Written by Joyce Smith, BS. Study finds that associations between screen time and lower psychological well-being were larger among adolescents than younger children.
Excessive screen time and its association with obesity and lack of exercise has been well established 1. Screen time today is more than television viewing; it includes digital media such as electronic gaming, smart phones, tablets and computers. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) recommends that children 2-5 years of age spend no more than one hour per day of high-quality programming to allow time for activities important to health and development and to establish viewing habits that lower obesity risks 2. The National Institute of Health estimates that youth commonly spend an average of five to seven hours on screens during leisure time3. Previous research on associations between screen time and psychological well-being among children and adolescents has been conflicting, leading some researchers to question the limits on screen time suggested by physicians 4.
Twenge and Campbell in 2016, 5 particularly interested in associations between screen time and diagnoses of anxiety and depression in youth, examined data from a large (n=40,337) national random sampling of 2 to 17 year old children and adolescents in the United States to determine their hours of screen time viewing and to evaluate a number of psychological well-being measures. Utilizing the National Survey of Children’s Health data from 2016 (administered by the U.S. Census Bureau), Twenge and Campbell analyzed the 40,337 surveys received from the caregivers of children aged 2-17. They established four age categories that corresponded to the children’s educational levels as followers: 2-5 years (n=9361) corresponded to preschool; 6-10 years (n=10,668), elementary school; 11-13 years (n=7555), middle school; 14-17 years (n=12,753), high school.
- They found that adolescents who spend more than seven hours a day on screens were twice as likely as those spending one hour a day to have been diagnosed with anxiety or depression, treated by a mental health professional or have taken medication for a psychological or behavioral issue in the last 12 months.
- Overall, links between screen time and well-being were much larger among adolescents than among young children.
Additional highlights of the study were:
- Moderate use of screens at four hours each day was also associated with lower psychological well-being than the use of only one hour each day.
- Among preschoolers, those who were high users of screens were twice as likely to frequently lose their temper and 46% were more likely to not be able to calm down when excited, and less likely to switch tasks without anxiety or anger. In this group, both high and moderate users had more difficulty sitting still, were easily distracted and had significantly less self-control.
- Among teens aged 14-17, 42.2 % of those who spent more than seven hours a day on screens did not finish tasks compared with 16.6 % for those who spent one hour daily on screens and 27.7 % for those who engaged in four hours of screen time.
- Of the youth aged 11-13, about 9% who spent an hour with screens daily were not curious or interested in learning new things, compared with 13.8 % who spent four hours daily with screens and 22.6 % who spent more than seven hours daily with screens.
- Non-users and low users of screens generally did not differ in well-being.
Potential under-reporting of caregivers, assessing only weekday (no weekend) use of screen time and potential under-representation of population groups (such as Black Americans) are limitations of this study. However, the authors Twenge and Campbell believe this study provides further evidence that the American Academy of Pediatrics’ established screen time limits of one hour per day for those aged 2 to 5, with a focus on high-quality programs, are valid. Across a diverse array of well-being measures, (including measures of self-control, relationships with caregivers, emotional stability, diagnoses of anxiety and depression, and mental health treatment), psychological well-being progressively decreased as screen time increased from one hour a day to seven or more hours a day, particularly among adolescents.
Source: Twenge, Jean M., and W. Keith Campbell. “Associations between screen time and lower psychological well-being among children and adolescents: Evidence from a population-based study.” Preventive medicine reports 12 (2018): 271-283.
© 2018 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Inc. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/BY/4.0/).
Click here to read the full text study.
Posted August 19, 2019.
Joyce Smith, BS, is a degreed laboratory technologist. She received her bachelor of arts with a major in Chemistry and a minor in Biology from the University of Saskatchewan and her internship through the University of Saskatchewan College of Medicine and the Royal University Hospital in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan. She currently resides in Bloomingdale, IL.
References:
- Chiasson M, Scheinmann R, Hartel D, et al. Predictors of obesity in a cohort of children enrolled in WIC as infants and retained to 3 years of age. Journal of community health. 2016;41(1):127-133.
- COUNCIL ON COMMUNICATIONS. Media and Young Minds. Pediatrics. 2016;138(5).
- Hale L, Guan S. Screen time and sleep among school-aged children and adolescents: a systematic literature review. Sleep medicine reviews. 2015;21:50-58.
- Babic MJ, Smith JJ, Morgan PJ, Eather N, Plotnikoff RC, Lubans DR. Longitudinal associations between changes in screen-time and mental health outcomes in adolescents. Mental Health and Physical Activity. 2017;12:124-131.
- Twenge JM, Campbell WK. Associations between screen time and lower psychological well-being among children and adolescents: Evidence from a population-based study. Preventive medicine reports. 2018;12:271-283.
