United States: The University of California San Francisco discovered in a recent study pre-teens who utilize specific forms of technology extensively may face a higher chance of evolving manic symptoms.
More about the news
The paper released by Social Psychiatry and Psychiatric Epidemiology evaluated 9,243 American children between the ages of ten and eleven across the nation.
As part of the Global Day of Unplugging (March 7), Verizon organized its initial “digital wellness summit” in New York City to deliver security information about technological use to the general public.
A press release mentioned, “Young people who spent more time engaged with social media, texting, videos, and video games were more likely to have “inflated self-esteem, decreased need for sleep, distractibility, rapid speech, racing thoughts, and impulsivity — behaviors characteristic of manic episodes, a key feature of bipolar-spectrum disorders,” Fox News reported.
Furthermore, the co-author Kyle Ganson, PhD, assistant professor at the University of Toronto’s Factor-Inwentash Faculty of Social Work, stated, “This study underscores the importance of cultivating healthy screen use habits early.”
“Future research can help us better understand the behaviors and brain mechanisms linking screen use with manic symptoms to help inform prevention and intervention efforts,” Ganson added.
What more are the experts stating?
CEO of Verizon Consumer Group, Sowmyanarayan Sampath, emphasized during a speech the necessity of establishing digital guarda, which children need the most.
Therefore, to mark the Global Day of Unplugging (March 7), Verizon hosted its first-ever “digital wellness summit” in New York City in order to share insights with the public about the safe use of technology.
“Digital wellness should be for every age, but really, we need a new blueprint as parents because we’ve never been through this before,” Sampath mentioned.
Sampath provided Fox News Digital with quantitative findings about cell phone behavior while discussing Verizon’s 2024 Consumer Connections Report.
Social media engagement by kids and teens reaches four to five hours each day based on the study findings, and so does their average daily notifications of 250-275, as Fox News reported.
Research data showed that children touched their phones to check them 150 times per day. One-fourth of such events took place while students were at school.
“This is what sparked us to think there is a healthier relationship people can have,” Sampath noted.