When do they notice what they watch?

[littlemisstax]

DD (9 months) loves snuggling up with DH on the sofa when he watches a film or plays xbox. When does he need to be careful about what he watches with her as I don't want her to take in the idea of shooting in games etc

You will be flamed here I think for letting her watch any adult content at 9 months. There's been debate today about whether ANY screen time is ok.

I think you have to balance out the benefits of having the time with your DH though. Personally I would say time connected to DH balances out negative effects of whatever is on the screen- but I may be a minority in that.

Hmm I think mine started to register what was on screen at about age 3 - and then ask lots of questions. The trouble is it can be totally innocent viewing but they don't understand. Mine is 5 now and sometimes I'm guilty of letting cbbc run into Tracy Beaker. We were having all these ~"you've no idea how horrible my life is" type comments until I realised they were coming from Tracy Beaker. I think you do need to be careful - as no amount of explanation registers - that it's a tv programme = not real. she lives in a childrens home - you don't. You are very loved and very lucky. What's a childrens home, can I live there, why doesn't she have as many toys as me, where's her mum....... It's better just to avoid it happening.

DD used to watch DH play XBox and we used to have her downstairs in the evenings while we were watching a film or whatever in the early days. She's 2 now, and we stopped it long ago. I think about 10 months or so - I remember there was an occasion where somebody was distressed on screen for some reason and it made her cry. We stopped it then. We don't have a TV licence so there's no TV - we have a couple of Looney Tunes DVDs and she's allowed to watch some cartoons with us at the weekend.