Researchers warn against sending kids to bed with their phones

Children as young as seven are using mobile phones in their bedrooms during the middle of the night, a new survey by South Australian researchers has found — and that isn’t the worst of it.

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Children as young as seven are using mobile phones in their bedrooms during the middle of the night, a new survey by South Australian researchers has found.

But it is the shock statistic, that as many as a quarter of youngsters aged just seven and eight are on a mobile phone between 10pm and 6am — that has experts worried.

UniSA Online’s Stephanie Centofanti says the five-year study, a partnership between her department, the university’s Behaviour-Brain-Body Research Centre and Resilient Youth Australia, involved surveying 180,700 Australian students, aged seven to 19.

“This is a huge data set and it provides us with a good snapshot of how Australian children are doing in terms of their wellbeing and technology use,” Dr Centofanti says.

“Our research is based on surveys with primary and high school students in which we found that 83 per cent of those aged 17 to 18 had reported using phones between 10pm and 6am, more than once in the previous week.

“What may be considered more surprising is that 25 per cent of those aged seven to eight also reported the same use (when they should be sleeping).

Dr Centofanti says the worrying statistic also highlights the negative mental health effects on pre-teen children of using mobile phones at night.

“Using smartphones at night is now common among children at that age and it will be a concern for parents and carers because not only does phone use impact negatively on sleep, but we are finding that it also increases angry or hurtful communication,” she says.

“(Technology at night) is having a big impact on the amount of sleep children are getting and the quality of sleep; children will wake up in the middle of the night, check their phone and send text messages.

“The problem is that kids aren’t able to catch up on lost sleep by having a lie-in after staying up on their phones, they still need to wake up early for school, and shorter sleep times relate to poorer functioning the next day.

“Lack of sleep can lead to poorer academic outcomes and can negatively impact mood and communication skills which can be really detrimental for kids’ ability to maintain positive relationships.”

The increased risk from cyber-bullying is also an issue.

“The other issue this raises is the flow over of bullying. Bullying that might have been confined to school days is now flowing over at night as children access (for example) social media accounts — not surprisingly this can lead to difficulties falling asleep,” Dr Centofanti says.