Problematic Mobile Media Use as a Family Issue: A Latent Profile Analysis in Parent-Child Dyads

Objective: It was aimed in the study to evaluate and compare the purpose, frequency, and scope of mobile media use in children with neurodevelopmental disorder and those without neurodevelopmental disorder. Method: This study planned with a comparative design was conducted with the participation of the mothers of 111 children with neurodevelopmental disorder and 237 children without neurodevelopmental disorder. The data were collected through a self-report questionnaire. Results: Most of the children had their own personal mobile media devices (with neurodevelopmental disorder=96.4%, without neurodevelopmental disorder=90.7%), and the majority used their mobile media devices to watch videos (with neurodevelopmental disorder=100.0%, without neurodevelopmental disorder=77.6%). Children with neurodevelopmental disorder used mobile media devices at an earlier age, and their duration of use in the day was longer (p<0.05). Conclusion: Education programs for mothers should be prepared in line with expert opinions which aim at reducing use of mobile media devices and screen exposure. Nurses should play a role in the development and evaluation of intervention programmes to prevent the negative consequences of mobile media use and screen exposure, especially in primary health care centres.

Objective The present study was conducted to determine the extent of exposure to and use of mobile devices by children (aged 0–60 months) with a diagnosed neurodevelopmental disability. Design A self-report survey-based design was employed. Setting Questionnaires were administered at a tertiary care hospital in Mumbai, India Participants The study included a convenience sample of 423 children with a neurodevelopmental disability (aged 0–60 months). The self-report survey was administered to the parents of the children. Results Analyses showed that 92.7% (n = 392) of all respondents have smartphones. 61% (n = 258) of the respondents stated that their children used mobile devices before 2 years of age. 58% (n = 246) of the parents gave children devices while feeding. A statistically significant difference was found in the mobile media usage between groups of children with different diagnoses (p < 0.001). Children diagnosed with ASD appeared to spend the largest amount of time on mobile media (m = 180.44 mins), as compared to children included with other diagnoses. Of the diagnosed children, only 13.4% (n = 57) of parents were informed about the possible negative effects of media use by their paediatricians. Conclusion The results suggest premature mobile media habits, frequent use and lack of awareness about the effects of mobile media usage among children diagnosed with a neurodevelopmental disability. We suggest there is a need to update recommendations for caregivers on the use of mobile media by young children with disability. Implications for rehabilitation The usage and consequences of mobile media use differ based on the type of neurodevelopmental disorder diagnosis. Parents of children with neurodevelopmental disorders often use mobile media as a distraction while engaging in various activities themselves, this information helps identify times at which mobile media might be purposefully used by parents as distractors There is an urgent need for clinical guidelines regarding mobile media usage among young children with neurodevelopmental disorders

Many policy recommendations state that children aged 2 to 5 should not spend more than an hour per day in front of a screen; however, these recommendations are challenged as technology use becomes more mobile and accessible to young children. Background/Objectives: The goal of this study is to examine the relationship between children’s and parents’ mobile media use (i.e., smartphones and tablets) and children’s developmental milestones, including their fine motor, gross motor, and personal social skills. Methods: Data for this study comes from two child development centers in the southwestern United States, one serving predominantly middle class families and another serving low-income families (N = 63). Parents completed online surveys regarding their own and their children’s social media use by uploading screenshots of their own and their children’s mobile media device (if applicable) over the last 24 h. Parents identified how many minutes they spent using social media, how many minutes their child spent using social media, and how many minutes their child spent watching television. To capture children’s developmental milestones, parents completed the ages and stages questionnaire (ASQ3), which measures children’s fine motor skills, gross motor skills, and social skills. Results: Correlation and regression analyses revealed that parent mobile media use was positively associated with children’s gross motor and personal social skills (B = 0.38 and 0.32, respectively, p < 0.05; R2 = 0.09–0.19) and children’s television viewing was negatively associated with children’s gross motor skills (B = −0.30, p < 0.05). Conclusions: Children’s mobile media may have different consequences for children’s developmental milestones compared to television, and parents’ mobile media use may be more associated with children’s developmental milestones than children’s own use of these devices.

