Behind the Screens

Imagine a preschool classroom during free play. A few children immediately jump into acting out a story together, assigning roles and building the scene as they go. Another child hangs back for a moment, quietly watching and trying to figure out how to join in. Then another child notices and says, “You can be the doctor,” or “Want to help us build?”

These moments happen every day in early childhood, and while they may seem small, they’re actually where a lot of social learning takes place. Children are constantly practicing how to read a room, understand emotions, enter a group, handle rejection, cooperate, and connect with others.

Empathy grows in these ordinary interactions. It develops when a child notices a friend looks upset, hears excitement in someone’s voice, or changes their behavior after realizing they hurt someone’s feelings. These aren’t skills children suddenly “have.” They’re built slowly, through thousands of real-life interactions: play, conversation, disagreement, laughter, waiting turns, and learning how other people respond.

That’s part of why conversations about screen time can feel so important—and also so complicated for parents.

Most families today are navigating a world where screens are simply part of daily life. They help us get through grocery store lines, long car rides, sick days, work deadlines, and exhausted evenings. Many children also genuinely enjoy educational shows, games, and video chats with family members. So for most parents, the goal isn’t eliminating screens entirely. It’s figuring out how to create balance in a very screen-filled world.

Research does suggest that when screen time begins to replace large amounts of face-to-face interaction, children can miss some of the subtle social practice that helps empathy grow. Studies have found associations between heavier screen use in early childhood and lower performance on certain measures of emotional understanding and perspective-taking. One study published in Computers in Human Behavior found that preschoolers with more than two hours of daily screen time scored lower on tasks involving emotional recognition. Other research from UCLA found that children’s ability to read facial expressions and nonverbal cues improved after spending time in device-free, in-person social settings.

What many of these studies point to isn’t that screens are “bad,” but that young children learn social skills best through responsive human interaction. Real conversations require children to notice tone, expressions, pauses, reactions, and body language in ways screens often don’t. Even high-quality content can’t fully replicate the unpredictability and responsiveness of real human connection.

At the same time, it’s important to approach this conversation with some grace. Parenting today happens in a completely different environment than it did even twenty years ago. Screens are woven into school, communication, entertainment, and everyday routines. Most parents are not choosing between “screens” and some idealized version of childhood—they’re making thoughtful decisions within real-life constraints.

The encouraging part is that empathy doesn’t require perfection. Children don’t need parents who never hand over a tablet or families that avoid screens altogether. What matters most is the overall rhythm of a child’s life. Are there regular opportunities for conversation, shared play, family routines, outdoor time, storytelling, boredom, problem-solving, and connection with other people?

Often, empathy grows in the simplest moments: talking at dinner, helping bake cookies, building forts with siblings, comforting a friend at the playground, reading together before bed, or listening to a parent narrate how someone else might be feeling. These interactions may not seem extraordinary, but over time they become the practice ground for emotional understanding.

What shapes children most isn’t one movie night, one busy week, or one afternoon spent on a tablet. It’s the broader pattern of their everyday experiences. When children regularly spend time engaging with real people—talking, playing, observing, responding—they naturally get more opportunities to practice the small but meaningful skills empathy depends on.

And little by little, those moments add up.