I agree with these recent recommendations for parents to limit their teens' daily entertainment screen time to two hours a day. Not counting homework, most American teens spend well over two hours every single day tweeting, watching TV, or attached to their smartphones. Almost all of these teens, whether they would admit it or not, are addicted to their smartphones and/or laptops. On average, teens spend almost 7 hours every day on their smartphones or laptops, and this growing addiction leads to teens staying up all night on the Internet and texting their friends. The main element is the overuse of smartphones and laptops in the dark at night, which is something that almost every teen does regularly. The artificial light from the smartphones or laptops being used in the dark after being used all day affects melatonin levels in the brain, making it much harder for teens to fall asleep. Two hours should be more than enough for the average teen to entertain themselves with social media, while balancing the rest of the day between homework and other, more stimulating activities that do not addict the teen and do not disrupt the teen's sleep cycle every night.
Levi Kahn, Norton High School
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