Knowledge and attitudes of parents, teachers, and doctors regarding screen overuse and its addiction in children, adolescents, and young adults: A survey focusing towards possible solutions

Abstract

Background: Media and technology have become an integral part of today's life. Internet addiction, video gaming, binge-watching, social media use, and hence the overall screen time is rising. There are physical, psychological, and social adverse consequences of screen overuse. Objective: The objective is to assess the knowledge and attitudes of the study participants and to present solutions for screen addiction. Subjects and Methods: A structured questionnaire was developed content validity ratio (CVR >0.65). It was sent via email to more than 500 participants and also on more than 70 WhatsApp groups. It was an online cross-sectional study where 800 participants were recruited using convenience and snowball sampling. Microsoft Excel 2019 and SPSS version 26 were used to obtain and analyze data. P value was determined by using the Chi-square test. Results: Knowledge of screen use guidelines and health concerns was highest in doctors followed by teachers and least in parents (P 0.001). 95% of doctors believed any kind of screen overuse should be classified as an addiction. For preventing screen addiction, the role of parents was voted to be most important (49% participants) and for overcoming screen addiction, the role of the person himself was voted to be most important (48% participants). Conclusion: The level of knowledge in our study population regarding screen use guidelines was moderate to low. The attitude of parents for tackling their child's screen use was found to be appropriate. The multi-stakeholder approach should be considered for tackling screen addiction.