(Press-News.org)
While a visit to the great outdoors is a common prescription for reducing screen use, a pioneering new study finds that time outdoors doesn’t always reduce smartphone screentime.
The new research, which tracked smartphone activity of 700 study participants for two years, reveals that participants’ smartphone activity actually increased during visits to city parks and other urban green spaces.
With smartphone use rising worldwide, the study clearly identifies a powerful way to reduce screen time: participants who visited nature reserves or forests saw significant declines in screentime over the first three hours, compared to visiting urban locations for the same amount of time.
The study, published in the journal Environment and Behavior, is the first to show that young adults now spend far more time on their smartphone screens than in nature, the researchers say. Given unparalleled access to participants’ devices, the team found that young adults in the study spent over twice as much time on their smartphones as they spent outdoors.
“Greentime, or time outdoors, has long been recommended as a way to restore our attention from the demands of daily life, yet before our study, little was known about whether nature provides a way for people to disconnect from the mobile devices that now follow us into the great outdoors,” said lead author Kelton Minor, a Postdoctoral Research Scientist at Columbia University’s Data Science Institute. “While past research suggested that short trips to city parks might provide a digital detox, we saw texting and phone calls actually go up. It was really the longer visits to wilder areas, like forests or nature preserves, that helped people get off their screens and wrest back their attention from their smartphones.”
A key advance of the study is the novelty of data’ richness compared to other smartphone studies, where participants typically self-report their smartphone use or environmental behaviors. In this study, participants consented to share their smartphone data—over 2.5 million privacy-preserving logs of activity from texts, calls and screen time—for science.
“Smartphones have an incredibly powerful pull on our attention, which will undoubtedly increase in the future—that’s what many technology companies are working on,” says University of Vermont (UVM) co-author Chris Danforth, a Gund Fellow who will co-lead a new $20M big data project on the science of storytelling. “Given the reported connections between mental health and our digital life, we need more studies like this to help establish ways to encourage a healthier relationship with technology.”
Discussing their findings, the researchers theorize that urban greenspace may instead be useful in enhancing remote social ties—hence the increase in texts and phone calls in urban parks—but may interrupt the individual’s opportunity to utilize the attention-restoring properties of nature.
Increased smartphone use has been linked to rising cases in anxiety, depression, and sleep problems, especially in younger generations. At the same time, research from UVM and others has shown that nature has restorative benefits for our minds and bodies that deliver a sense of joy comparable to a holiday like Thanksgiving or New Year’s. Researchers theorize that the visual and sensory experiences of nature help strengthen individuals’ ability to better focus on life beyond their smartphones.
The study is the first to compare time spent on smartphone screens to time spent in outdoor green spaces,according to the researchers. They found that even the young adults who typically used their smartphones the most reduced their usage in nature areas, providing evidence that more wild greentime may provide a digital break for even the most connected.
The study—Nature Exposure is Associated With Reduced Smartphone Use—is by an international team of scientists from the U.S. and Europe, including Columbia University, University of Vermont, University of Colorado Boulder, University of Copenhagen, and Technical University of Denmark. Researchers included Kelton Minor, Kristoffer Lind Glavind, Aaron J. Schwartz, Christopher M. Danforth, Sune Lehmann, and Andreas Bjerre-Nielsen.
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BALTIMORE, Md. (May 15, 2023) – More than 100 genes linked to the risk of schizophrenia seem to cause illness because of their role in the placenta rather than in the developing brain, according to a new study led by the Lieber Institute for Brain Development.
Scientists had generally assumed for over a century that genes for schizophrenia risk were principally, if not exclusively, about the brain. But the latest research, just published in Nature Communications, found that the placenta plays a much more significant role in developing illness than previously known.
“The secret of the genetics of schizophrenia has been hiding in plain ...
Statement Highlights:
In a review of the latest research, few stroke studies addressed racist policies, such as residential segregation, or social determinants of health, such as neighborhood deprivation, walkability or security; food availability; economic stability; education quality; or employment and health insurance, all of which play a role in stroke incidence, care and outcomes.
