Are educational videos good for kids? What eye-tracking shows

Are educational videos good for kids? Some are, but the fact that your child watched to the end tells you very little. A new study of more than 32,000 made-for-kids YouTube videos found that busy, moving backgrounds keep children's eyes on the screen, and the extra attention mostly lands on the motion rather than the lesson (The Hans India).

So the useful question is what a video is doing to hold them. Below is what the research found, where it stops short, and a two-minute test you can run on any video your child calls "learning."

What the new eye-tracking study actually did

The paper is called "Attention Trap? How Visual Motion Shapes Children's Screen Time and Engagement on Video Platforms." It's by Sumeet Kumar and Madhu Viswanathan of the Indian School of Business and Ravi Bapna of Santa Clara University, published in Information Systems Research. The researchers came at the question three ways (The Hans India):

• An analysis of more than 32,000 YouTube videos labelled "made for kids"
• A randomised experiment that added background motion to educational videos
• An eye-tracking study with children aged 6 to 10

A note on that label: "made for kids" is how creators tag videos on YouTube itself. The study wasn't specifically about the YouTube Kids app, so if you're asking whether YouTube Kids videos are educational, the same test further down works there too.

Busy backgrounds kept kids looking, mostly at the background

Across the 32,000 videos, 10% more visual motion went with about 1.1% more views, even after the researchers accounted for audio, emotional, text and other visual features. That's a correlation, and a modest one.

The experiment is stronger evidence because the researchers changed one thing on purpose. Educational videos with added background motion got 1.6% higher view rates at medium motion and 2% higher at high motion, compared with the same videos without it.

The eye-tracking part is the one that matters for parents. Background motion cut down the longer spells where children looked away. When the researchers checked where that extra looking went, it went largely to the moving background. The teaching content didn't get the bonus.

His advice to creators is to use motion where attention tends to drift instead of running it all the time. He also said the work doesn't show that keeping kids on screen automatically improves their focus on what's being taught, and that more research is needed.

The study tracked eyes and never tested learning

The headline on the coverage says these videos "attract attention, not learning." That goes further than the data does. A few things to keep in mind:

• It measured gaze. Where a child looks is different from what a child remembers. I couldn't find any learning or recall test in the coverage.
• The effects are small. A 2% bump in view rate matters to a channel with millions of views. For one child on one afternoon, it's a nudge.
• It's a business journal. Information Systems Research studies platforms and design. This isn't a child-development trial.
• Sample sizes are unclear. The press coverage doesn't say how many children took part in the experiment or the eye-tracking test.

What it does show is that motion is a lever creators can pull, on a platform that rewards views and watch time. The authors suggest platforms could measure motion and use it as a quality signal. Until that happens, the measuring falls to you.

Are educational videos good for kids? Pace and content decide it

Older research points the same way. In a 2011 lab study, about 60 four-year-olds watched 9 minutes of a fast-paced cartoon or an educational cartoon, or drew instead. The fast-paced group did worse on executive-function tasks straight afterwards (Pediatrics).

That study was small and only looked at the minutes right after watching, and it gets over-cited. Treat it as a hint about fast-paced cartoons and attention, with no proof of lasting harm.

On the other side, a Finnish study that followed 260 children aged 6 to 9 for 8 years found that more screen time over childhood was linked to better learning, attention and working memory scores in adolescence (The Star). It's observational and used self-reported screen time. Its author, Petri Jalanko, said what matters is what children do on screens, and he encourages uses that involve active thinking and problem-solving.

So screen time as a single number is a poor guide, which I covered in more depth in what 30 studies found about whether all screen time is bad for kids. For younger children, the AAP suggests about an hour a day of high-quality programming for ages 2 to 5, ideally watched with a parent. The WHO says no more than an hour of sedentary screen time a day for ages 2 to 4, and less is better.

Tweens already watch about five hours a day

TV and video make up the biggest share of that time, and short-form video like YouTube Shorts and TikTok has the highest daily participation of anything Common Sense measured (Common Sense Media). It's self-reported and starts at age 9, so it says nothing direct about preschoolers.

If you're wondering whether YouTube is bad for kids' attention span, the autoplay feed is a sensible place to look first. I went through that evidence in whether short-form videos are bad for attention span. Michael Robb, head of research at Common Sense, says research suggests "time on devices matters less than what it's replacing and what's happening on the devices" (FOX11).

A two-minute test for any "educational" video

This is how I'd pick among the best educational shows for kids, or judge a single video that claims to teach. It costs you two minutes, once per channel.

1. 01
   Mute it

   Watch two minutes with the sound off and notice how much of the screen moves, flashes or zooms when nothing is being taught.

2. 02
   Find the lesson

   Name what the video is trying to teach, then check whether the motion points at that thing or just fills the background.

3. 03
   Look for active moments

   Prefer videos and apps that ask your child to answer, make or solve something, in line with the Finnish researchers' advice.

4. 04
   Ask afterwards

   When it ends, ask "What did you find out?" and see whether anything comes back.

5. 05
   Pick the next one yourself

   Choose specific videos in advance so the autoplay feed isn't deciding.

Protect sleep, outdoor play, reading and family time first

Whatever passes the test, Robb's advice is to guard what screens tend to crowd out. Keep devices out of bedrooms overnight, make room for outdoor time and family time, and keep reading going, since it drops sharply as kids get older (FOX11). He also suggests parental controls to add a little friction.

For under-5s, watching together and talking about what's on screen is the AAP's advice, and it's also the easiest way to find out whether a "learning" video teaches anything. If videos are how dinner gets made in your house, I looked at using TV as a babysitter without the guilt trip.