Screen Use and Emotional, Behavioral, and Social Development in Children.
Teens gaming over 5 hours daily had higher odds of behavioral difficulties
Screen Use and Emotional, Behavioral, and Social Development in Children.
IMPORTANCE: The association between electronic screen use and psychosocial development in children remains unclear.
To evaluate the cross-sectional association between screen use and psychosocial development at 5, 10, and 15 years of age and the longitudinal association between screen use at 5 years of age and psychosocial development at 10 and 15 years of age.
DESIGN, SETTING, AND PARTICIPANTS: This secondary analysis of a cohort study used data from a large Scottish birth cohort, with follow-up at 5, 10, and 15 years of age between January 1, 2010, and December 31, 2020.
gaming over 5 hours a day raised the odds of behavioral difficulties
Daily screen use increased with age, with patterns varying by screen type.
Cross-sectional analyses showed no significant associations between screen use and TDS at 5 or 10 years of age.
Conversely, more than 1 h/d of social media and messaging was associated with lower odds of above-average TDS than less than 1 h/d (ranging from OR, 0.57 [95% CI, 0.39-0.84] to 0.61 [95% CI, 0.38-1.00] for 1-2 h/d of screen use).
In this cohort study, screen use was not consistently associated with poorer outcomes for children. These findings suggest that guidelines focusing solely on screen time may have limited impact on psychosocial outcomes.