Physical exercise is negatively associated with adolescent short-form video app addiction, while also positively associated with autonomous motivation and mental health literacy. High levels of autonomous motivation and mental health literacy are associated with lower levels of short-form video app addiction. Based on these association patterns, we suggest that schools and families, in holistic practices promoting adolescent health development, should emphasize the integration of physical exercise, autonomous motivation development, and mental health literacy enhancement. This comprehensive health promotion approach may provide a reference for future research exploring how to promote healthy digital media use habits among adolescents. It should be noted that the directionality of the aforementioned associations and their potential intervention effects still require further validation through longitudinal tracking or experimental studies.
Wu et al. (Sat,) studied this question.