Mobile media use by infants and toddlers

Children demonstrate increasing early engagement with mobile media facilitated by its portability and interactivity. Parents are known to employ a range of mediation strategies for mobile media use but continue to have limited awareness about the impact of mobile media on their child’s executive functioning. Mobile media use has previously been shown to be negatively correlated with the executive functioning development of a child; however, little is known of how parents approach their child’s mobile media use. This study employed a survey design (N=281) to examine how parents access information related to mobile media and document their perspectives about the impact of mobile media on their child’s behavior and executive functioning. Correlational analyses and cooccurrence graphs showed that parents implement several mediation strategies but rarely access guidelines on mobile media use. A confirmatory factor analysis examined the model fit for four latent constructs of the Behavior Rating Inventory of Executive Function (BRIEF®), which included the Inhibit, Emotional Control, Initiate, and Working Memory scales. Structural equation modelling substantiated the association between parental perception of negative impacts of mobile media related to their child’s behavior, academics, and/or attention and a lower observed executive functioning. Overall, these findings suggest that parents recognize the negative impacts of mobile media on their child’s behavior, and this is associated with how they see the development of their child’s executive functioning. The results emphasize the importance of educating parents as to the role of mobile media in shaping their child’s behavior and associated executive functions.

Accidental, Assisted, Automated: An Emerging Repertoire of Infant Mobile Media Techniques

Research on children's use of mobile media devices lags behind its adoption. The objective of this study was to examine young children's exposure to and use of mobile media devices. Cross-sectional study of 350 children aged 6 months to 4 years seen October to November 2014 at a pediatric clinic in an urban, low-income, minority community. The survey was adapted from Common Sense Media's 2013 nationwide survey. Most households had television (97%), tablets (83%), and smartphones (77%). At age 4, half the children had their own television and three-fourths their own mobile device. Almost all children (96.6%) used mobile devices, and most started using before age 1. Parents gave children devices when doing house chores (70%), to keep them calm (65%), and at bedtime (29%). At age 2, most children used a device daily and spent comparable screen time on television and mobile devices. Most 3- and 4-year-olds used devices without help, and one-third engaged in media multitasking. Content delivery applications such as YouTube and Netflix were popular. Child ownership of device, age at first use, and daily use were not associated with ethnicity or parent education. Young children in an urban, low-income, minority community had almost universal exposure to mobile devices, and most had their own device by age 4. The patterns of use suggest early adoption, frequent and independent use, and media multitasking. Studies are urgently needed to update recommendations for families and providers on the use of mobile media by young children.

We explored the relations among young children's mobile media use, sleep, and a form of self-regulation, temperamental effortful control (EC), among a national sample of 402 mothers who completed an online survey. We found that the relation between mobile media use and EC was moderated by children's sleep time. Tablet use was negatively related to EC only among children who slept less at night (40% of our sample). However, hand-held game player use was positively related to EC among children who slept longer at night (60% of our sample). In addition, sleep quality was a mediator in the relation between evening tablet use and EC. Evening use related to later bedtimes, more bedtime resistance, and worse sleep duration, and these indicators of poor sleep quality, in turn, predicted weaker EC. Statement of contribution What is already known on this subject? Young children are spending increasing amounts of time with mobile media, such as tablets and hand-held game players. Media exposure is related to children's self-regulation. Media exposure is related to children's sleep quality. What does this study adds? Number of sleep hours moderates the relation between mobile media use and EC among young children. Tablet time is negatively related to EC among young children who get fewer sleep hours. Hand-held game playing is positively related to EC among young children who get greater sleep hours. Sleep quality mediates the relation between evening tablet time and EC among young children.

