1. Introduction
Uncorrected refractive error is the leading cause of visual impairment worldwide, according to reports by the World Health Organization [
1]. Short-sightedness, also referred to as myopia, is the most common cause of uncorrected refractive error [
2]. The progression of myopia has been a concerning topic from a public health perspective due to the increased risks it poses for numerous visually blinding conditions such as glaucoma and retinal detachment [
3,
4,
5]. Myopia is becoming an epidemic worldwide, particularly in many East Asian countries where educational performance is strongly emphasized and outdoor activities are limited [
6]. Hong Kong is no exception, and a recent study showed that more than a quarter of children aged 6–8 years were myopic [
7,
8]. A recent epidemiological study conducted in Japan has shown that the prevalence of myopia is estimated to be 76.5% and 94.9% for schoolchildren aged 6–11 and 12–14 years, respectively [
9]. Myopia develops when there is a failure of emmetropization [
10,
11,
12,
13,
14]. High demands in near work, close working distance, and lack of outdoor activities are known risk factors for myopia development and progression [
15,
16,
17]. This vulnerability to environmental stress necessitates further attention in exploring the consequences of time spent on smart devices, such as smartphones and tablets, for school-aged children’s learning and overall developmental health. People who are myopic have impaired ability to see objects clear at distance, thereby potentially affecting their academic and job performance as well as career choices. Although clinical interventions that can effectively slow myopia progression, such as low dose atropine [
18] and orthokeratology [
19] are currently available, myopia progression intervention measures should also be implemented through early detection and early childhood education.
Current technological advances have made access to digital devices common among all population groups worldwide. The digitization trend has brought about new habits and demands in lifestyle ergonomics, introducing new public health burdens such as vision-related complications [
20]. Schoolchildren are most vulnerable to visual influences, resulting in the onset of subjective symptoms such as visual fatigue, headaches, and blurry vision [
21]. Nowadays, there is a surge in smartphone ownership, whereby it is very common to see children as young as two years old using smartphones as their new “electronic pacifier” [
22]. The effect of time spent on smart devices among school-aged children has been explored in various studies, most reporting a need for interventional strategies to reduce their usage [
23,
24]. In Hong Kong, there is an increasing trend in which smart device usage affects sleep patterns among adolescents [
25]. A number of studies also indicated that refractive error can be altered by sleep patterns [
26,
27]. A recent systemic review revealed that screen time was not associated with the prevalence and incidence of myopia [
28], nor was it found to be associated with smartphone usage time in a cross-sectional study [
29]. However, whether there is any long-term visual impact after smart device usage is yet to be determined [
30,
31].
Because of the popularity of smartphone use with school children and the introduction of electronically assisted teaching in schools, smart device usage is unavoidable, and appropriate guidelines ought to be developed. Therefore, it is important to explore its consequences for vision so that appropriate education can be provided to end-users to minimize this stress. In this study, we examined the association between smart device usage habits of primary and secondary school-aged children and their 1-year changes in refractive error.
3. Results
Table 1 shows the participants’ characteristics. The sample was gender-balanced and the mean age was 10.87 years (SD 2.00). Approximately half of the participants spent more than 4 h per day on smartphones, and approximately 40% spent at least 1 h per day on tablets. The average SERs at baseline were −1.69 D (right eye) and −1.64 D (left eye). At the 1-year follow-up, they progressed to −1.90 D and −1.84 D, respectively.
Time spent on smartphones at baseline was negatively and significantly associated with the SER of both eyes at baseline and 1-year follow-up (
Table 2, both
ps < 0.001). Time spent on tablets was insignificantly associated with baseline SER but significantly associated with SER at 1-year follow-up (both
ps < 0.05), with participants who spent 2–3 h per day on tablets having had the most negative SER (−2.30 D for the right eye and −2.21 D for the left eye), that is, having the most negative refractive error. Time spent on both smartphones and tablets at baseline was insignificantly associated with changes in the SER of both eyes.
Unadjusted and adjusted analyses of the association between smart device usage and changes in SER showed similar results (
Table 3 and
Table 4).
p-values from Pillai’s trace were insignificant. When the time spent on smartphones was 2–3, 3–4, and 4+ hours per day, the adjusted means of the 1-year change in SER ranged from −0.20 to −0.26 D and were all significantly different from zero. When the time spent on tablets was 0–1, 2–3, and 3–4 h per day, the adjusted means of the 1-year change in SER ranged from −0.18 to −0.23 D, and were all significantly different from zero.
