Screens and the Brain

As a homeschooling mom of three (ages 6, 3, and 1) who works from home on a screen, I didn't want to believe or accept the effect that screens are having on our brains. After all, I do need to work, and allowing my children to have occasional screen time saves my sanity, especially on hard days. But I can't run from the fact that our attention is under attack.

Dings, infinite scrolls, and banner notifications are more than a momentary distraction—they are persuasive design techniques based in behavioral psychology to maximize engagement time. This can:

• Reshape and rewire the brain: Heavy digital use is associated with changes in attention networks, reward systems, and prefrontal cortex development.
• Limit our attention spans: Research shows increased digital media use correlates with reduced sustained attention spans.
• Hijack our focus: Every notification, email check, or social media scroll creates "attention residue"—part of your mind remains stuck on the previous task. Multiple interruptions throughout the day = layers of attention residue = significantly reduced cognitive performance.
• Impair our ability to form and recall memories: Digital overuse affects working memory and can lead to "digital amnesia" when we rely on our devices rather than remembering

This happens to adults at work, students in school, and children at home.

Time limits, boundaries, and reminders do help, but each can only do so much when the brain's reward systems are being reconditioned to prioritize quick digital rewards over sustained attention and deep thinking.

So the struggle to focus through a workday when you're staring at a screen all day? The meltdown that happens when you ask your child to turn off the screen? The urge to check socials (again) and scroll for much longer than you planned? These are all natural bodily responses to screens.

I see it playing out right in front of my eyes with my children. Their attention seems to dwindle after each screen use, and they would ask for more screen time each day. I even started to notice my own ability to focus decline after a work session.

Understanding the science behind screens is what has helped me feel most empowered to make the right calls for myself and my family. Since it has helped me, I want to walk you through everything you need to know!

Is Anyone Else Noticing the Lack of Attention? (I'm Talking About My Own Here, Too)

When you look at the data on attention issues, it's no surprise that attention and focus have been affected. A 2019 study found that preschoolers with more than 2 hours of daily screen time were 7.7 times more likely to meet ADHD criteria by age 5 compared to those with less than 30 minutes of screen time. This research also linked higher screen time to a 6-fold increased risk of inattention problems.

Part of this is the stimulating nature of screen-related entertainment, whether it's children's shows, video games or social media. When thinking of "stimulating" content, many people think of bright colors, but the background music/sounds, number of characters, and quick movements also add to the stimulation.

The developing mind can easily become accustomed to the quick pace and constant stimulation of digital media. Unfortunately, this trains the brain to expect rapid-fire rewards and makes it harder to sustain the focused attention needed for deep learning.

Dr. John Hutton, a pediatrician and researcher at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, uses a powerful phrase to explain brain development:

There's a really great quote in brain science: Neurons that fire together wire together. That means the more you practice anything the more it reinforces and organizes the connections in your brain.

Research shows that "a growing body of evidence has found that children's brains can structurally and functionally change due to prolonged media multitasking, such as diminished gray matter in the prefrontal cortex, where attentional control and complex decision making abilities reside."

The Dopamine Problem: Desensitization, Not Just a "Rush"

You've probably heard about dopamine as the "feel-good" chemical, but the real problem with screens isn't just that they give us dopamine hits—it's that they cause dopamine desensitization.

Victoria L. Dunckley, M.D., the author of Reset Your Child's Brain, explains that repeated stimulation from screen time causes neurological pathways to become overused and desensitized. When reward pathways are overused, they become less sensitive, and more and more stimulation is needed to experience pleasure.

According to Dunckley, gaming releases so much dopamine that on a brain scan, it looks similar to cocaine use. Meanwhile, dopamine is also critical for focus and motivation, so even small changes in dopamine sensitivity can wreak havoc on how well a child feels and functions.

This is why your child melts down when screen time ends—their brain has been primed to expect constant dopamine hits, and suddenly removing that stimulus feels genuinely distressing to their nervous system. It's also why normal activities (like playing with toys or reading a book) can feel boring after screen time—the dopamine system has been temporarily desensitized.

