Increase in Adolescent Screen Time ties with Depression

Question

Increases in screen time in youth has been found to be associated with increases in depressive symptoms.

Comments

While reading this article, I gathered information and believed for this statement fact check to be true. While conducting extra outside research, I found that the author's of the article, all three of them, have licensed PHD's. This goes to show that they understand the material that is covered in this article. The more time that adolescents spend of their phone, the more that they find themselves sitting around their room or the couch all day not doing anything productive. I also read about how it is primarily significant in the teen ages because that certain generation uses electronics and technology a lot more than older generations. Overall, I see this article to be credible and true due to the credible authors and true information.

Answer 1

In the article "Association of Screen Time and Depression in Adolescence" published by JAMA Network, the writers make the claim that use of social media and television may increase the chance of depression in adolescents. They take research from 44 scholarly references that each back up their claim and makes it more credible. It's written by people that have their PhD in the topic which further adds to the validity of the claim as well as making points and stating facts from other related sources. Upon further research on the link between screen time and mental health, I found an article published by National Library of Medicine titled "Screen Time and Mental Health: a prospective analysis of the adolescent brain cognitive development (ABCD) study" that released the statement that "Screen time is prospectively associated with a range of mental health symptoms, especially depressive symptoms, though effect sizes are small. Video chat, texting, videos, and video games were the screen types with the greatest associations with depressive symptoms." (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC11457456/). Given the fact that many sources agree with the fact that there is a correlation between screentime, and depression makes the claim that there are ties between adolescent screen time and depression. One thing that would make this claim stronger is if the article was released after Covid-19 occurred because then the percentages and facts would be more accurate. 

Comments

Your analysis is very strong, especially with the National Library of Medicine's finding. Clarifying what "small effect sizes" mean for screen time and depression would add depth.

---

This is a very reliable examination with connects screen time to cases of depression, especially when referring to this article being documented by individuals that have their PhD to validate the report. Also, the JAMA Network article you've referenced is very strong due to JAMA's reputation of being very reliable with their medical journals and with a high impact factor.

---

This is a very strong claim seeing as the information comes from the National Library of Medicine, as well as acknowledging that the information would be stronger if the research was redone to capture the effects that COVID-19 has had on adolescents.

Answer 2

A 2022 research study named "Screen time and depression risk: A meta-analysis of cohort studies" (Research Study Article) came to a conclusion that although screen time can be a large factor regarding depression in adolescents, it is not the only cause. This study included 241,398 participants and 18 cohort studies. The meta-analysis study started by searching multiple data-bases for any trace of correlation between synonyms of screen time and the word depression. There was a specific criteria that was crucial to follow to allow only reliable and crucial sources. In addition, due to this study being conducted after Covid-19 it is more of a trustworthy source due to the changes in adolescents from Covid-19. This study is conducted/published by multiple public research institutions. Due to this being a study with multiple combinations of subjects, there are no obvious biases within the study group. The claim is found to be true due to the outcome of the study showing that among young populations screen time that exceeded over 1 hour often was a cause of depression, compared to a separate individual study showing that anything less than 1 hour was not as significant.