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Early-Childhood Tablet Use and Outbursts of Anger
Caroline Fitzpatrick1,2, Pedro Mario Pan3, Annie Lemieux1
1Department of Preschool and Elementary School Education, Université de Sherbrooke, Sherbrooke, Québec, Canada.
Insights
Increased tablet use in preschoolers is linked to more anger and frustration, which in turn leads to more tablet use, creating a detrimental cycle for emotional regulation development.
Area of Science:
- Child Psychology
- Developmental Science
- Media Psychology
Background:
- Preschooler tablet use is rising, with potential links to emotional dysregulation.
- Research on the direction of association between tablet use and self-regulation is limited.
- Few studies have modeled within-person associations over time.
Purpose of the Study:
- To estimate how child tablet use contributes to anger and frustration expressions from ages 3.5 to 5.5 years.
- To examine bidirectional associations between tablet use and emotional regulation.
Main Methods:
- Prospective, community-based study of 315 parents and their preschool-aged children in Nova Scotia, Canada.
- Repeated assessments at ages 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years.
- Used a random-intercept cross-lagged panel model to analyze parent-reported tablet use and child anger/frustration via the Children's Behavior Questionnaire.
Main Results:
- A 1-SD increase in tablet use at 3.5 years was associated with a 22% SD increase in anger/frustration at 4.5 years.
- A 1-SD increase in anger/frustration at 4.5 years was associated with a 22% SD increase in tablet use at 5.5 years.
- Findings suggest a bidirectional relationship between tablet use and anger/frustration.
Conclusions:
- Early childhood tablet use is associated with increased anger and frustration.
- Child anger/frustration is subsequently associated with increased tablet use, forming a cycle.
- This cycle may negatively impact the development of emotional regulation in young children.
Importance:
Tablet use continues to increase in preschool-aged children. The use of mobile devices has been linked to child emotional dysregulation. However, few studies have been able to show a clear direction of association between child tablet use and the development of self-regulation skills. In addition, few studies have modeled within-person associations over time.
Objective:
To estimate how child tablet use contributes to expressions of anger and frustration across the ages of 3.5 to 5.5 years at the within-person level. The study team also examined the extent to which associations are bidirectional to clarify the direction of the correlations.
Design, Setting, And Participants:
This prospective, community-based convenience sample of 315 parents of preschool-aged children from Nova Scotia, Canada, was studied repeatedly at the ages of 3.5 (2020), 4.5 (2021), and 5.5 years (2022) during the COVID-19 pandemic. All analyses were conducted between October 5, 2023, and December 15, 2023.
Exposure:
Parent-reported tablet use at the ages of 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years.
Main Outcome And Measures:
Parents reported child expressions of anger/frustration at the ages of 3.5, 4.5, and 5.5 years using the Children's Behavior Questionnaire.
Results:
The sample was equally distributed across child sex (171 were identified by parents as being born boys [54%] and 144 as girls [46%]). Most reported being Canadian (287 [91.0%]) and married (258 [82.0%]). A random-intercept cross-lagged panel model revealed that a 1-SD increase in tablet use at 3.5 years (corresponding to 1.22 hours per day) was associated with a 22% SD scale increase in anger/frustration at age 4.5 years (standardized coefficient = 0.22; 95% CI, 0.01-0.44). A 1 SD scale increase in anger and frustration at 4.5 years was associated with a 22% SD (corresponding to 0.28 hours per day) increase in tablet use at 5.5 years (standardized coefficient = 0.22; 95% CI, 0.01-0.43).
Conclusion And Relevance:
In this study, child tablet use at age 3.5 years was associated with more expressions of anger and frustration by the age of 4.5 years. Child proneness to anger/frustration at age 4.5 years was then associated with more use of tablets by age 5.5 years. These results suggest that early-childhood tablet use may contribute to a cycle that is deleterious for emotional regulation.
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