Excessive screen time behaviors and cognitive difficulties among adolescents in the United States: Results from the 2017 and 2019 national youth risk behavior survey.

BACKGROUND

The widespread use of digital media by young people has generated speculations that their excessive use may have deleterious cognitive effects. Previous studies examining the association between screen time and cognitive deficits in youth have yielded mixed conclusions. We study this association using a nationally representative sample of school going adolescents in the United States.

METHODS

We queried data from the 2017 and 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Survey. An analytic sample of 17,076 adolescents was analyzed using binary logistic regression. Outcome variable was cognitive difficulties (difficulty in concentrating, remembering, or making decisions), and the explanatory variable was excessive screen-time behaviors.

RESULTS

Of the 17,076 adolescents, about one in three (34.1%) had cognitive difficulties, and 45% of adolescents engaged in excessive screen-time behaviors on an average school day. After adjusting for covariates, the odds were 1.28 times higher for adolescents who engaged in excessive screen-time behaviors to report serious cognitive difficulties compared to adolescents who did not engage in excessive screen-time behaviors (AOR = 1.28, p < .001, 95% CI = 1.18-1.40).

CONCLUSION

Study results support the association between excessive screen behaviors and cognitive difficulties in adolescence. Findings of this study are discussed with implications for practice and research.

Informations de copyright

Copyright © 2022. Published by Elsevier B.V.

Déclaration de conflit d'intérêts

Declaration of Competing Interest The authors declare that they have no competing interests, financial or otherwise, related to the current work. JF is supported by a University of Manchester Presidential Fellowship (P123958) and a UK Research and Innovation Future Leaders Fellowship (MR/T021780/1) and has received honoraria/consultancy fees from Atheneum, ParachuteBH and Nirakara, independent of this work. JT is supported by a research fellowship from the American Psychiatric Association Foundation and the American Psychiatric Association. JT also receives support from Otsuka unrelated to this work. This paper is based on public data from the 2017 and 2019 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS) collected by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The study was funded by the National Institute on Minority Health and Health Disparities grant T37MD014218 (PI: Dr. Cavazos-Rehg). The views and opinions expressed in this paper are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent the views of CDC, NIMHD, or their partners. Dr. Baiden had full access to the data and takes responsibility for the integrity of the data and the accuracy of the data analysis.