Testimony

Testimony Before the Florida House Education & Employment Committee on Student Screen Time

Feb 2023 🇺🇸 The Capitolist

In February 2023, addiction psychologist Nicholas Kardaras testified before the Florida House Education & Employment Committee about technology use among students. He told the committee that children exceeding roughly two hours of daily screen time show an association with double the rate of attention difficulties that can affect schoolwork, and cited research associating unsupervised screen use beyond one hour a day among preschoolers with differences in white-matter brain development tied to language and cognitive growth. Kardaras urged lawmakers to adopt strict no-personal-device policies in schools rather than simply requiring phones to be put away, pointing to New York City schools' reported test-score gains after restricting phones, and proposed treating kindergarten through sixth grade as device-free zones. He also told the committee that technology companies design products that compete for and monetize children's attention. His testimony coincided with pending Florida legislation on school social-media access and digital-safety education.

~2x attention-difficulty rate at 2+ hrs/day screen time

Kardaras told the committee that children exceeding roughly two hours of daily screen time show an association with double the rate of attention difficulties, which he linked to academic struggles — his own testimony as reported by The Capitolist, not independently verified by TechKids.

White-matter differences in unsupervised preschool screen use over 1 hr/day

He cited research associating screen use beyond one hour a day without parental supervision among preschoolers (ages 3–5) with differences in white-matter brain development tied to language and cognitive growth, per his testimony as reported by The Capitolist.

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CITATION

Kardaras, Nicholas. Testimony before the Florida House Education & Employment Committee, Florida House of Representatives, February 16, 2023. Reported in: DeLisa, Caden. "House committee considers screen time reduction among students." The Capitolist, February 16, 2023. https://thecapitolist.com/house-committee-considers-screen-time-reduction-among-students/

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