Screen media usage, sleep time and academic performance in adolescents: clustering a self-organizing maps analysis

Screen media usage, sleep time and socio-demographic features are related to adolescents' academic performance, but interrelations are little explored. This paper describes these interrelations and behavioral profiles clustered in low and high academic performance. A nationally representative sample of 3,095 Spanish adolescents, aged 12 to 18, was surveyed on 15 variables linked to the purpose of the study. A Self-Organizing Maps analysis established non-linear interrelationships among these variables and identified behavior patterns in subsequent cluster analyses. Topological interrelationships established from the 15 emerging maps indicated that boys used more passive videogames and computers for playing than girls, who tended to use mobile phones to communicate with others. Adolescents with the highest academic performance were the youngest. They slept more and spent less time using sedentary screen media when compared to those with the lowest performance, and they also showed topological relationships with higher socioeconomic status adolescents. Cluster 1 grouped boys who spent more than 5.5 hours daily using sedentary screen media. Their academic performance was low and they slept an average of 8 hours daily. Cluster 2 gathered girls with an excellent academic performance, who slept nearly 9 hours per day, and devoted less time daily to sedentary screen media. Academic performance was directly related to sleep time and socioeconomic status, but inversely related to overall sedentary screen media usage. Profiles from the two clusters were strongly differentiated by gender, age, sedentary screen media usage, sleep time and academic achievement. Girls with the highest academic results had a medium socioeconomic status in Cluster 2. Findings may contribute to establishing recommendations about the timing and duration of screen media usage in adolescents and appropriate sleep time needed to successfully meet the demands of school academics and to improve interventions targeting to affect behavioral change.