All you need to know about screen time and your health

I'd be surprised if you haven't yet heard about screen time and it's impact on our health and wellbeing. Awareness is growing around how screens, such as our phones and laptops, might be affecting us, with many electronics companies opting to adapt their products to make them more user-friendly.

Though most research on screen time focuses on children and adolescents, recent research according to TIME Magazine says that excessive screen use may still have a damaging consequences for adults such as:

• digital eye strain
• impaired sleep
• worsened mental health

So, what we can do to limit our screen time?

We know that screens are becoming part of our daily life - and it may be unreasonable to expect no screen time at all given that many of us use screens to study and a lot of our socialising is now done online.

However, reducing your screen time may help boost your health and wellbeing. Here's a few tips to reduce your time spent in front of a screen:

Try an activity that makes it difficult to use a screen

When you're taking those all-important study breaks, try doing something that encourages you to leave the screen behind. Running, swimming and cycling are great examples, but even reading a book or painting are lower-intensity options that still give our eyes a rest from the screen.

Set yourself a challenge

If you find you're more likely to stick to something if you turn it in to a game for yourself, why not try it for screen time?

Set yourself a challenge of spending a set amount of time away from your screens each day - maybe even just 10 minutes to start with! 

Equally, many devices now have a functionality that helps you to monitor your screen time, so you could use this to set yourself some targets.

Practice mindfulness

As we know, mindfulness is not just meditation. A big part of mindfulness is being able to be present in the current moment. So, net time you're with friends or doing an activity that doesn't require a phone - put it away and see how your experience of the present moment might change when you're not online at the same time.

Take a moment (away from this screen!) to have a think about your screen time and what you could do to reduce it.