As a child, few things thrilled me more than a trip to the high street Blockbuster or visiting my local library to pick a film for the week. But working as a nanny for Gen Alpha kids has shown me that this formative ritual is all but extinct.
With over 67 per cent of UK households subscribed to at least one video streaming service, the era of physical media has faded. What I’m mourning is the loss of children’s attention spans, making them unable and unwilling to sit through films.
Most children in Britain own a smartphone before they turn 12; 10 per cent of six-year-olds already have their own. This early exposure to addictive tech has been linked to shrinking attention spans – just eight seconds, according to a 2015 Microsoft study – and has reshaped how children consume media.
Kids raised on iPads and clickbait have different habits. After school, they rush to claim the family iPad, logging into Roblox or swiping through YouTube shorts. CBBC viewership has fallen to just 14 per cent of six- to 12-year-olds.
When I convince them to give Shrek a chance, they skip ahead within minutes, hunting for a more entertaining scene. They’ve been conditioned to see media as a constant stream of stimulation, scrolling through the progress bar like a highlights reel.
This shift has started to reshape cinema. Studios are churning out loud, fast-paced remakes engineered to hold an eight-second attention span. Children are missing out on emotional touchstones like Bambi or Aladdin – films that shaped how I saw the world. You can’t build nostalgia from a YouTube Short.
