SynthesisChild: care, health and development2025
Impact of the Use of Interactive Screens on Language Development in Children up to 6 Years of Age: A Systematic Review.
Synthesis in Child: care, health and development, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Impact of the Use of Interactive Screens on Language Development in Children up to 6 Years of Age: A Systematic Review.Child: care, health and development · 2025Pooled it
- Executive Functioning as a Mediator Between Digital Media Exposure and Communication Outcomes in Children and Adolescents.Journal of Intelligence · 2026Article
- Digital screen time and speech-language delay in children: A cross-sectional study.Bioinformation · 2025Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
5 authors.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveThe study aims to examine the association between interactive screen use and language development in children up to 6 years of age through a systematic review of observational studies.
methodsThis systematic review was conducted according to the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines. The literature search included four databases and used the PECOS strategy. Observational studies-either cross-sectional or longitudinal-that investigated the relationship between the use of mobile devices (such as smartphones and tablets) and language development in children aged 0-6 years were included. Duplicate records were removed using Rayyan software. Screening was carried out in pairs in two stages: title/abstract review and full-text reading.
resultsMost of the evidence suggests a negative association between excessive screen time and language development, particularly in expressive language and vocabulary. However, some studies found no statistically significant association, suggesting that factors such as exposure time, quality of interactions and family context influence the observed outcomes. Methodological heterogeneity limited direct comparisons between findings.
conclusionsAlthough the results are not consistent, there is evidence of negative effects of prolonged and unsupervised use of electronic devices on young children's language development.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.