Is Technology Affecting Teens' Education Negatively?

Time Use

• In earlier times, entertainment was not as freely available as it is today. The difference lies in technology. Kids of the past had less to do after coming home from school, and were therefore more likely to do the only thing they really had to do: study. But kids today have distractions literally attached to their bodies, usually in the form of smartphones and hand-held video games. The child of today, who is naturally impulsive, is just as likely to pull out her phone to start texting or browsing the Internet as she is to open her textbooks. Children who cannot control their technology use will find the time they should have been spending on schoolwork suddenly disappearing. And in the worst-case situations, teens could become addicted to their technology of choice, which could totally eat up their time for school.

Sleep Quality

• Social psychologist Kristin Dehmler, author of ̶0;Adolescent Technology Usage During Sleep-Time,̶1; points out how technology use can be detrimental to teenagers through affecting their sleep quality. Dehmler found that teens who use technology before and during bedtime have trouble falling asleep and staying asleep; their sleep quality is significantly worse than that of their technology-resistant peers. Naturally, this lack of sleep can carry over to the academic environment. Students who don̵7;t sleep well before a day of school will have poorer concentration, negatively influencing test performance and memorization skills.

Academic Performance

• Social psychologists interested in the effects of technology on education have looked into the connection between technology use and grade point average. Dehmler, like many other psychologists, found that technology use is usually detrimental to a teen̵7;s GPA. Specifically, having a habit to use technology for entertainment purposes, such as by playing online games or watching videos, can hurt a student̵7;s GPA. This is likely due to entertainment being useless in skill enhancement. A teen learns little from just playing a game or watching a video, and he would be better off academically if he spent that time studying or engaging in extracurricular activities that challenge the mind, such as chess or writing.

Information for Moms

• As a mom, you likely have a slight tendency to overreact at the sign of a problem in your child. The good news is, according to Kimberly Young, Internet scholar and author of ̶0;Internet Addiction,̶1; under 5 percent of teens have a serious addiction to technology. Most other teens handle their access to technology rather well. But you can still play a role in helping your teen use her technology responsibly. As you tend to have a better overall picture of how your teen spends his time, you have the prerogative to be assertive in restricting technology use when it gets out of hand. By supervising your teen̵7;s technology use, you prevent serious problems from ever affecting your child̵7;s education.