Safe Use of Screen Time Among Adolescents: A Randomized Controlled Study of the Efficacy of Yoga

For students between the ages of 11 and 18, the estimated daily exposure to electronic media is around 1.5 hours, suggesting a growing trend in the amount of time spent in front of a screen. Increasing screen time use is related to sleep, mental health, cognitive, emotional, and behavioral disorders, unhealthy diets, depressive symptoms, poor quality of life, and substance-behavioral addictions.

The current study is a parallel-group, simple randomized controlled trial (RCT). A total of 100 participants were randomized into a yoga group (YG) (n=50) and an attentional control group (CG) (n=50) by using an online randomizer. The YG received yoga practice, whereas the partially active CG received an educational program on digital hygiene. Students were assessed for screen time use, Smartphone Addiction Scale-Short Version (SAS-SV), general well-being, depressive symptoms, and generalized anxiety following 12 weeks of intervention.

The yoga group showed a significant decrease in the scores of SAS-SV, generalized anxiety, depressive symptoms, and screen time use after the intervention (p<0.001, p<0.05, p<0.01, and p<0.001, respectively). Furthermore, there was a statistically significant decrease in screen time use for all modes of total weekdays, weeknights, and weekends. Additionally, in the yoga group, the majority of the sub-factors of screen time use showed statistically significant changes; time spent on television showed a constant decrease in all modes such as weekdays, weeknights, and weekends.

The result of the current study suggests that yoga practice has a positive influence on screen usage behavior and associated health-related complications. More studies are required to understand if yoga practice can help mitigate the pleasure-seeking behavior that drives the excessive usage of screens.