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Brain & Nervous System

Use of mobile and cordless phones and cognition in Australian primary school children: a prospective cohort study.

No Effects Found

Redmayne M, Smith CL, Benke G, Croft RJ, Dalecki A, Dimitriadis C, Kaufman J, Macleod S, Sim MR, Wolfe R, Abramson MJ. · 2016

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Young children's minimal phone use showed no significant cognitive effects, but modern heavy usage patterns remain unstudied.

Plain English Summary

Summary written for general audiences

Australian researchers followed primary school children to see if using mobile and cordless phones affected their thinking skills and memory. They found very little evidence that phone use impacted cognitive function, with only 5 out of 78 measured outcomes showing any differences between phone users and non-users. The study suggests that at typical usage levels for young children, these devices don't appear to significantly harm developing cognitive abilities.

Study Details

Use of mobile (MP) and cordless phones (CP) is common among young children, but whether the resulting radiofrequency exposure affects development of cognitive skills is not known. Small changes have been found in older children. This study focused on children’s exposures to MP and CP and cognitive development. The hypothesis was that children who used these phones would display differences in cognitive function compared to those who did not.

Use of mobile (MP) and cordless phones (CP) is common among young children, but whether the resultin...

MP and CP use for calls was low; and only 5 of 78 comparisons of phone use with cognitive measures w...

Overall, there was little evidence cognitive function was associated with CP and MP use in this age group. Although there was some evidence that effects of MP and CP use on cognition may differ by gender, this needs further exploration. CP results may be more reliable as parents estimated children’s phone use and the CPs were at home; results for CP use were broadly consistent with our earlier study of older children.

Cite This Study
Redmayne M, Smith CL, Benke G, Croft RJ, Dalecki A, Dimitriadis C, Kaufman J, Macleod S, Sim MR, Wolfe R, Abramson MJ. (2016). Use of mobile and cordless phones and cognition in Australian primary school children: a prospective cohort study. Environ Health. 15(1):26, 2016.
Show BibTeX
@article{m_2016_use_of_mobile_and_3327,
  author = {Redmayne M and Smith CL and Benke G and Croft RJ and Dalecki A and Dimitriadis C and Kaufman J and Macleod S and Sim MR and Wolfe R and Abramson MJ. },
  title = {Use of mobile and cordless phones and cognition in Australian primary school children: a prospective cohort study.},
  year = {2016},
  doi = {10.1186/s12940-016-0116-1},
  url = {https://ehjournal.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12940-016-0116-1},
}
DOI: 10.1186/s12940-016-0116-1

Cited By (23 papers)

Quick Questions About This Study

A 2016 Australian study following primary school children found very little evidence that mobile and cordless phone use impacts cognitive function. Only 5 out of 78 measured outcomes showed any differences between phone users and non-users, suggesting minimal effects on developing thinking abilities.
The Australian study found cordless phone results may be more reliable than mobile phone findings since parents could better estimate children's home usage. However, both phone types showed minimal impact on memory and cognitive function in primary school children.
The 2016 study found some evidence that mobile and cordless phone effects on cognition may differ by gender, with girls being the highest users of both phone types. However, researchers noted this finding needs further exploration.
The Australian cohort study found mobile and cordless phone use for calls was low among primary school children. This low usage level may explain why researchers detected minimal cognitive effects in their comprehensive testing battery.
The study found some evidence that children with 'more' cordless phone use had slower response times on certain tasks compared to 'some' use groups. However, overall cognitive function showed little association with phone use in this age group.