Productivity in students may be affected by increased screentime

Mar 28

Mar 28 Productivity in students may be affected by increased screentime

Time spent using devices such as computers, smartphones, a television or game console, is defined as screen time.

Research says that adults spend over 11 hours per day engaging on media. (https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/tech-happy-life/201812/how-much-screen-time-is-too-much)

Too much screen time takes away from our well-being and our ability to be productive, and excessive screen time causes damages to the brain. The affects can include cravings and impaired dopamine function, impaired cognitive functioning, reduced cortical thickness, compromised white matter integrity and gray matter atrophy.
(https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/blog/mental-wealth/201402/gray-matters-too-much-screen-time-damages-the-brain?page=1)

There are four different types of screen time. These are interactive, non-interactive, educational and recreational.

Interactive is communicating through FaceTime, video games or even using online tools such as Photoshop to draw pictures.

Non-interactive is sitting in front of Netflix to watch your favorite TV shows and movies.

Educational screen time is doing math problems on websites such as, Khan Academy and Math.com.

Time spent playing games or watching video on YouTube for fun is recreational time.

While conducting a survey amongst students on campus, most students spend time in the recreational and non-interactive modes. Students admitted that they spend around five hours a day on media. This means they average 35 hours a week on their phones.

Q’Ladrin Qourters (sophomore), expressed that even when she puts a time limit on her social media apps or other apps in general, she still ends up overriding her limit. She acknowledged that “a lot of it is out of boredom, so when I don’t have anything to do I go to my social media”.

Although social media and binge watching shows can be addicting, research shows that doing the following will cause you to be more productive:

1. monitor how much screen time you spend a day

2. socialize more in person

3. eat without your electronic devices

4. involve yourself in new hobbies, and

5. put your phone on do not disturb more often

(https://born2invest.com/articles/cut-screen-time-productive/).