Ways to measure screen use by children

Ways to measure screen use by children

Children are growing up with screens all around them. However, the role of screens in the lives of children and its potential impact is heavily debated, with evidence supporting detrimental, negligible and beneficial effects. Overall, mixed and inconclusive evidence is very common. In order to better understand the possible positive and negative impact of screen use on children it would be crucial to first have robust methods to measure screen use, which in turn could help provide practical evidence-based information to families.

Many challenges in capturing contemporary screen use by children 

Gone are the days when technology simply involved a television set in one room with a limited number of scheduled broadcast channels. In today’s digital society there are many complexities in how children engage with screens which creates many challenges for capturing contemporary screen use. Children now frequently use multiple devices and software, with varying content, for different tasks and in a variety of contexts. 

Some considerations when considering ways to measure screen use: 

• Children differ: Different aspects of screen use may be important for different children. For example, infants and toddlers screen use would be vastly different to adolescent screen use. Screen use could also differ based on children’s gender and interests, as well as their physical, mental or social capabilities. 
  
• Technology differs: Children can engage with a range of different technologies with different hardware, software and content. Devices could also be used simultaneously. Different devices and differing content could have different impacts on children. 
  
• Tasks differ: Children can use screens for a variety of tasks or purposes. For example, for relaxation, activities of daily living, communication, or education.
  
• Other people: Children may be using screens with other people such as parents, siblings and peers. 
  
• Local context: Children could use screens in multiple physical contexts (home, educational settings and in the community), as well as in virtual worlds. 
  
• Broader Environment: Many elements in the broader environment could influence children’s screen use including socio-economic, cultural and physical environment. For example, community attitudes, cultural practices and weather could influence children’s screen use.  
  
• Time: When children use screens may have different impacts. For example, morning or evening screen use, weekday or weekend use, or before or after school. Screen use patterns could also vary across the year with school term vs school holidays, and summer vs winter. 
  
  

Summary of different measurement options

There are a range of different methods used to measure digital screen technology use by children and adolescents. Each method has its own advantages and disadvantages. Here are some examples of ways to measure screen use:

• Self-/Proxy reporting (questionnaires, diaries, electronically prompted sampling): These methods typically collect recall of screen use (either retrospective, across day or instant recall). Generally, they are low cost and have the potential to be large scale with a wide reach. They can capture a range of constructs including use, interaction and context. However, they are subject to recall inaccuracy and reporting/social desirability bias leading to overall imprecision. 
  
• Direct observation: Contemporaneous observation and recording of screen use by an observer in children’s natural environment can improve accuracy with reduced potential for reporting bias and can be used for children of any age. Can be used to capture details for a range of use aspects including use, interaction and context. However, direct observations are intrusive to the child and family and the presence of the observer could influence their behaviour. It also has high researcher data collection burden therefore is impractical for large scale and wide reach. 
  
• Recording devices (fixed room cameras, wearable/portable cameras, audio recorders): Audio-visual recording devices have the ability to capture various screen devices as well as contextual information with high accuracy and low bias. Portable recording devices can capture a variety of locations. However, recording devices have ethical concerns including participant privacy and third-party consent. They can be intrusive to the child and family and are likely limited to small scale.
  
• Screen-device onboard logging: Contemporaneous manual or automated onboard logging of app use or internet traffic on devices such as smartphones or tablets. Automated logging has high accuracy (if only one user of device) and low bias. It has the potential to be used large scale and with wide reach. Automated logging can measure duration, frequency, app type, app status (foreground, background) including short bursts of exposure. However, it is invasive to personal privacy, currently cannot capture easily across all types of screen use (e.g., television, console gaming), and it may not identify user of device. 
  
• Remote digital trace logging: Contemporaneous automatic capture of network traffic at the home router, internet service provider or digital platform (e.g., social media) levels by collecting digital trace data. Remote digital trace logging has high accuracy and low bias, with low burden to participants. It is generally low cost, can be used large scale with wide reach. It can capture rich details of interactions with technology use such as phone calls, messages and websites visited and interactions with social media. However, it is invasive to personal privacy, can only capture certain types of data and may require agreement of network/platform.
  
• Proximity logging: Contemporaneous detecting when a participant is near a screen (when both have chips attached), typically using radio-frequency identification (RFID). Proximity logging has high accuracy and low bias, with low burden to participants and no identifying data collected. It has the ability to capture proximity to a range of devices with children of any age. However, it only records proximity, not actual use. 

What is the best method?

Accurately capturing the critical aspects of screen use by children is difficult, with no gold standard and no one perfect method that can capture all aspects of children’s technology use. Perhaps the ‘best method’ could be a combination of methods. Selecting the appropriate measurement method would depend on many considerations for example the aim of the study, the target participants, types of technology, tasks of screen use, as well as the local context setting and broader environment of interest, and the time of year / week / day that the screen is likely to be use. As well as considering the ethical implications of certain measurement options.