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My son could be a great gamer and expert multitasker in less than two years: he’s less than three months old. Three recent studies by independent research company, NPD Group, looked at how kids are using technology.

A consumer study for the Toy Industry Association found that tweens - kids between 5 and 12 - are experts at multitasking. Some parents even claimed their two year olds are already “experts at multitasking.“ In the study, titled Kids’ Leisure Time II, NPD found that kids send most of their leisure time (12 hours per week) watching TV/movies, decreasing slightly from the 2005 study.

Chart Source: The NPD Group/Kids’ Leisure Time II

In a separate NPD study, titled, Kids and Consumer Electronics II, results indicated that kids age 4-14 are using electronics an average of six months earlier than kids in the 2005 study. Yep, kids are tech savvy earlier in life. The report also indicated that twice as many children owned portable cameras and digital music players in 2006 than 2005 and cell phone ownership increased 50%.

The third study in NPD’s trifecta, titled Kids & Digital Content, found that video games are the most common downloaded content for kids age 2-14. Watching movies, TV and other online videos followed with a few even watching the news (good for them).

Although funded by potentially biased companies, these three independent studies represent a general trend toward increased tech use. Of course to us gadget geeks, these findings are really no surprise. Much like you were able to program your parents’ VCR with ease, your kids could already be hacking your video iPod or getting through parental controls and firewalls to download risque stuff.

If you’ve read the book “Everything Bad is Good For You” by Steven Johnson, then you already understand the idea that kids are getting smarter with each generation, looking for and embracing more complex forms of entertainment at earlier ages. TV show plots are more complicated, video games are more complex and even TV remotes are programmable. Even so, there is a give-and-take relationship between companies and kids that helps gadgets and games evolve - they make stuff a little easier to use and kids are able to use increasingly complex gadgets.

Read [NPD Report]

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