Examining Predictors of Young Children’s Screen Time during COVID-19

• In Event: Promoting Positive Media Use Across Development

Abstract

Although the American Academy of Pediatrics recommends less than 1 hour per day of high-quality screen time (ST) for 2-5-year-old children (AAP, 2016), this age group typically exceeds this daily amount (Rideout & Robb, 2020). During the COVID-19 pandemic, children’s ST significantly increased and was largely driven by ST for entertainment purposes (Ribner et al., 2021), indicating the need to assess the content of ST. In addition, recent work has demonstrated the significance of parenting stress on children’s ST during the pandemic (Seguin et al., 2021). The goals of this research are to extend this work by characterizing 2 and 5-year-old children’s ST during the pandemic and assessing the parental as well as environmental and child factors associated with ST.

Participants were 284 two and five-year-old children and their parents who completed online assessments, time diary interviews, and parent surveys during the COVID-19 pandemic. Parents completed time diary phone interviews and reported all their and the child’s activities in the previous 24 hours. Total ST consisted of time parents reported their child was watching TV or using electronic media. This time was further coded to indicate whether the content was educational or non-educational. After child assessments, researchers completed a child behavior rating form from the Preschool Self-Regulation Assessment study (Smith-Donald et al., 2007). Parents reported on their neighborhood quality (National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, 1968), the Parenting Stress Index (Abidin, 1995), the Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (Radloff, 1977), and their education, income, marital status, and child age.

Regression results indicated that 5-year-olds had significantly more total and non-educational ST than 2-year-olds (Table 1). Less neighborhood safety, lower socioeconomic status (SES), and being older were significant predictors of total ST. Greater parenting stress, less neighborhood safety, and lower SES were significant predictors of non-educational ST. In an analysis using the AAP recommended ST minutes (< 1 hour), children who exceeded this amount had parents with significantly higher levels of parenting stress and lower SES (Table 2).

Significant stress by age interactions were also detected. For 5-year-olds, higher levels of parenting stress and less neighborhood safety were associated with more ST. Better self-regulatory skills were related to less non-educational ST for 5-year olds. The proportion of non-educational ST was related to parents’ depression symptoms differentially by age where more depression symptoms was related to an increase of the proportion of non-educational ST for 5-year olds but a decrease for 2-year olds.

Exploring the stressors associated with children’s ST during the COVID-19 pandemic was a primary goal in this work. In this study, we found that parenting stress, neighborhood safety, and child factors were related to ST and ST content, and these associations were stronger for 5-year-olds compared to 2-year olds. This work provides a framework for how ST experiences differ by child age and could encourage more specific recommendations by the AAP for different age groups.

Authors

• Linsah Coulanges, University of Pittsburgh
  Presenting Author

• Heather J. Bachman, University of Pittsburgh

• Melissa E Libertus, University of Pittsburgh

• Elizabeth Votruba-Drzal, University of Pittsburgh