We surveyed 1,500 Florida youngsters about cellphones and their psychological well being – what we realized suggests faculty cellphone bans could have necessary however restricted results

In Florida, a invoice that bans cellphone use in elementary and center colleges, from bell to bell, lately sailed by the state Legislature.

Gov. Ron DeSantis signed it into legislation on Might 30, 2025. The identical invoice calls for top colleges in six Florida districts to undertake the ban throughout the upcoming faculty yr and produce a report on its effectiveness by Dec. 1, 2026.

Mother and father are divided on the difficulty. In response to a report from Training Week, many dad and mom need their youngsters to have telephones for security causes – and don’t assist bans consequently.

However within the debate over whether or not telephones must be banned in Ok-12 colleges – and if that’s the case, how – college students themselves are not often given a voice.

We’re consultants in media use and public well being who surveyed 1,510 youngsters ages 11 to 13 in Florida in November and December 2024 to find out how they’re utilizing digital media and the function tech performs of their lives at dwelling and in school. Their responses had been insightful – and sometimes stunning.

Adults usually cite 4 causes to ban cellphone use throughout
faculty: to enhance youngsters’ psychological well being, to strengthen educational outcomes, to cut back cyberbullying and to assist restrict youngsters’ general display time.

However as our survey reveals, it might be a bit a lot to anticipate a cellphone ban to perform all of that.

What do youngsters need?

Among the questions in our survey shine gentle on youngsters’ emotions towards banning cellphones – although we didn’t ask that query immediately.

We requested them in the event that they really feel reduction after they’re in a scenario the place they will’t use their smartphone, and 31% stated sure.

Moreover, 34% of children agreed with the assertion that social media causes extra hurt than good.

And youngsters had been 1.5 to 2 occasions extra more likely to agree with these statements in the event that they attended colleges the place telephones are banned or confiscated for a lot of the faculty day, with use solely permitted at sure occasions. That group coated
70% of the scholars we surveyed as a result of many particular person colleges or faculty districts in Florida have already restricted college students’ cellphone use.

How college students use cellphones issues

Some “energy customers” of cellphone apps might doubtless use a break from them.

Twenty p.c of youngsters we surveyed stated push notifications on their telephones — that’s, notifications from apps that pop up on the cellphone’s display — are by no means turned off. These notifications are doubtless coming from the most well-liked apps youngsters reported utilizing, like YouTube, TikTok and Instagram.

This 20% of youngsters was roughly thrice extra more likely to report experiencing anxiousness than youngsters who not often or by no means have their notifications on.

They had been additionally almost 5 occasions extra more likely to report incomes principally D’s and F’s in class than youngsters whose notifications are at all times or typically off.

Our survey outcomes additionally recommend cellphone bans would doubtless have optimistic results on grades and psychological well being amongst a number of the heaviest display customers. For instance, 22% of children reported utilizing their favourite app for six or extra hours per day. These college students had been thrice extra more likely to report incomes principally D’s and F’s in class than youngsters who spend an hour or much less on their favourite app every day.

In addition they had been six occasions extra doubtless than hour-or-less customers to report extreme melancholy signs. These insights remained even after ruling out quite a few different doable explanations for the distinction — like age, family earnings, gender, dad or mum’s training, race and ethnicity.

Banning college students’ entry to telephones in school means these youngsters wouldn’t obtain notifications for no less than that seven-hour interval and have fewer hours within the day to make use of apps.

Telephones and psychological well being

Nonetheless, different knowledge we collected means that bans aren’t a common profit for all youngsters.

Seventeen p.c of children who attend colleges that ban or confiscate telephones report extreme melancholy signs, in contrast with simply 4% amongst youngsters who hold their telephones with them throughout the faculty day.

This discovering held even after we dominated out different potential explanations for what we had been seeing, corresponding to the kind of faculty college students attend and different demographic components.

We aren’t suggesting that our survey reveals cellphone bans trigger psychological well being issues.

It’s doable, as an example, that the colleges the place youngsters already had been battling their psychological well being merely occurred to be those which have banned telephones. Additionally, our survey didn’t ask youngsters how lengthy telephones have been banned at their colleges. If the bans simply launched, there could also be optimistic results on psychological well being or grades but to return.

As a way to get a greater sense of the bans’ results on psychological well being, we would want to look at psychological well being indicators earlier than and after cellphone bans.

To get a long-term view on this query, we’re planning on doing a nationwide survey of digital media use and psychological well being, beginning with 11- to 13-year-olds and monitoring them into maturity.

Even with the constraints of our knowledge from this survey, nonetheless, we will conclude that banning telephones in colleges is unlikely to be a right away answer to psychological well being issues of children ages 11-13.

Grades up, cyberbullying down

College students at colleges the place telephones are barred or confiscated didn’t report incomes larger grades than youngsters at colleges the place youngsters hold their telephones.

This discovering held for college kids at each non-public and public colleges, and even after ruling out different doable explanations like variations in gender and family earnings, since these components are additionally identified to have an effect on grades.

There are limits to our findings right here: Grades usually are not an ideal measure of studying, they usually’re not standardized throughout colleges. It’s doable that youngsters at phone-free colleges are actually studying greater than these at colleges the place youngsters carry their telephones round throughout faculty hours – even when they earn the identical grades.

We requested youngsters how typically up to now three months they’d skilled mistreatment on-line – like being known as hurtful names or having lies or rumors unfold about them. Youngsters at colleges the place cellphone use is proscribed throughout faculty hours truly reported enduring extra cyberbullying than youngsters at colleges with much less restrictive insurance policies. This outcome continued even after we thought of smartphone possession and quite a few demographics as doable explanations.

We aren’t essentially saying that cellphone bans trigger a rise in cyberbullying. What might be at play right here is that at colleges the place cyberbullying has been notably unhealthy, telephones have been banned or are confiscated, and on-line bullying nonetheless happens.

However based mostly on our survey outcomes, it doesn’t seem that faculty cellphone bans forestall cyberbullying.

General, our findings recommend that banning telephones in colleges is probably not a straightforward repair for college kids’ psychological well being issues, poor educational efficiency or cyberbullying.

That stated, youngsters may profit from phone-free colleges in ways in which we have now not explored, like elevated consideration spans or diminished eyestrain.