“What am I supposed to do? I can’t follow him around all day … and grounding him would be a blessing for him. He disappears into the bathroom for hours … should I cut the power, lock away his phone? No agreement ever holds without constant reminders, and there’s always an argument. ‘Just one more minute, just one more minute!’—I hear it all the time … It’s a daily battle!”

I truly feel for these parents—and I’m glad my own children are grown.

Lately, more and more parents in my pediatric consultations have been asking me to explain to the child sitting in front of me that “gaming” is bad for their eyes. So far, I’ve been rather cautious about making that claim, simply because there is no solid scientific evidence to support it in such general terms.

But now, new findings are pointing us in a different direction.

A recent study led by Jason M. Nagata, published in the journal NeuroImage (2026), examined the relationship between social media use and brain structure in 7,614 adolescents aged 10 to 13. The data come from the large-scale ABCD Study, one of the most comprehensive longitudinal studies on child brain development worldwide. The analysis was based on MRI data from the second assessment wave (2018–2020).

The study found that longer daily use of social media is associated with reduced cortical thickness and smaller volumes in several brain regions.

These regions are far from arbitrary. They include areas responsible for cognitive control, planning, and strategic thinking, as well as the processing of emotions and conflicts. Attention networks are also involved.

Such structural differences are already known from other research contexts. Studies describing similar changes in these brain regions have linked them to increased impulsivity, mental health challenges in adolescence, and substance use disorders. Comparable patterns are also discussed in relation to ADHD and depression.

Importantly, however, the present study did not assess behavioral outcomes. It analyzed imaging data only, and any interpretation is therefore based on comparisons with existing research.

Interestingly, these associations were primarily linked to the amount of time spent on social media each day. Measures of social media addiction, by contrast, were not clearly associated with differences in brain structure in the region-specific analysis.

One limitation of the study is that its second-year design does not allow for conclusions about cause and effect. It remains unclear whether social media use influences cortical thickness, or whether certain brain characteristics predispose adolescents to more intensive use. In addition, the data on usage are based on self-reports, which may be imprecise, and different types of content or activities were not distinguished.

So since last week, I can at least add something new to this ongoing debate: I still don’t know whether “gaming” is bad for the eyes.

But when it comes to the developing brain and adolescents’ psychosocial development, there is now growing evidence that too much may not come without consequences.