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Study Finds Social Media May Be Causing Lower Literacy Levels in Children

By August 24, 2018Language, News

A recent study by University College London (UCL) has suggested that heavy use of social media can cause lower levels of literacy in children. The study was based on 11,000 children tracked from their births in 2000 and has found that time spent on social media could be distracting children from reading and homework, thus having an adverse effect on their literacy.

As The Telegraph reports, Director of UCL’s International Centre for Lifecourse Studies, Professor Yvonne Kelly, said the findings suggest a link between “the amount of time young people spend on social media and their levels of literacy.”

Regardless of their gender, heavy social media uses of both genders were equally affected. “We looked at whether the more time young people spend on social media, the less time they have for the things that might improve their literacy such as reading for enjoyment and doing homework,” she said.



Kelly suggested that the Government should implement ‘healthy’ time limits on how much children can use social media outside of school. The study also suggested that those who used social media regularly, particularly girls, were more likely to suffer with depression.

“More hours spent on social media appear to impact negatively on young people’s wellbeing and could have knock on effects for their longer-term prospects at school and work,” she wrote in an article for the Royal Society for Public Health’s ‘Scroll-Free’ campaign, which urges people to give up social media for the duration of September.

The millennium cohort study, which studied children born in the year 2000 at ages nine months, three, five, seven, 11 and 14, discovered that, by their teenage years, children were more likely to avoid homework or reading books in favour of social media and video games.

About half of the teenagers were using social media on weekdays. 61 percent of girls were using during weekdays compared to 31 percent of boys. The average time spent online was 1 hour 21 minutes a day, though 10 percent spent over three hours a day online.

Among the boys studied, gaming was more popular than social media. 48 percent of all boys spent time gaming, and 12 percent of them reported spending more than five hours a day gaming. Only 1 in 10 of the girls studied spent time gaming.

40 percent of the studied youngsters spent time doing homework on a weekday. 35 percent of boys did homework, whereas 44 percent of girls did. The average time spent on homework was 1 hour 13 minutes. Only 1 in 10 of the children read in their spare time. 14 percent of girls read for pleasure compared to only 7 percent of boys.

According to Dr Cara Booker, research fellow at Essex University’s Institute for Social and Economic Research (IESR), the tendency to use shorthand words online such as ‘Lol,’ ‘U,’ and ‘@,’ could be reducing young people’s literacy.

“Communication skills in face-to-face situations have been on the decline since social media has become more widely used. Speaking and listening skills are often the forgotten literacy dexterities and students will struggle in work, school and personal relationships without them,” she said.

The research also showed that those who frequently use social media are more likely to suffer from depression. Girls were found to be 50 percent more likely to use social media for more than four hours a day and were more prone to suffering from depression. Their depression is thought to be caused by factors such as lack of sleep, increased risks of cyber-bullying, and low self esteem caused by artificial social standings promoted by social media.

“Our research indicates it may indeed be time for recommended healthy and safe limits of social media use and that a focus on girls, especially initiatives to boost their mental health could help mitigate some of the negative effects,” said Professor Kelly.

“Heavy users of social media are less happy and have more problems at school and at home. Interventions to help them limit and manage social media use better are likely to be important.

“Girls are particularly vulnerable to the negative effects of social media and may be an important group to focus on among those looking to mitigate these effects.”

Dr Booker suggested that a guide limiting under 11’s to two hours a day, and three or four hours a day for teenagers could help parents and young people be more aware of the time they spend online. “It gives everybody – parents, adolescents and adults – an idea of how much time you should be spending on screen as well as social media,” she said. “A lot of what children do is modelled on our behaviour. If everyone has in their head a time in their heads of two hours, it means that you can have time when you are technology free, like no phones at the dinner table.”



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