The mediation of mobile and social media technologies has reshaped how people imagine, understand, and, in turn, calibrate the visibility of their self-expression, information sharing, and relationship-building. This paper presents a case study of how promoters and attendees in underground electronic/dance music culture (EDMC) maintained the boundaries of the “underground” by co-constructing norms of mobile and social media use. Drawing upon 20 nights of field observations at live music events and 27 semi-structured interviews with promoters and attendees, I highlighted two scenarios in which promoters and attendees leveraged the spatial and temporal affordances of mobile and social media to calibrate their visibility. First, the last-minute and indirect sharing of event location afforded the community to bar outsiders from entering while allowing insiders to authenticate themselves by navigating to their gatherings. Second, the dialectical shaping between promoters’ venue policies and attendees’ folk theories of phone etiquette maintained a reduced level of mobile media use at such gatherings. These practices brought to light how mobile and social media afford new spatial-temporal conditions of visibility and bring forth new possibilities for people to not only manage – but play with visibility.

Higher television exposure has been repeatedly linked to poorer self-regulation among young children.Recent studies show use of mobile screen media devices is also negatively related to self-regulation in early childhood.Despite the proliferation of mobile devices in households with young children, it is unclear whether children's use of smartphones and tablets predicts their selfregulation independently of television use and parents' screen media use or when also considering evocative effects of children's dysregulation.This multi-method, cross-sectional study with a racially diverse sample (N = 72) in the western U.S. examines parents' (86.3% mothers) leisure media use and preschool-aged children's (M = 38.02months, 55.6% girls, 47.2% racial-ethnic minority) mobile media use, television use, and dysregulation as predictors of their behavioral battery-assessed self-regulation.As hypothesized, path models show the amounts of children's mobile media use, television use, and dysregulation negatively predict their self-regulation, and mobile media use is a stronger predictor than television use.We conclude with future directions to yield stronger inferences of screen media effects on child development that can inform interventions and screen time guidelines.

BackgroundThe widespread use of digital technologies has raised growing concerns about their impact on mental health. While self-regulation has been proposed as a protective factor, little is known about how distinct psychological profiles based on self-regulatory and technology use patterns relate to psychological distress. Person-centered approaches, such as latent profile analysis, may offer deeper insights, particularly in underrepresented populations.ObjectiveThis study aimed to identify latent psychological profiles based on self-regulation, nomophobia (fear of being without a phone), and problematic use of the internet and social media (defined by behavioral symptoms), to examine their associations with general psychological distress and the presence of emotional symptoms in a Colombian sample. Additionally, the predictive roles of age and gender in class membership were explored.MethodsParticipants were recruited through a convenience sampling strategy aimed at ensuring heterogeneity of the sample in terms of age and gender. A total of 453 participants aged 12 to 57 years (mean 21.03, SD 8.41 years; 257/453, 56.7% female) completed validated measures of self-regulation (Abbreviated Self-Regulation Questionnaire), nomophobia (Nomophobia Questionnaire), internet and social media use (MULTICAGE-TIC, a multidomain screening questionnaire based on the CAGE framework), and psychological distress (General Health Questionnaire-12). Latent profile analysis was conducted using standardized scores of continuous variables. Model fit was assessed using the Bayesian information criterion, entropy, and bootstrapped likelihood ratio test. Differences in psychological distress scores across latent classes were examined through variance analysis (ANOVA) and regression models. A multinomial logistic regression tested the predictive value of age and gender for class membership.ResultsThe optimal solution revealed 4 distinct latent profiles (entropy=0.85). Class 1 showed high self-regulation and low problematic technology use, displaying the lowest psychological distress scores. Class 2 presented moderate levels across all indicators but the highest level of psychological distress. Classes 3 and 4 showed mixed patterns. Class 3 (higher information and communication technology [ICT] use and lower self-regulation) exhibited lower distress than class 2, whereas class 4 (younger individuals with low self-regulation and moderately high ICT use) showed higher distress than class 3. Psychological distress differed significantly across profiles (ANOVA, P<.001). Age and gender predicted class membership. Older males were more likely to belong to class 1, and younger females were more likely to be classified into classes 3 and 4.ConclusionsLatent profile analysis identified distinct configurations of digital behavior, self-regulation, and psychological distress. Self-regulation consistently differentiated profiles with lower distress scores, suggesting its relevance for understanding how individuals manage ICT use. These findings support the value of person-centered approaches to characterize heterogeneous patterns of technology-related behaviors. The study provides evidence from a Spanish-speaking sample, offering a novel perspective on psychological distress and problematic technology use in contexts that remain underrepresented in the literature.

