Title

Unveiling the link: Screen dependency and sleep pattern disturbances in preadolescent children

Authors

R. Devikrishna¹, S.Madhavi², Lilly Christopher³, Buvaneswari Ramakrishnan⁴, P. Jamunarani⁴, N. Sivasubramanian⁵, B. Mahalakshmi⁶, * & K. Ponmari⁷

Affiliation

¹Department of Psychiatric Nursing, Meenakshi academy of higher education and research, Chennai, Tamilnadu, India; ²Department of Medical & Surgical Nursing, KMCH College of Nursing, Coimbatore, The Tamilnadu DR. M.G.R Medical University, Chennai, India; ³Department of Medical & Surgical Nursing, Meenakshi Academy of Higher Education and Research, Chennai, Tamilnadu, India; ⁴Department of Psychiatric Nursing, KMCH College of Nursing, Coimbatore, The Tamilnadu DR. M.G.R Medical University, Chennai, India; ⁵Department of Psychiatric Nursing, Nootan College of Nursing, Sankalchand Patel University, Visnagar, Gujarat – 384315, India; ⁶Department of Paediatric Nursing, Nootan College of Nursing, Sankalchand Patel University, Visnagar, Gujarat – 384315, India; ⁷Department of Medical & Surgical Nursing, SGRRIM & HS College of Nursing, Shri Gururam Rai University, Dehradun, Uttarakhand - 248001, India; *Corresponding author

Email

R. Devikrishna - E-mail: devikrishna2211@gmail.com

Lilly Christopher - E-mail: deanstudentaffairs@maher.ac.in

Buvaneswari Ramakrishnan - E-mail: buvaneswari@kmchcon.ac.in

P. Jamunarani - E-mail: jamunarani@kmchcon.ac.in

B. Mahalakshmi - E-mail: mb.fn@spu.ac.in

K. Ponmari - E-mail: Ponmarikannan1986@gmail.com

Article Type

Research Article

Date

Received October 1, 2025; Revised October 31, 2025; Accepted October 31, 2025, Published October 31, 2025

Abstract

Sleep pattern disturbances among 75 preadolescent children (aged 9–12 years) at The NGP School, Coimbatore, in 2025, with 42 identified as having screen dependency is of interest. Using the Digital Addiction Scale for Children (DASC) and Sleep Quality Scale (SQS), data were collected via structured interviews. Using the SQS, sleep disturbances were categorized as mild (31%, 1–43), moderate (33%, 44–87) and severe (36%, 88–130). Significant associations were found between age and sleep disturbances (χ²=27.06, df=4, p<0.05) and religion with screen dependency (χ²=18.96, df=4, p<0.05). Thus, we show the need for interventions to address screen-related sleep issues in preadolescents.

Keywords

Screen dependency, sleep pattern disturbance, preadolescent children, sleep quality

Citation

Devikrishna et al. Bioinformation 21(10): 3546-3549 (2025)

Edited by

P Kangueane

ISSN

0973-2063

Publisher

Biomedical Informatics

License

This is an Open Access article which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. This is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.