Managing Screen Time in the Age of AI: Supporting Healthier Habits for Teens From the Inpatient Setting

Psychiatric symptoms such as depressed mood, feelings of worthlessness, and anxiety can be exacerbated in adolescents by online content that mirrors their negative emotions.^1,2 In the authors' experience working on an inpatient unit, adolescents cite social media as a source of distress precipitating hospitalization. Moreover, screen time often becomes a point of family conflict, particularly during safety planning for discharge. Even when families agree on the need to address problematic mobile device use, algorithms driven by artificial intelligence (AI) are designed to hook users and curate content that feeds off negative emotional states and makes it challenging to break the cycle.^3,4 We describe an intervention for interested families in our adolescent inpatient unit to support sustained change post discharge.