Millions of parents around the world are wondering whether they can give their youngest daughter a smartphone for her tenth birthday, allow their 13-year-old to follow friends and influencers on Instagram, or whether they can limit their oldest high schooler’s video game time.. To the recurring and often passionate debate about the vices and virtues of children’s exposure to screens, a study published Monday, Nov. 13, in the journal Nature human behavior provides well-founded conclusions based on the use of a large amount of data.

The team led by Taren Sanders, a researcher at the Institute of Positive Psychology and Education at the Australian Catholic University, conducted a so-called “umbrella” study, a meta-analysis of papers that are themselves meta-analyses of scientific studies. The one hundred and two meta-analyses taken into account looked at 2,451 studies with a total of no fewer than 1.9 million participants.

Key lesson from this review of the scientific literature: Whether positive or negative, the phenomena highlighted are different intensity “Low to moderate”. Researchers are careful not to say that a particular use has a particular effect, but only talk about connections. Contacted by The world, Taren Sanders regrets the difficulty of highlighting causal relationships. “For example, does social media promote depression, or do depressed people turn more to screens? “Hard to say based on the evidence we have.” he explains.

Decline in learning ability

If we stay in the realm of statistical correlations, the use of screens in general, television in particular, and video games is associated with a decline in learning ability. On the other hand, the use of digital books with a narrative dimension as well as educational programs that involve touching the screen or the use of augmented reality, are associated with an increase in these capacities. This also applies to learning arithmetic, not only for digital learning tools, but also for video games that involve operations with numbers.

The study confirms the importance of taking into account the way screens are used, which is clearly reflected in the area of ​​literacy. In fact, difficulties in learning to read and write are linked to the use of screens in general; however, when the child is watching with another person, especially one of his parents, there is a positive connection – as long as the two viewers are suitable for an active exchange, says Taren Sanders.

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