Reem A. Alyoubi, Sumayyah A. Kobeisy, Hatem N. Souror, Farah A. Alkhaldi, Muteb A. Aldajam, Khalid S. Allebdi, Ohoud A. Alghamdi, Khames T. Alzahrani, Mazen A. Basheikh

Abstract

Introduction: Digital media and screens in their various forms are ubiquitous to modern society not only in the lives of adults but of children as well.  Excessive screen time has been associated with obesity, sleep disturbance and has negatively impacted cognitive development and in some, may cause behavioral problems. Screen time has been linked to reports of headaches not only in adults but in children as well. Methodology: A cross-sectional study was conducted as an online survey distributed amongst 13-30 years old population across Saudi Arabia from July to August 2020. Ethical approval was obtained from the Research Ethics Committee of the Faculty of Medicine at King Abdulaziz University in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia. The survey data used to support the findings of this study are available upon request from the corresponding author. Statistical analysis was done using IBM SPSS Statistics Version 20. Results: A total of 421 volunteers participated in the study. More than half (55.3%) of the respondents were between 19-24 years of age, almost two-thirds (62.9%) were male and the majority (96.7%) were Saudi. 51.1% have suffered a headache after an average of 2.55 ±1.785 hours of active screen time. The age of starting active screen time was significant for headache after screen time (p= 0.036), however, there was no significance for the occurrence of headache after a certain duration of active screen time in hours or days per week (p= 0.367 and p= 0.479, respectively).   Conclusion: Modern society has imposed digital media in day to day life. However, excessive use and unregulated utilization especially among children may have a negative impact on their physical, social, and cognitive development.