Stress and Infant Media Exposure During COVID-19: A Study Among Latino Families.
Sarah Zanzoul, Pamela Ohman Strickland, Alan L Mendelsohn and 4 others
PMID 38127845WHAT IT FOUND
Higher parent and economic stress were linked to more infant screen exposure in 247 low-income Latino families.
The study cannot show stress caused screen use.
Key findings
01Parent stress increased over time from November 2020 to February 2022.
02Higher parent stress was associated with higher total infant screen exposure, more frequent screen use, and greater odds of parents using screens to calm infants.
03Economic stress was associated with higher total screen exposure in separate models, but not when parent stress was included in the total screen model.
STILL TO COME
How it was doneWhat they foundWhat it means for SLPs
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What it does not show
The associations are cross-sectional and concurrent, so the study cannot show that stress caused screen exposure or that screen exposure caused stress. Parent-reported measures may be affected by recall and social desirability bias. The ScreenQ subscale reliability and validity have not been published, and the Spanish version was translated for this study. The sample was limited to low-income Latino families at three community health centers in central New Jersey, and the study did not examine differences by country of origin. Other unmeasured factors could explain the associations, and the study did not test mediation among stress, pandemic cases, and screen exposure. The paper analyzed baseline data from an ongoing literacy-promotion trial; it did not test whether an intervention changed stress or screen exposure.
Declared interests
The authors reported no relevant conflicts of interest.
The easy way to misread this
Do not conclude that reducing parent or economic stress will lower infant screen exposure. The study measured associations at one time point and cannot show cause.