Associations Among Problematic Internet Usage in Adolescents, Parental Internet Factors, and Parent-Adolescent Communication.
Libby Matile Milkovich, Kimberly A Randell, Ashley K Sherman and 1 others
PMID 39960784WHAT IT FOUND
Adolescents whose parents also met criteria for problematic internet use were much more likely to meet criteria themselves.
More lenient content rules, stricter time rules, and poorer parent-teen talk about internet use also went with adolescent problematic use.
Key findings
01Parents with problematic internet use were much more likely to have an adolescent with it: 87% versus 42%, and the odds were almost 10 times higher.
02Adolescent problematic internet use was associated with more lenient internet-content rules, stricter internet-time rules, and lower quality of parent communication about internet use.
03Problematic internet use was common: 69.9% of adolescents and 61.4% of parents met criteria.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
Read the rest of this summary
You get three full summaries a month, free, and we do not ask for a card. Search, the TL;DRs and your library stay unlimited either way.
What it does not show
The study is cross-sectional, so it cannot show whether parent problematic internet use leads to adolescent problematic internet use or the other way around. Participants were recruited online, which may leave out parents who rarely use the internet. The study did not report how many invited people declined, so it cannot show whether people who agreed to participate were different from people who did not. The measured prevalence of problematic internet use was higher than in some previous studies, likely because the screening tool is sensitive. Child factors such as impulse control were not measured.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that parent internet use causes adolescent problematic internet use. The study was cross-sectional, so it cannot show which came first or whether changing parent use would change adolescent use.