The statement summarizes research on interventions to address racial and ethnic disparities in stroke care and outcomes.
Additional research is needed to determine ...
The light pollution caused by coastal cities can trick coral reefs into spawning outside of the optimum times when they would normally reproduce, a new study has found.
Coral broadcast spawning events – in which lunar cycles trigger the release of eggs on certain nights of the year – are critical to the maintenance and recovery of reefs following mass bleaching and other similar events.
However, using a combination of light pollution data and spawning observations, researchers were able to show for the first time that ...
LA JOLLA, CALIF. – May 15, 2023 – Researchers from Sanford Burnham Prebys and the Chinese University of Hong Kong have developed a computational approach to predict whether a person with type 2 diabetes will develop kidney disease, a frequent and dangerous complication of diabetes. Their results, published in Nature Communications, could help doctors prevent or better manage kidney disease in people with type 2 diabetes.
“This study provides a glimpse into the powerful future of predictive diagnostics,” says co-senior author Kevin Yip, Ph.D., a professor and director of Bioinformatics ...
Cribs, strollers and other infant and child equipment can be expensive and most families in a new national poll agree that it’s wasteful to buy these items new when they’re needed for such a short time.
But while half of parents say they have used pre-owned equipment for babies and young children, two in three acknowledge that it’s difficult to always know whether it’s safe for their child, according to the University of Michigan Health C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital National Poll on Children’s Health.
“Used child essentials ...
Managing cardiovascular disease (CVD) risk factors may play a role in preserving physical function during the aging process, according to new research published today by The Journals of Gerontology, Series A: Biological Sciences and Medical Sciences.
“Approximately 10% of older adults have muscle weakness and diminished physical function that leads to adverse health outcomes and physical disability,” said lead author Dr. Shivani Sahni. “Since loss of physical function contributes to reduced mobility, disability, institutionalization, and mortality, management of CVD risk factors can help preserve physical function with age,” ...
PRESS RELEASE
EMBARGOED TO 15 MAY 2023
Contact: Victoria Withy
Head of Marketing, Communications and Membership
E: victoria.withy@ese-hormones.org
M: +44 (0) 7761 800855
Today, 15 May 2023, the European Society of Endocrinology (ESE), the European Hormone and Metabolism Foundation (ESE Foundation) and other partners are marking the second European Hormone Day.
European Hormone Day brings together all those with an interest in endocrine health and disease to promote a better understanding of the role of hormones and encourage a collective call for change about ...
Fukuoka, Japan—Researchers from Kyushu University and Asahi Kasei Corporation have developed a new way to estimate the age of microplastics found in the upper oceans. The method involves a combination of analyzing plastic oxidation levels with environmental factors such as UV exposure and ambient temperature.
The team applied their new method to estimate the age of microplastics found in nearshore and offshore sites in the North Pacific Ocean. They found that the age of microplastics in nearshore regions ranged from 0 to 5 years old, whereas microplastics from offshore regions ranged from 1 to 3 years old. Their ...
A new engineering study has been commissioned by the European Space Agency (under PECS, the Program for European Cooperating States), to prove the reliability of meta-optical elements for space use in a collaboration between the ESA, Bulgarian start-up company LaboraXpert and TMOS, the Australian Research Council Centre of Excellence for Transformative Meta-Optical Systems.
In the first study of its kind, it will determine whether meta-optical components can withstand the pressures of space launch and prolonged exposure to the space environment.
TMOS Centre Director Prof. Dragomir Neshev says, “The demand for Earth observation data is growing, yet the industry still faces the ...
Mice with a defected human gene responsible for a rare genetic disease, called congenital adrenal hyperplasia, have been developed for the first time. The achievement, presented at the 25th European Congress of Endocrinology, may help to develop new therapies for people with the most common type of congenital adrenal hyperplasia.
Congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH) is a group of inherited conditions, which affects about 1 in 15,000 births. In the most common form, called 21-hydroxylase deficiency, mutations in the CYP21A2 gene cause the adrenal glands ...
