Barriers and facilitators: The contrasting roles of media and technology in social–emotional learning

Media and technology have come to play a ubiquitous role in children’s lives. In response, researchers continue to explore the impact of media and technology on children’s overall health and development. Since the COVID-19 pandemic, our paradigms have increasingly shifted from asking whether technology is influencing children’s experiences to how technology is influencing child development. Accordingly, numerous studies using varied theoretical frameworks document how context, content, and amount of media and technology use influence children’s social–emotional skill development. This perspectives paper collates and synthesizes theoretical frameworks and empirical evidence among children from birth to age 12 to address the question, “What are the ways, positive and negative, that media and technology use impact children’s social and emotional learning (SEL)?” Our findings point toward opportunities to mitigate barriers and leverage facilitators to support children’s social–emotional learning and development as we progress into a technology-driven future.