrong one and you may lose some. It’s all done seamlessly through a virtually world wide electronic exchange similar in ways in which to a conventional stock exchange but without the ‘bricks and mortar’ of a building. Forex dealers or brokers are located in many different countries, a number of them known for their ‘offshore’ banking and tax benefits.
Forex trading is definitely a kind of ‘investment’. This is a business term and seen generally in a positive light inferring the growth of capital. Forex traders have that as their goal, but there are various factors involved in truly achieving that growth. Because there are such a lot of ‘forex losers’, forex trading often gets ‘bad press’. It’s derided by some as ‘gambling’ which has an inherently bad connotation and is even officially banned in some countries.
However, nearly all types of ‘investment’ involve risk and wager, whether or not it’s trading stocks, futures and options - or buying real estate. The worldwide Forex market is a huge business, though, with the almost unbelievable turnover per day of nearly $4,000,000,000,000! Most of that is traded by large financial institutions together with government and commercial banks and managed funds. However, there are millions of smaller, private investors too.
Astute investors (even gamblers) are terribly aware of risk and attempt to manage it by staying within self-imposed limits. There are some similarities between forex spot trading and a casino game like roulette. They are both stimulating and exciting as they happen in the ‘here and now’ with instant results. Each are affected to a point by ‘the house’; for forex it is the dealer, bank or broker. Luck will play a part, as with many things in life, however knowledge of the ‘game’ and skills at ‘playing’ it are the deciding factors when it comes to winning or losing. There are various things that can influence the typically fast movement up or down of stocks, shares, commodity prices and foreign exchange rates. Prices could trend in one direction for minutes, hours, weeks or years, with fluctations of varying duration. Forex traders depend upon those fluctuations more than the long term trend.
Gamblers, traders and investors are happy when their capital grows over time. If they need it to grow faster and more consistently, most attempt to learn more about trading in order to stop making mistakes and profit more. Again, the astute ones also are ready to set cash aside for his or her education. That becomes part of the overall investment.
If, on the other hand, somebody starts trading the forex markets (it’s terribly easy to do) because he or she has been led to believe that forex trading is an straightforward way to make cash, they will be disappointed with their results. After they begin losing money more often than they’re making it, they become disenchanted. Some will be forced to quit; others will try again; some will begin believing that the whole thing could be a scam.
Several will give up because they do not want to make the effort to learn a way to trade properly. Some will write off their losses and attempt to search out another quick way to riches. Unfortunately, they’re likely to fail once more and for exactly the same reason: lack of ability and/or lack of the needed effort.
Without education and knowledge, forex trading is an extraordinarily risky pursuit. With even basic training, the odds improve dramatically and reckless gambling can evolve into ‘investment’. There are many ways in which to get a good forex education. There’s no need to spend a fortune of cash to develop a safe, potentially profitable trading technique.
A course ideal for forex newcomers is Forex Nitty Gritty from Bill Poulos available at http://www.Forex-NittyGritty.com. You’ll learn the basics of good trading for as little as $100. It’s very easy to lose a lot more than that - very quickly - if you do not know what you are doing. Take a look at Forex Nitty Gritty.
Peter McNamara is a British expat, semi-retired in Singapore and enthusiastic about market trading as a ’small investor’. His own early experience with forex trading resulted in loss. He eventually ’saw the light’. Visit his site at Forex-Loser.com.
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