Content and Context in Children’s Screen Time and Relations to Academic Skills

Children’s screen time has increased dramatically in the past few years and the content and contextual factors related to screen use merits further investigation in determining impacts on academic skills. In this longitudinal study of 128 4 and 5-year-old children, using time diary data to measure children’s screen time and direct child assessments of academic skills, this study examined whether contextual factors related to screen time (total screen time, content, parental monitoring, and device type) predicted children’s academic skills. Results showed that only use of mobile devices predicted spatial skills at age 5 when considering these contextual factors individually. Via cluster analysis, three unique groups of screen users were uncovered: Cluster 1 was “low total, unmonitored, and non-educational TV,” Cluster 2 was called “moderate total, educational mobile devices,” and Cluster 3 was “highest total, educational TV and mobile devices.” Cluster 2 showed better literacy skills at age 5 than both Cluster 1 and Cluster 3. Findings suggest that certain contextual features of screen time may predict children’s literacy skills and the need to move beyond simple global measures of children’s total screen time to assess academic outcomes. Future directions of this research and limitations are discussed