A placard on display during a press conference by Gov. Kathy Hochul launching her statewide push for distraction-free schools on Wednesday, Jan. 22, 2025, at the Farnsworth Middle School in Guilderland, New York. (Jim Franco/Albany Times Union via Getty Images)
"I'm not a big fan of government controlling people's lives, but in this context, I'm all for it," psychotherapist Thomas Kersting told Fox News Digital. Kersting is a former school counselor who has lectured for 16 years about the adolescent impact of increased screen time. He wrote a bestselling book called "Disconnected," which posited that increased screen time for kids is re-wiring their brains.
"I started seeing an incredible influx of kids diagnosed with attention deficit disorder (ADHD) from when I was working as a high school counselor. It did not add up," Kersting said. "The chronic eight or nine hours a day of stimulation affects the executive functioning, executive functions of the brain, which is what you need to be able to concentrate, focus, retain, and all that stuff."
Two female students writing text messages on their smartphones as they eat lunch in their school cafeteria. (Nicolas Guyonnet/Hans Lucas/AFP via Getty Images)
But while parents may be apprehensive, taking phones out of school can help improve students' test scores, attention spans and socialization, while reducing the need for disciplinary intervention, Kersting said.
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The study by Seattle Children's Hospital found that, excluding web browsers, the top five apps or categories used by school-aged students were messaging, Instagram, video streaming, audio apps and email.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/teens-spend-quarter-time-school-phones-new-study-finds