• 03
• Aug
• 2007

Do incar DVD players make the children car sick?

We spend quite bit of time during the course of a year heading back home to Lincolnshire from up here in the North East – close to a 7hr round trip.

The A1 could possibly be the most boring road around, specially when you are on it for around 2hrs with two children who started asking “are we nearly there yet” just after Scotch Corner services.

I’m getting a dab hand at eye spy, and there is a whole new world of songs being opened up to me on every journey. Sadly this’ll only keep the children happy for a while, then the chorus of “how much longer is it?” begins again.

We’ve decided that, as much as we are against the children watching too much TV, in car DVD players may be the way to go.

Before we head of to Halfords and hand over £200 to the bored looking teenager on the ‘ICE’ counter we have a few questions you might be able to help with.

1. If your child finds reading in the car makes them feel ill, does watching DVD’s on a screen attached to the rear of the front seat headrest have the same effect? Our daughter finds looking at a book or playing with the etchersketch can make her feel car sick within around 10 minutes. I can’t help thinking that DVD’s would have the same effect.
   
   
2. Do incar DVD players work during the day? If I try and use my MacBook Pro outside in the garden during the day the bright sunshine makes it almost impossible to view the screen, and these new PowerBooks have much brighter screens than any other laptop I’ve used.
   
   So, would the ‘bright outside light’ effect produce the same outcome with a DVD player? I’m guessing that the more expensive ones are better than the cheap ones, but is the problem still there?
   
   
3. finally, do you find the children are happy watching films on a car journey or does the novelty soon wear off? Is it worth getting a pair of screens that will also accept a PlayStation or is that not really necessary?

If you can answer any or all of these questions we’d really like to hear from you, please post your answer(s) using the comments form below.