Quote:
Originally Posted by EowynCarter
I wouldn't let my child alone without explaining about the in-app purchases, and only if he is old enough to understand.
And just letting a $$$ device in the hands of a child...
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That assumes the parent is aware of the implications of IAP. If they were, most would not only explain to their child not to buy things, but probably also turn it off just in case they don't understand or still made a mistake.
As for not giving a device to a kid or (as another poster said) using it as a babysitter. If you trust your child not to throw a temper tantrum when they lose and to sit carefully with the device, there's no reason not to let them use it. If they do drop it and break it, well accidents will happen and that's the risk you took giving it to a child.
Just because a child is playing a game on an tablet or phone rather than a DS, console, computer or board doesn't make any difference imo. Play is play and considering how important technology is to most people's lives now, there's possibly many advantages to introducing children to it early.
That said, I'm sure some parents do hand over phones just to keep their kids quiet rather than engage with them themselves aka using it as a babysitter, much like some parents will let the TV be the babysitter. However, just because some do that, does not mean every child that watches TV is doing so because their parents don't give a .... and are letting the TV babysit, any more so than it does when they're using a tablet/phone/other device.