Young Adolescents' Digital Technology Use and Mental Health Symptoms: Little Evidence of Longitudinal or Daily Linkages

Abstract

This study examines whether adolescents' digital technology use is associated with mental health symptoms (N=388) during early to mid-adolescence. Adolescents completed an initial Time 1 (T1) assessment in 2015, followed by a 14-day ecological momentary assessment (EMA) via mobile phone in 2016-2017 which yielded 13,017 total observations over 5270 study days. Adolescents' T1 technology use did not predict later mental health symptoms. Adolescents' reported mental health was also not worse on days when they reported spending more versus less time on technology. Little was found to support daily quadratic associations (whereby adolescent mental health was worse on days with little or excessive use). Adolescents at higher risk for mental health problems also exhibited no signs of increased risk for mental health problems on higher technology use days. Findings from this EMA study do not support the narrative that young adolescents' digital technology usage is associated with elevated mental health symptoms.

Keywords: adolescence; digital technology usage; early adolescence; ecological momentary assessment; mental health; technology.

Figure 1

Study Design

Figure 2

Quadratic Associations- Time spent on Technology Creating Content and Daily Depressive Symptoms. Left panel depicts within-person daily quadratic association of daily technology use creating content (X axis) and expected depressive symptoms (Y axis). Right panel depicts between-person average quadratic associations between technology use creating content (X axis) and expected depressive symptoms (Y axis). Dashed lines represent the 95% confidence interval. The full ranges of reported hours of technology use creating content are depicted, grey shading reflects the 95^th and 99^th percentiles for technology use creating content.