How Screens Disrupt Memory Formation

When attention is fragmented, information struggles to move from working memory into long-term storage—meaning children remember less of what matters.

The process of Normal Memory Formation:

Information enters working memory (prefrontal cortex). With attention and rehearsal, hippocampus begins encoding. During sleep, hippocampus consolidates memories. Over time, memories are transferred to neocortex for permanent storage. Hippocampus helps retrieve these memories when needed.

What Screen Disruption Actually Does:

The Vulnerable Developing Brain

Research tracking children from infancy through age 9 found that screen time at age 12 months was linked to altered brain activity and attention deficits years later. The study concluded: "As the duration of screen time increased, the greater the altered brain activity and more cognitive deficits were measured."

Young children are particularly vulnerable to these effects. The same study explained that prefrontal cortex "has a more protracted development" and "is highly vulnerable to environmental influences over an extended period of time." This means that the choices we make about screen time during early childhood can have lasting impacts.

Jan-Marino Ramirez, a neuroscientist at Seattle Children's Hospital, explains the concern:

We know that enrichment is good for the brain. But some of these devices and games are overwhelming—there's so much information, and it goes so fast. When we give mice this kind of stimulation, they have no balance in adjusting their attention, and they become very impulsive. We don't know if that is true in humans. But we need to understand whether there may be a situation where we are doing too much to the brain—if there is a limit to the amount of information our brain can process—and what that might do to alter brain development.

What We Can Do

Look, we can't abandon technology. Bills need paying, work needs doing, kids need learning tools. But we don't have to accept the current deal where every device is engineered to fragment our attention and rewire our brains.

The solution isn't complicated: Turn off notifications. Delete apps that don't serve you. Choose screens that don't flicker or blast blue light. Use devices that can actually go outside instead of keeping you trapped indoors.

I've made these changes in my home. We use a Daylight Computer for the kids' learning time—no blue light, no flicker, no notifications popping up mid-lesson. We also just... use our devices less. More time outdoors. More books. More boredom, even. The jittery, overstimulated feeling that used to follow us around? Mostly gone.

You don't need permission or a perfect plan. You just need to start. Your attention is worth protecting. So is your kids' developing brain.

Sources

1. CDC - ADHD Data and Statistics
2. PubMed Study on ADHD
3. Manwell et al. (2022) - "Digital dementia in the internet generation"
4. Ward et al. (2017) - "Brain Drain: The Mere Presence of One's Own Smartphone Reduces Available Cognitive Capacity"
5. Leroy, S. (2009) - "Why is it so hard to do my work? The challenge of attention residue when switching between work tasks" - Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 109(2), 168-181
6. Loh & Kanai (2016) - Media multitasking and brain structure changes
7. Twenge & Campbell (2018) - Screen time and mental health
8. Uncapher et al. (2016) - Media multitasking associated with poorer memory performance
9. Cain et al. (2016) - Screen time before bed disrupts sleep-dependent memory consolidation
10. Wilmer et al. (2017) - Heavy media multitaskers show reduced ability to filter irrelevant information
11. Markle, T. - Digital Media Treatment & Education Center, "Attention, Media Use, and Children"
12. Hutton, J. et al. (2019) - "MRIs show screen time linked to lower brain development in preschoolers," CNN Health
13. Hutton, J. et al. (2020) - "Screen Usage Linked to Differences in Brain Structure in Young Children," Cincinnati Children's Hospital
14. NIH Study (2023) - "Infants Exposed to Excessive Screen Time Show Differences in Brain Function Beyond Eight Years of Age"
15. Ramirez, J. (2024) - "The Truth About Research on Screen Time," Dana Foundation
16. Cross, J. (2023) - "What Does Too Much Screen Time Do to Children's Brains?" NewYork-Presbyterian
17. The Jacob's Ladder Group (2025) - "The Dopamine Cycle: Impacts of Excessive Screen Time"
18. SUNY Potsdam - "What Does Screen Time Do To My Brain?"
19. Tamana, S. et al. (2019) - "Screen-time is associated with inattention problems in preschoolers: Results from the CHILD birth cohort study"