Overview

• A study published in JAMA tracked 4,300 adolescents over four years and found that nearly one in three developed increasingly compulsive social media or mobile phone use.
• Adolescents with high or escalating addictive use trajectories for social media and phones faced a two to three times greater risk of suicidal ideation and behavior compared with peers showing low compulsive use.
• More than 40 percent of participants exhibited high addictive use of video games, which correlated with elevated symptoms of anxiety, depression and aggression.
• Total screen time was not linked to future mental health outcomes, highlighting that patterns of compulsion and loss of control are the primary risk factors.
• Researchers caution that simple limits on access may fall short unless interventions also address the underlying addictive behaviors