Examining the Relationship Between Children’s Screen Use and Externalising Behaviours

Abstract

Children’s screen use and its relationship with young people’s mental health has received significant attention in recent years. The research conducted in this area is often cross-sectional in design and therefore unable to explore the bi-directional relationship between these two constructs.
The first chapter is a meta-analysis of existing screen time literature and its relationship with externalising behaviours in children aged 4 – 18 years. Child age, screen type, type of measure and reporter of measure were included as moderators. The meta-analysis included 17 studies including a total of 15,448 young people. The overall association between children’s screen use and externalising behaviours was significant but small, Z = 0.117 (95% Confidence Interval [CI] = 0.061 – 0.173, p < .001). Screen type, type of measure were significant moderators of this relationship. The current meta-analysis suggests that there is a relationship between children’s screen use and externalising behaviours which is moderated by screen type, reporter of externalising measure and type of externalising measure. The review highlights a number of methodological limitations of the studies included and suggests further research is conducted before screen use guidelines for children over five are implemented.
The second chapter is an empirical study on pre-schoolers’ screen use and externalising behaviours during the Covid-19 pandemic in England. The study aimed to overcome some of the methodological limitations of previous studies by employing a longitudinal design and using cross-lagged analysis to explore the bi-directional association between pre-schoolers screen use and externalising behaviours. Types of screen use, active and passive, were also explored separately. The study was conducted using data from the Co-Spyce dataset. The results showed one cross-lagged effect; increases in active screen use at baseline significantly predicted externalising behaviours at one month follow-up (β = 0.25, p = .013). This relationship was not bi-directional. There was no over-time relationship between passive screen use and externalising behaviours but there was a within-time relationship. Active screen use significantly predicts externalising behaviour overtime whilst passive screen use does not. The strength of this relationship is
weak but suggests that the mechanisms underlying the relationship between active and passive screen use and externalising behaviour differs.

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Identifiers

ORCID for Peter Lawrence: orcid.org/0000-0001-6181-433X

ORCID for Jana Kreppner: orcid.org/0000-0003-3527-9083

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