ORIGINAL RESEARCH article
Front. Psychiatry
Sec. Public Mental Health
Volume 16 - 2025 | doi: 10.3389/fpsyt.2025.1618965
The association between using screen in the dark and depressive symptoms: A longitudinal study among Chinese adolescents
Provisionally accepted
Shuangxiao Qu
Fengyun Zhang
Xuelai WangShenglei HuangKeyang Zheng
Liting ChuYuting HuangYanting YangDongling Yang*Chunyan Luo*- Shanghai Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention (SCDC), Shanghai, China
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Objective: To investigate the association between using screen in the dark—a predominant source of LAN—and depressive symptoms in Chinese adolescents. Methods: This study utilized a sample of 3659 adolescents (51.87% boy, mean age 14.41 ± 1.55 years) from the 2020-2022 Surveillance of Students' Common Diseases and Health Influencing Factors in Shanghai, China. Baseline screen usage was collected by self-reported questionnaire. Depressive symptoms at baseline, 1- and 2-year follow-up were assessed using the Center for Epidemiology Scale. Generalized estimating equations were used to evaluate the association of using screen in the dark with depressive symptoms. Results: The prevalence of depressive symptoms and severe depressive symptoms in this study was 23.59% and 5.25% respectively at baseline. 15.76% adolescents who had depressive symptoms in 2020 aggravated to severe depressive symptoms in 2021 or 2022. 12.38% of the participants reported using screen in the dark. Using screen in the dark was associated with higher likelihood of depressive symptoms (OR = 1.89, 95%CI: 1.67, 2.15) and severe depressive symptoms (OR = 1.89, 95%CI: 1.54, 2.31). The adverse effect of using screen in the dark and screen time > 2 hours/day on depressive symptoms was slightly higher than only screen time > 2 hours/day (OR = 1.24, 95%CI: 1.12, 1.37) or only using screen in the dark (OR = 2.15, 95%CI: 1.73, 2.67). Additionally, those who using screen in the dark combination with screen time > 2 hours/day or insufficient sleep have the highest likelihood of depressive symptoms. Conclusions: Screen use in dark environments independently related to depressive symptoms in adolescents, with compounded associations from excessive screen time and sleep deprivation. These findings underscore the need for public health interventions targeting nighttime digital behaviors.
Keywords: S.Q. Conceptualization, Formal analysis, Funding acquisition, writing-original draft. F.Z.methodology, project administration. X.W. methodology, resources. S.H. data curation, resources. K. Z. data curation, software. L.C. data curation
Received: 27 Apr 2025; Accepted: 29 Jul 2025.
Copyright: © 2025 Qu, Zhang, Wang, Huang, Zheng, Chu, Huang, Yang, Yang and Luo. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.
* Correspondence:
Dongling Yang, Shanghai Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention (SCDC), Shanghai, China
Chunyan Luo, Shanghai Municipal Center for Disease Control and Prevention (SCDC), Shanghai, China
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