From the above results, 2 h per day of smart device usage appeared to be a cutoff for SER change, and this cutoff was thus used in the following analysis.
Table 5 shows the interactive association of smartphone and tablet usage on the 1-year change in SER. The high smartphone usage (≥2 h per day) and low tablet usage (<2 h per day) subgroup was the group with the highest negative refractive error at both baseline and 1-year follow-up (both
ps < 0.001). Multivariate regression was performed to examine the interactive effect of smartphone and tablet usage on the 1-year change in SER while controlling for potential confounders (
Table 6). For right eyes, compared with the reference group (those with <2 h per day on both smartphone and tablet usages), individuals spending ≥2 h per day on smartphone usage and <2 h per day on tablet usage had a significantly larger decrease in SER (1-year change −0.09 vs. −0.25 D,
p = 0.01), while the level of significance was marginal (1-year change −0.15 vs. −0.28 D,
p = 0.055) for the left eye. The other two subgroups had insignificant differences in SER compared with those of the reference group.
4. Discussion
In this study, we found that smartphone use in young children was associated with a negative shift in refractive error. Children who spent more time (≥2 h per day) on smartphones, but less time (<2 h per day) on tablets showed greater negative shift in refractive error than those who spent more time on both devices. These results suggested that prolonged smartphone usage may present a higher risk of myopia progression than tablet usage. The study results suggested that children and adolescents should spend at most 2 h per day on both smartphones and tablets to reduce myopia progression. It is believed that tablet usage has less impact on SER because of the difference in posture when one uses tablets and smartphones. Studies have shown that people tend to place tablets further away than smartphones during use [
33], the convergence demand during tablet use is less than that of smartphone use [
34], and this prolonged accommodative convergence may contribute to myopia progression [
35].
This study explored a dilemma in the current education system. While smart devices have been widely used to augment learning through online teaching, whether they pose long-term visual repercussions such as myopia progression in school children is yet to be confirmed. Given this uncertainty regarding the prevalence of myopia, when increased smart device usage is necessary, a monitoring model should be applied until further evidence clearly indicates the long-term effects of electronic screen time on children’s myopia development. Our results showed that school-children who spent more time on smart devices had a higher magnitude of myopia, at both the baseline and 1-year follow-up measurements. This finding is consistent with a recent cross-sectional study conducted in urban areas of Tianjin [
36]. On the other hand, the myopia progression, as determined by SER changes over a 1-year period, did not differ significantly among groups with different smartphone/tablet usage. Nonetheless, we observed that school-aged children who reported using smart devices for two hours or more per day tended to have a greater increase in myopia change within a 1-year follow-up period. This discrepancy could be caused by the limited duration of the study, as the annual changes in refractive error in Hong Kong schoolchildren are estimated to be 0.5D [
37], rendering the detection of subtle differences challenging. In addition, the negative correlation between smartphone/tablet usage and SER at the baseline visit may suggest a potential causal relationship, as a child might have already been using smartphones/tablets for years before the baseline measurement in this study. Although myopia progression was evident in all groups at the 1-year follow-up, its progression parallels in significance to the duration of usage. Further studies with more frequent measurements are required to confirm this finding by monitoring screen time and changes in SER for a longer period.
Consistent with previous findings, this study factored in potentially extraneous factors that could lead to an increase in myopia, including the parental history of myopia [
8,
38]. Our sampling included the core public schools representing the typical Hong Kong education experience, which further highlights the need for myopia progression monitoring. One limitation of our study was that cycloplegic agents were not used due to ethical issues, as the data were collected on normal school days and cycloplegic agent installation would interrupt the subjects’ daily school activities. Lack of cycloplegic agents may potentially affect the results of the autorefraction, as the subjects may have a tendency to accommodate, resulting in a more negative SER [
39]. However, our data showed that SERs were strongly correlated with the axial length measurements (baseline
r = 0.74,
p < 0.001), and hence, we expected that the measured SER should also be strongly correlated with the actual SER. Other limitations include a more objective measure of screen time (e.g., screen time app) usage that tracks students’ usage over the year, which may be required to provide more accurate results on the usage of devices rather than questionnaire-based data. With that, screen time usage over the entire experimental period can be monitored more precisely. Finally, the moderately-correlated 1-year change in SER of right and left eyes might be contributed by the position of the smart device during use, but we did not collect data on the hand they commonly used for holding the smart devices so our hypothesis could not be tested.