JMIR Publications

ABSTRACT

Background:

Increasing digital technology and media use among young people has raised concerns about problematic use and negative consequences. The formal recognition of a technology addiction (gaming disorder) requires an understanding of the landscape of interventions designed to prevent this disorder and related technology addictions.

Objective:

We conducted a rapid systematic review to investigate the current evidence on prevention approaches to promote digital wellbeing, defined as the healthy use of digital media and technology and the absence of problems resulting from excessive use.

Methods:

We used a pragmatic approach to systematically review and synthesize recent literature rapidly with a focus on contextual factors that can aid in understanding translatability, making tradeoffs appropriate to rapid reviews per recommendations. We searched multiple databases, including grey literature, for primary studies and systematic reviews of prevention interventions targeting children, adolescents, and youth. We extracted data on study characteristics, quality, and translatability and synthesized evidence through narrative description and through vote counting of controlled trials. The protocol was pre-registered on PROSPERO and data are openly available on our OSF website.

Results:

We found 6,416 citations, of which 41 were eligible for inclusion. Most interventions combined approaches and included an education component. Synthesis showed benefits for time on the internet, smartphones, and screens as well as for problematic internet use, problematic social media use, and problematic smartphone use. Mixed effectiveness was found for gaming outcomes, while outcomes for time on social media, when aggregated, were null. Both included meta-analyses reported small positive effects on reductions of screen time. Studies delivered to parents and teachers and small sample size studies were less often effective. However, study reporting was overall lacking, impairing the ability to draw conclusions.

Conclusions:

As digital technology use increases, interventions to prevent problematic use and improve digital wellbeing continue to proliferate. Understanding context factors that influence healthy use as well as limitations of the current evidence is vital for informing future research. The current review demonstrates positive findings for effectiveness of prevention interventions for some behavioral outcomes, but not others, and describes factors that may contribute to translation and implementation. Future research would benefit from following appropriate reporting guidelines, reporting both benefits and harms of interventions, and including greater detail on factors informing translation.