Despite the documented rise of children’s use of mobile media devices in the United States, particularly in lower-income homes, there is limited research on how children and parents interact together with these types of devices. This study sought to describe and investigate how parents and their 3-year-old children use one type of mobile digital media – e-books. With a sample of 65 families from middle- and lower-income homes, the present study examined different parent profiles in a parent–child interaction with e-books and how parents’ attitudes around learning influenced their interactions. Results show that parents and children on average demonstrated high levels of engagement and collaboration when using an e-book, although there was wide variability in the way parents and children interacted with e-books. Using latent profile analysis, three distinct profiles of parent interactions when using e-books with their children were identified: parents with high levels of speech quality and dialogic talk but low levels of engagement, parents with low levels of speech quality, and parents with high speech quality but low dialogic talk. In addition, parent report measures of self-efficacy, growth mindset, knowledge of child development, and screen time used at home varied by the parent profiles identified in this study. The findings suggest that future research should examine parent profiles to help advance the research base in service of informing efforts to promote adult–child interactions as they relate to mobile device use.

Media use literature has predominantly adopted a variable-centered approach. However, a limitation of this approach is that it overlooks the nuanced differences between individual participants or groups in media use types. To address this limitation, this study adopts a person-centered approach to identify media use types among third-grade elementary school children based on the time spent on media and purposes. Additionally, the study examined the associations between the media use types and parent and child factors. Data were collected from 1,327 third-grade children (49.7% girls) in South Korean elementary schools and their parents, who participated in the Panel Study on Korean Children conducted by the Korea Institute of Child Care and Education. A latent profile analysis was performed. This study identified three media use profiles in children: Learning-oriented/shortest-use time (primarily using media for learning purpose and for the shortest duration; 54.2%), Multipurpose-oriented/long-use time (using media for multiple purposes and for a long duration; 22.5%), and Games & entertainment-oriented/longest-use time (primarily using media for games and entertainment purposes and for the longest duration; 23.3%). Children's gender and permissive parenting styles influenced the membership of specific media use profiles. Boys were more likely than girls to belong to the Games & entertainment-oriented/longest-use time profile, whereas girls were more likely than boys to belong to the Multipurpose-oriented/long-use time profile. In addition, higher levels of mothers' permissive parenting styles were associated with an increased likelihood of belonging to the Games & entertainment-oriented/longest-use time profile rather than the Learning-oriented/shortest-use time profile. Overall, the members of the Games & entertainment-oriented/longest-use time profile exhibited the highest levels of problematic media use, executive function difficulties (planning-organizing, behavioral control, and attention-concentration difficulties), and externalizing and internalizing problems. Based on the research findings, this study recommends intervention strategies for parents (especially mothers) and schools to effectively monitor children's media use and facilitate their healthy media use by considering differential media use types according to children's gender.

Despite social media use being one of the most popular activities among adolescents, prevalence estimates among teenage samples of social media (problematic) use are lacking in the field. The present study surveyed a nationally representative Hungarian sample comprising 5,961 adolescents as part of the European School Survey Project on Alcohol and Other Drugs (ESPAD). Using the Bergen Social Media Addiction Scale (BSMAS) and based on latent profile analysis, 4.5% of the adolescents belonged to the at-risk group, and reported low self-esteem, high level of depression symptoms, and elevated social media use. Results also demonstrated that BSMAS has appropriate psychometric properties. It is concluded that adolescents at-risk of problematic social media use should be targeted by school-based prevention and intervention programs.

Needs affordance as a key factor in likelihood of problematic social media use: Validation, latent Profile analysis and comparison of TikTok and Facebook problematic use measures