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Research finds link between teen depression, cell phones

HOUGHTON — In the last decade, increasing mental distress and the need for treatment of mental health conditions among youth in North America has paralleled a steep rise in the use of smartphones and social media by children and adolescents, researchers say.

A report, titled “Smartphones, social media use and youth mental health,” was published in the Canadian Medical Association Journal on Feb. 10, 2020 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7012622/).

In Ontario, the proportion of teenagers reporting moderate to serious mental distress increased from 24% in 2013 to 34% in 2015 and to 39% in 2017 with parallel increases in health service utilization, the report states. However, this was not necessarily new information when the report was published two years ago.

An article published by NPR on Dec. 17, 2017 (www.npr.org/2017/12/17/571443683/the-call-in-teens-and-depression#:~:text=via%20Getty%20Images-,Researchers%20found%20a%20sudden%20increase%20in%20teens’%20symptoms%20of%20depression,popular%2C%20researcher%20Jean%20Twenge%20says.&text=A%20new%20study%20found%20that,more%20likely%20to%20consider%20suicide) titled “The Risk of Teen Depression and Suicide is Linked to Smartphone Use, Study says,” reported a study found that teenagers are increasingly depressed, feel hopeless and are more likely to consider suicide.

Researchers found a sudden increase in teens’ symptoms of depression, suicide risk factors and suicide rates in 2012 — around the time when smartphones became popular, according to Jean Twenge, one of the authors of the study.

Twenge’s research showed that teens who spend five or more hours per day on their devices are 71% more likely to have one risk factor for suicide, the NPR article reported. And that is regardless of the content consumed. Whether teens are watching cat videos or looking at something more serious, the amount of screen time — not the specific content — goes hand in hand with the higher instances of depression, the study showed.

A 2017 study published by the Child Mind Institute (https://childmind.org/awareness-campaigns/childrens-mental-health-report/2017-childrens-mental-health-report/smartphones-social-media/) listed several negative factors related to teens using smartphones:

• Eighth graders who spend 10 or more hours a week on social media are 56% more likely to report being unhappy than those who spend less time.

• Heavy users of social media increase their risk of depression by 27 percent.

• YouTube is widely viewed by teens as a positive force, but teens report Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter and Instagram increase feelings of anxiety.

• Girls, not surprisingly, were found to be disproportionately affected by the negative aspects of social media.

• More than twice as many girls as boys said they had been cyberbullied in the last year (22% vs. 10%).

• More than twice as many girls as boys report being cyberbullied

• Boys’ depression increased by 21% between 2012 and 2015, and girls’ depression increased by 50%.

The study also suggested a hidden causality link between cellular device activity and adverse effects on teens: sleep.

Teens who spent three or more hours a day on electronic devices were 28% more likely to get less than seven hours of sleep, while teens who visited social media sites every day were 19% more likely not to get adequate sleep.

Lack of sleep can negatively affect teens’ mood. It can also negatively impact their ability to think, react, regulate their emotions, learn and get along with adults.

It’s a vicious cycle–lack of sleep affects mood, and depression can lead to lack of sleep. And multiple studies have found that severe sleep debt is linked to suicidal ideation, the report stated.

Teens who do not sleep enough, the article reported, are more than twice as likely to report higher levels of depressive symptoms (31% vs. 12%).

Teens who sleep less than seven hours a night are also 68% more likely to have at least one risk factor for suicide.

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