Authors: Sudheer Muppalla, Sravya Vuppalapati, Apeksha Pulliahgaru, Himabindu Sreenivasulu,
Publishers: NIH, (2023).
This article from the NIH not only talks about the health issues that overuse of screen time causes for children, it also talks about how children have actually become “digital natives” and how this is causing the effects of screen time that more lasting and detrimental to this new generation's health. This article goes into depth about the effects on children’s cognition, language development, social emotional development, as well as what parents and other adults can do to manage screen time. It mentions various studies including The Quebec Longitudinal Study of Child Development which discovered that a one hour ‘increase in TV exposure at two years of age corresponding to a 7% unit decrease in participation in class and a 6% unit decrease in math proficiency in the fourth grade.’ It also mentions the relationship between screen time and levels of emotional regulation, aggression, and poor sleep as well as obesity, depression, and anxiety. Overall, this resource does a very good job of explaining the risks and statistics surrounding this issue, as well as what could be done to prevent this.
Author: Michelle Ponti
Publisher: National Institute of Health, (2023)
This particular article goes into the effects on children of preschool age. It takes into account the effect that COVID 19 had on children, and gives an update to an earlier study from 2017 that looked into the negative developmental and psychosocial effects. It discusses how screen time is having an effect on children’s sleep habits, their lifestyles and amounts of activity, as well as the impact that this has on a developing brain. To be specific, the author references a study that mentions that ‘In the United States, most 2-year olds use a digital device daily, and 9 out of every 10 children were introduced to a device before their first birthday. One recent study reported a 60% rate of touchscreen device use in children younger than 3’. Though it discusses the potential opportunities that screens can add for development, since screens can add better opportunities for education, but also goes over the risks for brain development on young children specifically.
Authors: Chandra G, Haarika, V, Kedarnath, T, Uma, R,
Publisher: National Institute of Health, (2024),
The following article by Sekhar et al. looks at 53 different research articles, some looking at screen time at an individual level, with others looking at it at a group level. One thing that they mention is the effect that COVID had on children specifically, due to the increase in screen time in schools nowadays since COVID. This is so much worse for children in elementary and middle school, and though a lot of countries like the US have set up regulations about this, not every country has and this makes it more complicated.
Authors: Tracie Barnett, Jennifer O'Loughlin, Catherine Sabiston, Igor Karp, Mathieu Belanger, Andraea Van Hulst, Marie Lambert.
Publisher: American Journal of Epidemiology, (2010).
In this article from the American Journal of Epidemiology, Barnett et al. discusses the research that shows the effects that screens have on health in particular. In particular, it mentions how this can cause a negative relationship with metabolic rate, cardiometabolic risk, and adiposty, which can cause many adverse health effects by itself. Though this article does mostly discuss a study titled the Nicotine Dependence in Teens, the results from that study actually are relavent to this study due to the sedentary lifestyle of these particular teens from this study, since most of these teens self reported that they spent excessive amounts of time on screens.
Authors: Christopher Streegan, Juan Lugue, Paulin Morato-Espino.
Publishers: Journal of Pediatric and Neonatal Individualized Medicine, (2022).
This particular article by Streegan et al. aims to look at the relationship between screen time and developmental issues in children aged 0-9. It particularly looks at those children who didn’t previously have diagnosed issues, and took information from various countries including Thailand, UK, China, South Korea, and the US. It covers the importance of educational programming for young children, as well as the importance of avoiding programming with lots of action, violence, and loud noises for very young children due to the negative effects that this has on children’s development. Particularly, this kind of programming can actually be more overwhelming for them and can cause issues with distractibility and inattentiveness in children in other instances. It also discusses the importance of screen time being used as a tool with parents and caregivers can use for things like vocabulary development and teaching about educational topics like animals, other parts of the world and their cultures, as well as skills for interacting with others. This article overall does show how screen time can be beneficial to others when put together with prosocial behaviors, which makes it stand out as a resource for this type of project.
Author: Jay Geidd
Publisher: Dialogues in Clinical Neuroscience,
Jay Geidd's article Adolescent brain and the natural allure of digital media provides a good amount of research on the psychological and physical effects that digital screens can have on the teen brain. In essence, it looks into how screens can cause depression, anxiety, and many problems with sleep. Particularly, Geidd discusses the argument that looking at screens is in fact not natural for us at all, since we are meant to be interacting with others instead. However he challenges this it with the idea that though this might seem true, this is something that is natural for teens to be looking for, despite the psychological and physical effects that it has for them. Particularly, Geidd makes the argument that teens use digital media and screens as much as they do to get a dopamine high, out of a sense of desire and a need for something to satisfy this need for them, since the internet provides a sense of adventure and escape in a lot of ways, as well as ways to discover different parts of our identities. Geidd encourages us to understand how we can use screens to satisfy these desires in healthy ways, as well as encouraging our teens to do the very same.
Author: Ariela Gashaj
Publishers: The Undergraduate Journal of Public Health, (2025)
This article looks at the distinct influence that screen time has on teens and young adults in particular. It provides data from young adults themselves and discusses the percentage of teens and young adults who think that they are addicted to their phones, as well as the difference in usage between males and females. Though Gashaj mentions the benefits of using social media as a way to communicate and interact with others, they also mention how dangerous this can be for anyone under 30 in particular, due to the fact that their brains are still so malleable and vulnerable to their environments that they are creating, as well as the habits that they are building for themselves as well. They also mention the idea that it can be really difficult to determine what is real and credible for a lot of teens and young adults now as a result of social media, since there is such a high access to information nowadays. They also touch on the issues that this excessive screen time can cause, including problems with body image, social isolation, and emotional difficulties. Overall, Gashaj provides a good amount of research about the amount of time that young adults and teens are actually using screens, and how more advocacy and education on this issue is super important.
Author: Jennifer Cross, MD.
Publisher: New York Presbyterian Health Matters, (2023).
This article from Dr Jennifer Cross helps researchers to understand how screen time can affect children’s brain development, particularly when it comes to slowing it down. Particularly, this slows down brain development, as well as their ability to solve problems. For example, the article mentions a study that suggests that young children watching too much TV can actually do worse on reading tests. It also mentions how too much screen time can effect children’s sleep schedules as well. Cross provides lots of tips about how to manage screen time for young children, as well as how to use it in a healthy way.
Author: Khumukcham, A, Sudhakar, S,
Publisher, Journal of Education and Health Promotion, (2023).
This article from Khumukcham et al. provides a lot of good information about the deeper negative effects of screen time. Particularly, it touches on how screen time can physically effect individuals by giving them headaches, dry eyes, blurred vision, and poor posture, as well as causing many mental health problems including anxiety and depression, as well as causing people to feel really isolated and lonely. The author speaks to the importance of coming up with new initiatives and limits to screen time from educators and law makers, as well as having parents and caretakers come up with their own limits and initiatives at home.