Dimitri A Christakis, MD, MPH

Professional History

Board Certified:

Pediatrics

Medical/Professional School:

University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine, Philadelphia

Residency:

University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Pediatrics

Research Focus Area:

Health Promotion and Disease Prevention

Description of Research:

The first years of children's lives are critically important for children?s lifelong development. Consider that a newborn's brain triples in size in the first two years after birth. This immense growth happens in direct response to the environment that that infant experiences. Consider further that as many as half of children from lower income families start kindergarten without the basic skills they need to learn and that educational gap puts them at a disadvantage throughout school.

Dr. Christakis, is a Professor of Pediatrics, Director of the Child Health Institute at the University of Washington, and a pediatrician at Children's Hospital in Seattle. Dr. Christakis is the author of over 100 original research articles and a textbook of pediatrics. He is also the author of The Elephant in the Living Room: Make Television work for your kids. (September 2006; Rodale) Dr. Christakis is an international expert on children and media. His research focuses on the effects of media on child health and development and has been featured on Anderson Cooper 360, the Today Show, ABC, NBC, and CBS news as well as all major national newspapers.

His research to date has included:

TV viewing in the first three years of life can lead to problems with language development as well as attention and cognitive development at school age.

Playing with blocks can improve language acquisition for children ages 1.5 to 2.5 years of age.

Watching violent cartoons during preschool ages is associated with aggression at ages 7-10 whereas watching educational programming is not.

His current research includes:

Helping parents make better media choices for their preschoolers and effects on their behavior at school age.

Distributing computers with educational software to low income families to try and improve kindergarten readiness.