Sleep disruptions, depressive symptoms linked to screen time among girls | Image Credit: © Songsak C - © Songsak C - stock.adobe.com.

For adolescents, specifically adolescents females, excessive screen time can negatively impact various aspects of sleep, thus increasing risk of depressive symptoms, according to a new Swedish study published in PLOS Global Public Health.¹

Background

According to the study authors, led by Sebastian Hökby, National Centre for Suicide Research and Prevention in Stockholm, Sweden, the Swedish Public Health Agency recently recommended a maximum of 2-to-3 hours of daily leisure screen time for adolescents aged 13 to 18 years.

The agency described screen time, unrelated to school, to include social media, gaming, and streamed multimedia content. Screen time does not include streamed music, podcasts and other audio sources.

Study details and results

The Swedish Public Health Agency recommended a cut-off for adolescents aged 13 to 18 years as a less than 3 hour limit, and a less than 2 hour limit for children aged 6 to 12 years. Authors noted the main focus of the study was among the older adolescent group.

In the study, researchers followed 4810 Swedish students aged 12 to 16 years and collected data on sleep quantity and quality, depressive symptoms, and screen usage at 3 timepoints over a 1 year period.²

The study sample of participants were pulled from a larger group of students (n = 10,299) from 116 Stockholm schools. There were 2446 participants that self-reported as "boy" and 2364 participants that reported as "girl." Participants had a mean age of 14 years (SD = 0.72 years).

The study excluded individuals who reported suicidal plans or attempts within the previous 2 weeks.

Depressive symptom degree was the main outcome variable in the study, measured using the Swedish translation of Beck’s Depression Inventory-Second edition (BDI-II). The 21-items on the scale, when used clinically, "are summed up to get a total score that ranges 0–63, where the cut-off for ‘Mild Depression’ is at >13 points; a cut-off we have previously found meaningful to use in the context of sleep and depression in this participant pool," stated the authors.¹

"Unfortunately, depression scores must be interpreted differently herein, due to the latent variable modeling. In this study, one could refer to someone’s BDI-II score as their 'standardized latent G-factor score,'" they wrote.

Within 3 months, data revealed that increased screen time led to impacted sleep. Each gender reported 3 to 4 hours of daily leisure screen time.^1,2

The average G-factor depression scores were 2.2 times higher for girls than for boys, according to results (10.1 vs. 4.6 points; CA-factor scores 2.5 times higher; SV-factor scores were 2.0 times higher), with girls also reporting more sleep quality index symptoms than boys (Md symptom score = 2.04 vs. 1.63). Girls also slept for shorter durations.¹

Additionally, the research found that screen time was found to postpone sleep times to later hours, further disrupting multiple aspects of the sleep-wake cycle at the same time.²

For boys, screen time had an adverse effect on depression after 12 months, while for girls, the depressive effect was mediated via sleep disturbances. Sleep accounted for 38%-to-57% of the association between screen time and depression in girls.

Conclusion

"In this study, we found that adolescents who reported longer screen times also developed poorer sleep habits over time. In turn, this led to increased depression levels, especially among girls," stated the authors in a press release from PLOS.²

"Our results do suggest that less[…] screen time seems healthier, in line with previous World Health Organization statements…if screen times were somehow reduced, for example through public health policies, our results imply that the high burden of depressive states among young Swedish women, and maybe young men, would likely decrease," they concluded.

References:

1. Hökby S, Alvarsson J, Westerlund J, Carli V, Hadlaczky G. Adolescents’ screen time displaces multiple sleep pathways and elevates depressive symptoms over twelve months. PLOS Glob Public Health. 5(4): e0004262. doi:10.1371/journal.pgph.0004262

2. PLOS. Study links teen girls’ screen time to sleep disruptions and depression. Eurekalert. April 2, 2025. Accessed April 3, 2025. https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/1078851?