Social media can harm your choices

Reseachers have found excessive social media use can impair decision-making, in a similar way to drug and gambling addiction.

Excessive screen time may impair decision-making. Picture: iStock

Excessive use of social media may impair your decision-making capabilities in much the same way as drug, alcohol and gambling addictions.

Monash University contributed to recent research, published in the Journal of Behaviour Addictions, which tested the ability of young adults to make decisions in a card game scenario and also measured their dependence on Facebook.

“Our study found that by the end of the gambling task, the participants that performed the worst displayed the most excessive social media use,” says Monash professor Antonio Verdejo-Garcia.

“The results found are similar to those of individuals dependent on various substances such as opioids, marijuana, alcohol and nicotine, as well as individuals exhibiting problem gambling.

“There are many benefits with being connected online, but this research cautions that it might be wise to have limits. Excessive use could lead to disadvantageous decisions.”

It comes after research from the Australian National University last year suggested more than 1.4 million people were experiencing gambling-related harm, often for 15 years or more.

We know not getting enough exercise is bad and that being sedentary is worse, but new research shows not all laziness is equal.

“Some types of sitting are more strongly associated with body fat in children than others, and time spent watching TV seems to be the worst culprit,” says University of South Australia researcher Margarita Tsiros.

“Boys not only watched more TV than girls — an extra 37 minutes per day — but also spent significantly more time playing video games.

“Video gaming and computer use are popular pastimes, but our data suggests these activities may be linked with higher body fat in boys.”

A separate study by the University of Western Australia looked at home-based outdoor play in nearly 1600 Perth preschoolers on days when they were not in childcare, and found much depends on giving them something to play on.

“The main factor associated with increased playtime in the yard was the number of fixed play structures, with each additional piece of equipment adding an average of five minutes to a child’s daily playtime,” says lead researcher Hayley Christian.

Parents should not think their extra chubby toddler has time to learn about healthy weight.

Research from the University of Sydney, published in The Journal of Paediatrics, has found that excessive weight gain in children under two years can lead to cardiovascular and metabolic risk factors in teenage years.

“Our study found that there are two main pathways to obesity as a teenager — rapid weight gain in the first two years of life, or rapid weight gain between ages two and five years,” says Dave Celermajer.

“The data shows there are consequences of the timing of the onset of excess BMI (body mass index) in early childhood. Earlier onset of a rising BMI that persisted through childhood results in greater central fat and higher cholesterol in teenagers, independent of their BMI at 14 years.”

A recent National Obesity Summit in Canberra highlighted the growing problem — literally, growing outward — and ongoing efforts to develop a national strategy on obesity. Two-thirds of adults and a quarter of children aged from five to 17 years are now overweight or obese.

If anyone needs further evidence that there is no link between vaccines and autism, a Danish study has found that even in kids thought to be at risk of autism, the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine was not a trigger.

“Yet again, and with more detail than the existing dozen or more studies, they have shown that MMR vaccine is not linked with autism,” says Kristine Macartney, director of the Australian National Centre for Immunisation Research and Surveillance.

“As they explored special risk groups, they were also able to show after MMR vaccination there was no higher rate of autism in children who had risk factors for developing the condition (such as siblings with autism) or higher rates during specified time periods after vaccination.”

Macartney encourages parents to seek advice from qualified health professionals and not believe the conspiracy theories promulgated by social media.

“Looking forward, continuing to evaluate the MMR-autism myth when it has already been thoroughly debunked will come at the expense of not pursuing other important research to better understand and prevent autism.”