Digital Distraction or Stimulated Self-Disclosure: Preadolescents' Mobile Device Use in the Family Context

Abstract

This study explored the social repercussions of preadolescents' mobile device use within the family context by testing two opposing predictions regarding the impact of technology on the quality of interpersonal relationships. Specifically, we examined whether smartphone and tablet use was positively related to preadolescents' self-disclosure to their parents and/or displaced family time, which we hypothesized to be related to children's satisfaction with family life. Results of a cross-sectional survey (n = 698, 49.6% girls, Mage= 10.9, SD = 0.69) provided support for both hypotheses, thus corroborating the presence of at least two diverging pathways that underlie this relationship. Although mobile device use seemed to foster a context that supported children's self-disclosure to their parents, results also indicated a negative and indirect association through children's perceived family time. This negative pathway, however, did not hold when social use among children and parents (e.g., playing games together online) was considered separately.