This is Scientific American's 60-second Science, I'm Jared Rizzi.Kids spend a lot of time looking at screens. And some parents worry.But a new study argues against the apprehension parents may feel."The danger is that they're hearing a message that social media, digital technology use is causing very serious and harmful problems like depression, like suicide-related behaviors."Candice Odgers, professor of psychological science at the University of California, Irvine."And the idea is that if you shut off social media, which lots of kids use to connect with each other, their friends, find out information about health,you could in fact be making a situation worse.Parents are really being sent a message that is not supported by anything scientifically."Odgers and her colleagues looked at the screen-related behavior of 400 public-school students in North Carolina ages 10 to 14.This group was picked as a representative sample of race and socioeconomic status for the entire U.S.The researchers found that―even not counting time doing schoolwork on screens―the kids spent between almost five hours to seven hours per day on their devices, with the older kids online the most.That's a lot of hours, but:"Overall, what we find is no connection between the amount of time that young people spend online using digital technologies and mental health symptoms like depression, anxiety.When we do find associations, they were actually quite surprising to us.
