Australian Research
What science, research, and Australian's themselves are telling us about the digital lives of our children and teens.
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Health Professionals for Safer Screens (HPFSS)
Growing Up Digital Australia:
Phase 2
Parent experiences
2021
Sample: 2,450 Australian parents and grandparents.
Key FIndings:
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By far, the most common (64%) reason for giving their child a phone was for contact at school and on public transport.
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Over 90% state that they are negatively distracted by digital technologies. 74% say that this is increasing with time also.
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53% believe that their attitudes towards digital media changed during covid-19 lockdowns.
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50% of parents would like more suport from their school about how to manage digital media use and technology at home.
Internet gaming disorder (IGD) & smartphone overuse in Australian primary secondary school children: prevalence and developmental impacts
Prevalence of screen use
2025
Sample: 1,993 Australian children aged 10-14 yrs old.
Key Findings:
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Primary school aged children spend an average of 6.34 hours on screens each day.
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For secondary school aged teens, this increases to an average of 9.03 hours per day.
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Children with sub-clinical or clinical levels of smartphone overuse reported significantly higher total developmental impacts compared to children with normal phone use
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This was true to intrenet gaming overuse also, particularly in social and emotional development and behavioural impacts.
Prevalence of electronic device use before bed among Australian children and adolescents: a cross‐sectional population level study
Nighttime device use
2022
Sample: 70,936 students from South Australia, aged 8-18 years old.
Key Findings:
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90% of children use an electronic device in the hour before bed at least one night per week.
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51% use it every night.
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Girls aged 15-18 had the highest usage, also children from socioeconomically disadvantaged communities.
Nighttime Phone Use and Past Exposure to Cyberbullying and Their Impact on Sleep and Psychological Wellbeing
Nighttime device Use
Cyberbullying
2024
Sample: 53,734 students from all states, aged 7-19 years old.
Key Findings:
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Nighttime phone use predicts both psychological distress and reduced sleep (<8hrs).
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Being cyberbullied also predicts these two outcomes.
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Of children who experience cyberbullying, those who access their phone at night may experience greater impact on their sleep and psychological wellbeing.
Royal Children's Hospital (RCH) National Child Health Poll
Parent concern
2021
Sample: 1,980 Australian parents of children aged 0-18 years.
Key Findings:
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The number one health concern for parents is excessive screen time with more than 90% of parents reporting it was a big problem or somewhat of a problem in the community.
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Cyberbullying and bullying (53%) was the second top health concern parents have for all children.
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Internet safety (52%) was the third top concern that parents have.
Growing Up Digital Australia:
Phase 1
Teacher experiences
2020
Sample: 1,876 Australian teachers and principals.
Key Findings:
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84% of teachers see digital technologies being a growing distraction in the learning environment.
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78% of teachers say students’ ability to focus on educational tasks has decreased.
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60% see positive impacts for students with disabilities.
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59% observed a decline in students’ overall readiness to learn in the last 3–5 years.
Type of screen time moderates effects on outcomes in 4013 children: evidence from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children
Type of activity & impact
2019
Sample: 4,013 Australian students aged 10-11 and tracked over four years.
Key Findings:
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Total screen showed a small linear association with: worse physical health, health-related quality of life, and socio-emotional outcomes.
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Small benefit to NAPLAN scores from time spent on screen for education (e.g homework on laptop), however this could be explained simply by the increased time spent on academic tasks (there was no comparison to non-tech based learning).
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Results do not support the proposed idea of 'moderate use can be beneficial'. Data instead supports a less-is-best approach.
Adherence to Screen Time Guidelines Among Families in Australia With Children of Different Ages
Meeting screentime guidelines
2022
Sample: 1,993 mothers of children aged under 13 years (mean age 6.9 years).
Key Findings:
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34.2% of families report that all of their children exceed the Australian age-based screen time guidelines (i.e. no screen time for 0-2yrs, one hour per day for 2-4yrs, two hours per day for 5-12yrs).
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A further 22.8% of families had some of their children exceed the guidelines while some meet it.
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Children aged 2-4 years have the highest rate of exceeding the guidelines: 83% watch more than the suggested one hour per day.
Associations between meeting sleep, physical activity or screen time behaviour guidelines and academic performance in Australian school children
Meeting screentime guidelines
2020
Sample: 934 students in Grades 5-12 from a WA school.
Key Findings:
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89% report exceeding the screentime guideline of two hours of recreational screen time per day.
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Meeting the Australian screentime guidelines is associated with higher maths grades, higher English grades, and higher Average Academic Index.
Australian children’s physical activity and screen time while in grandparental care
Grandparents
2024
Sample: 1,190 grandparents who provide three or more hours of care to children aged 3-14 years old.
Key Findings:
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A quarter of the time children spend in their grandparents’ care is occupied with screen-based activities.
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Most commonly TV, movies, and videos.
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Positively, playing in the yard was a common activity.
Cross sectional associations of screen time and outdoor play with social skills in preschool children
Social skills
2018
Sample: 575 mothers of children aged 2-5 years, residing in and around Melbourne.
Key Findings:
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Higher TV/DVD/video time may be associated with poorer social skills.
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More time spent in outdoor play was associated with stronger social skills.
The Association Between Socioeconomic Status and Use of Time in Australian Children and Adolescents
SES differences
2023
Sample: 4,526 children and teens aged 8-19 years old, across all states. Measurements over a 16 year span.
Key Findings:
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Youth from lowest SES families engaged in an average of 30 more minutes per days of sreen time.
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Most of this difference (67%) was due to differences in the amount of time spent watching TV, 30% due to differences in time spent gaming.