Study finds that playing videogames may be more cognitively beneficial for children than other forms of screentime (social media, watching videos/ TV)

By The Conversation | June 1, 2022

Many par­ents feel guilty when their chil­dren play video games for hours on end. Some even wor­ry it could make their chil­dren less clever. And, indeed, that’s a top­ic sci­en­tists have clashed over for years. In our new study, we inves­ti­gat­ed how video games affect the minds of chil­dren, inter­view­ing and test­ing more than 5,000 children…

Read More

Canadian study finds causal link between time playing videogames at age 12 and ADHD symptoms at age 13

By Dr. David Rabiner | March 7, 2022

Recent stud­ies have linked screen time — includ­ing video game play — to con­cern­ing out­comes in chil­dren, includ­ing low self-esteem, low life sat­is­fac­tion, and depres­sive symp­toms. Screen time has also been found to be cor­re­lat­ed with symp­toms of ADHD in chil­dren and ado­les­cents, even when ear­li­er atten­tion dif­fi­cul­ties are tak­en into account. These find­ings suggest…

Read More

On physical activity, neuroplasticity, depression, screen time, neuromodulation and more

By SharpBrains | October 29, 2021

Wel­come to a new edi­tion of Sharp­Brains’ e‑newsletter, fea­tur­ing this time eight sci­en­tif­ic reports and indus­try resources plus a few fun brain teasers. #1. Study finds ulti­mate hack to pro­tect teen brains from harm­ful screen time: Exer­cise (and good role-mod­­el­ing): “Girls who spent less than an hour on screens and boys who spent less than…

Read More

Study finds ultimate hack to protect teen brains from harmful screen time: Exercise (and good role-modeling)

By Greater Good Science Center | October 27, 2021

Recent­ly, the Wall Street Jour­nal ran an arti­cle about how Insta­gram was affect­ing teen men­tal health. In par­tic­u­lar, some inter­nal stud­ies at Face­book (which owns Insta­gram) appeared to con­firm that when teen girls used the site, they suf­fered poor­er body image and were at increased risk for depres­sion and eat­ing dis­or­ders. But is social media…

Read More

Large NIH study to collect and share data on the impact on kids’ brains of screen time and other social, behavioral, physical and environmental factors

By SharpBrains | December 17, 2018

NIH Study Probes Impact of Heavy Screen Time on Young Brains (Bloomberg): “Brain scans of ado­les­cents who are heavy users of smart­phones, tablets and video games look dif­fer­ent from those of less active screen users, pre­lim­i­nary results from an ongo­ing study fund­ed by the Nation­al Insti­tutes of Health show 

Read More

Update: Only 5% of US children ages 8–11 follow guidelines recommended for brain development

By SharpBrains | October 31, 2018

___ Dear read­er, Time for Sharp­Brains month­ly e‑newsletter, dis­cussing the lat­est inno­va­tions for brain health and men­tal health, and open­ing in this occa­sion with an impor­tant wake-up call. New research: Only 5% of US chil­dren ages 8–11 fol­low screen time, sleep and exer­cise guide­lines rec­om­mend­ed for brain devel­op­ment Neu­ro­feed­back or med­ica­tion to treat ADHD? New study reinforces…

Read More