Author: Laura Sanders / Source: Science News for Students
Screens — on computers, smartphones, tablets and more — surround us more than ever. But it might be best to look away. Nearly two out of three U.
S. kids spend more than two hours a day looking at screens, a new study finds. The kids who spend more time staring at screens perform worse on memory, language and thinking tests than do those who spend less time in front of a device. That’s the result of a study of more than 4,500 kids 8- to 11-years old.Time on devices has its pros and cons. Screen time before bed can make it harder to sleep. But some time with devices also can improve a student’s moods. For this study, researchers wanted to find out how much time kids were spending on screens — whether a smartphone, a television, an iPad or a computer. They also wanted to look at how much sleep and exercise these kids were getting. Finally, the scientists wanted to gauge kids’ cognitive abilities. These are mental activities — such as solving puzzles, remembering things or learning something new.
The researchers used data gathered as part of a large, long-term study. Called the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) Study, it surveyed more than 4,500 kids and their parents. The study asked about screen time. It also asked about exercise and sleep, and tested memory and learning.
So how much screen time is too much? The researchers went with guidelines from experts.
These recommend no more than two hours of recreational screen time a day. They also advise kids to get at least an hour of exercise each day and between nine and 11 hours of sleep at night.If that prescription seems strict, it was. Only five in every 100 of the surveyed children met all three guidelines. In fact, 29 in every 100 didn’t meet any of the guidelines. So they were “getting less than nine hours of…
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