School phone policies and their association with mental wellbeing, phone use, and social media use (SMART Schools): a cross-sectional observational study
[SUMMARY AND ABSTRACT READ IN FULL, verbatim, at the Europe PMC core record, PMID 40213498, PMCID PMC11984610. Author position confirmed at api.openalex.org, Goodyear 'first' and corresponding, Pallan 'last', fourteen authors. THE RESULTS AND METHODS BODY WAS NOT READ] Goodyear, V. A., Randhawa, A., Adab, P., Al-Janabi, H., Fenton, S., Jones, K., Michail, M., Morrison, B., Patterson, P., Quinlan, J., Sitch, A., Twardochleb, R., Wade, M., & Pallan, M. (2025). 'School phone policies and their association with mental wellbeing, phone use, and social media use (SMART Schools): a cross-sectional observational study.' The Lancet Regional Health - Europe, 51, 101211. doi:10.1016/j.lanepe.2025.101211. THE MOST USEFUL SOURCE IN THE BATCH, AND THE ONLY EVALUATION OF SCHOOL PHONE POLICIES WITH ADOLESCENT MENTAL WELLBEING AS A PRE-SPECIFIED PRIMARY OUTCOME. Design: cross-sectional observational study, the quantitative arm of a multi-method study, mixed-effects linear regression, registered as ISRCTN77948572, funded by the NIHR Public Health Research Programme. Sample: 1,227 participants aged 12 to 15 across 30 secondary schools in ENGLAND, 20 restrictive where recreational phone use was not permitted and 10 permissive. PRIMARY OUTCOME: mental wellbeing on the Warwick-Edinburgh scale. RESULT, VERBATIM: 'Mean WEMWBS score was 47 (SD = 9) with no evidence of a difference between groups (adjusted mean difference -0.48, 95% CI -2.05 to 1.06, p = 0.62).' Restrictive schools showed lower phone time DURING SCHOOL, adjusted mean difference -0.67 hours, 95% CI -0.92 to -0.43, p = 0.00024, and lower in-school social media time, -0.54 hours, 95% CI -0.74 to -0.36, p = 0.00018, 'but there was no evidence for differences when comparing usage time on weekdays or weekends'. CONCLUSION, VERBATIM: 'There is no evidence that restrictive school policies are associated with overall phone and social media use or better mental wellbeing in adolescents. The findings do not provide evidence to support the use of school policies that prohibit phone use during the school day in their current form, and indicate that these policies require further development.' THE LIMITATION THAT MUST TRAVEL WITH IT, from the journal's own linked commentary which WAS read in full: the school response rate was 10 PER CENT, and the cross-sectional non-randomised design 'limits conclusions about causal effects'. SO THIS IS A NULL IN AN OBSERVATIONAL DESIGN AND IT IS NOT A DEMONSTRATION THAT RESTRICTION DOES NOTHING. It is a demonstration that the one study with wellbeing as a pre-specified primary outcome did not find a difference. Carry both halves or carry neither. AND THE MECHANISM FINDING, which is the quietly consequential part: restriction cut phone use during school and did not cut total daily use.
[SUMMARY AND ABSTRACT READ IN FULL, verbatim, at the Europe PMC core record, PMID 40213498, PMCID PMC11984610. Author position confirmed at api.openalex.org, Goodyear 'first' and corresponding, Pallan 'last', fourteen authors. THE RESULTS AND METHODS BODY WAS NOT READ] Goodyear, V. A., Randhawa, A., Adab, P., Al-Janabi, H., Fenton, S., Jones, K., Michail, M., Morrison, B., Patterson, P., Quinlan, J., Sitch, A., Twardochleb, R., Wade, M., & Pallan, M. (2025). 'School phone policies and their association with mental wellbeing, phone use, and social media use (SMART Schools): a cross-sectional observational study.' The Lancet Regional Health - Europe, 51, 101211. doi:10.1016/j.lanepe.2025.101211. THE MOST USEFUL SOURCE IN THE BATCH, AND THE ONLY EVALUATION OF SCHOOL PHONE POLICIES WITH ADOLESCENT MENTAL WELLBEING AS A PRE-SPECIFIED PRIMARY OUTCOME. Design: cross-sectional observational study, the quantitative arm of a multi-method study, mixed-effects linear regression, registered as ISRCTN77948572, funded by the NIHR Public Health Research Programme. Sample: 1,227 participants aged 12 to 15 across 30 secondary schools in ENGLAND, 20 restrictive where recreational phone use was not permitted and 10 permissive. PRIMARY OUTCOME: mental wellbeing on the Warwick-Edinburgh scale. RESULT, VERBATIM: 'Mean WEMWBS score was 47 (SD = 9) with no evidence of a difference between groups (adjusted mean difference -0.48, 95% CI -2.05 to 1.06, p = 0.62).' Restrictive schools showed lower phone time DURING SCHOOL, adjusted mean difference -0.67 hours, 95% CI -0.92 to -0.43, p = 0.00024, and lower in-school social media time, -0.54 hours, 95% CI -0.74 to -0.36, p = 0.00018, 'but there was no evidence for differences when comparing usage time on weekdays or weekends'. CONCLUSION, VERBATIM: 'There is no evidence that restrictive school policies are associated with overall phone and social media use or better mental wellbeing in adolescents. The findings do not provide evidence to support the use of school policies that prohibit phone use during the school day in their current form, and indicate that these policies require further development.' THE LIMITATION THAT MUST TRAVEL WITH IT, from the journal's own linked commentary which WAS read in full: the school response rate was 10 PER CENT, and the cross-sectional non-randomised design 'limits conclusions about causal effects'. SO THIS IS A NULL IN AN OBSERVATIONAL DESIGN AND IT IS NOT A DEMONSTRATION THAT RESTRICTION DOES NOTHING. It is a demonstration that the one study with wellbeing as a pre-specified primary outcome did not find a difference. Carry both halves or carry neither. AND THE MECHANISM FINDING, which is the quietly consequential part: restriction cut phone use during school and did not cut total daily use.
Written from the sUMMARY AND ABSTRACT READ IN FULL, verbatim, at the Europe PMC core record, PMID 40213498, PMCID PMC11984610. Author position confirmed at api.openalex.org, Goodyear 'first' and corresponding, Pallan 'last', fourteen authors. THE RESULTS AND METHODS BODY WAS NOT READ.
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The Lancet Regional Health - Europe, 51, 101211. doi:10.1016/j.lanepe.2025.101211