USF launches first digital media use lifespan study

A groundbreaking new study led by a University of South Florida St. Petersburg researcher will track youth through 2050 to discern the long-term impacts of digital media use.

The Life in Media Survey will collect insights and experiences regarding digital media from thousands of children aged 11 to 13 as they grow into adults. Researchers will assess the same participants for 25 years and determine attitude, behavior and health changes.

Justin Martin, the Eleanor Poynter Jamison Chair in Media Ethics & Press Policy at USF St. Petersburg, leads an extensive research team. He called the study long overdue.

“A study like this really should have been launched 10 to 12 years ago,” Martin said. “The spread of the iPhone in the United States between 2007 and 2013 is the fastest adoption of new technology in human history.

“Adoption came fast, and use came intensely. And we know that digital media affects people, particularly children, in adverse ways.”

Snapshot studies on digital media’s effects have shown a correlation between prolonged use and anxiety and depression. Martin expected to “wake up one day and read about researchers undertaking this very study, but that wasn’t the case.”

While researchers will conduct the study over 25 years, data collected biannually will provide ongoing insights to parents, teachers, healthcare providers and other stakeholders. Survey topics include social media use and addiction, cyberbullying news consumption, streaming services, parental controls, media literacy and artificial intelligence.

Researchers will examine responses and patterns to discern potential connections between device ownership and social media use and the prevalence of sleep deprivation, anxiety, depression, and other mental, physical and emotional wellness indicators.

“We hope to learn ways that digital media use helps people over their lifespan,” Martin said. “And we’ll also find information on how digital media use, particularly in the developmental years of childhood, results in negative effects later in life.”

Justin Martin, the Eleanor Poynter Jamison Chair in Media Ethics & Press Policy.

As a journalism and communications researcher, Martin said he is particularly interested in discovering how a middle-aged person became “a consumer of ethically grounded news and information.” Participants will complete the study when they are 36 to 38 years old.

Martin also eagerly anticipates learning the effects of early adoption. Nearly half of U.S. children do not own a smartphone at 11. However, he noted that over 90% own a device at 13.

“We’ll be able to compare health outcomes over the long-term of kids who had smartphones at a younger age and those who didn’t,” Martin said. “Public health researchers and psychologists now recommend children use smartphones later in life.”

He and his team will test “just how sensible that recommendation is” over 25 years. They expect prolonged digital media consumption, like “anything taken to an extreme,” to promote negative outcomes.

Martin also believes in the positive effects of new technology. He co-authored a previous study that found binge-watching streaming services was associated with people spending more time with friends and family.

Roughly 1,500 Florida youth will take the survey in November to provide researchers with baseline data. The Harris Poll, a global research firm, will obtain parental permission before children complete the online questionnaire.

USF will publish its first report in the spring. The pilot survey will help inform a nationwide, long-term study with up to 9,000 children.

Martin, an associate professor in USFSP’s Department of Journalism and Digital Communication, noted the research team also includes university-wide experts in psychology, public health, political science and sociology. Officials from the Poynter Institute for Media Studies and its MediaWise youth initiative are also contributing.

“I’m proud of how diverse our research team is,” Martin said. “It’s certainly exciting to do innovative work that hasn’t been done before, and the university has supported it since day one.”

Martin pitched the study during his first interview at USF. He said leadership “recognized right away that … it’s worth doing.”

Martin hopes to remain involved in the study for as long as possible, whether as the lead researcher or in another capacity. His focus is seeing its completion and ensuring the resulting data is “useful to a lot of different groups of people, but particularly to children.”

The endowment that supports Martin’s position will fund the pilot survey. Over 100 kids completed the questionnaire in the first week.

The research team expects participant attrition over the coming decades, underscoring the importance of reaching 7,000 to 9,000 children. “So that 25 years from now, we’ll still have a large enough sample to learn insights from,” Martin said.

“We want to study the same variable over time, and we’ll do that to the best extent we can,” he added. “We also know there are going to be exciting and interesting changes in digital media.”