Abstract
As screens are increasingly integrated into every facet of modern life, there is growing concern over the potential effects of high screen time. Previous studies have largely utilized self-report data on mood and behavioral aspects of screen time, and no molecular theory has yet been developed. In this study, we explored the fecal microbiome and metabolome of a diverse group of 60 college students, classified by high (≥ 75 min/day) or low (0–75 min/day) self-reported screen time using 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing, targeted liquid chromatography-tandem mass spectrometry, and targeted detection of short-chain fatty acids using gas chromatography-mass spectrometry. Several key taxa and metabolites were significantly altered between groups and found to be highly co-occurrent. Results of pathway and enzyme enrichment analyses were synthesized to articulate an integrated hypothesis indicating widespread mitochondrial dysfunction and aberrant amino acid metabolism. High screen time was also predicted to be significantly associated with type I diabetes, obesity, chronic fatigue syndrome, and various manifestations of inflammatory bowel. This is the first-ever study to report the effects of high screen time at the molecular level, and these results provide a data-driven hypothesis for future experimental research.
Highlights
As screens are increasingly integrated into every facet of modern life, there is growing concern over the potential effects of high screen time
An initial principal component analysis (PCA) was performed between high and low screen time groups using the entire set of captured metabolites and gut microbiota (GM) features (Supplementary Fig. S1)
The first two components accounted for approximately 75% of all variance, and analysis of 95% confidence intervals (CIs) showed two potential outliers (DW40 and DW100, one from each study group) which were removed from further analyses upon confirming non-ignorable missingness of metabolomic data
Summary
As screens are increasingly integrated into every facet of modern life, there is growing concern over the potential effects of high screen time. High screen time was predicted to be significantly associated with type I diabetes, obesity, chronic fatigue syndrome, and various manifestations of inflammatory bowel This is the first-ever study to report the effects of high screen time at the molecular level, and these results provide a datadriven hypothesis for future experimental research. Another study involving magnetic resonance imaging demonstrated a strong, positive association between brain connectivity and time spent reading books whereas a strong, negative association was observed between length of exposure to screen-based media and degree of neuronal a rborization[15] It appears as though physical activity does not compensate for the adverse effects of screen time on the microstructure of the central nervous system[16,17]. No study to date has investigated the potential effects of screen time using a systems biology approach
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