Wednesday, February 18, 2026 2/18/2026

Assessing Children's Screen Time with Wearable Sensor

Award Number: R21HD104164
ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
OPDIV: NIH
AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY
AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 08/01/2022
PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 07/31/2025

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Assessing Children's Screen Time with Wearable Sensor - Project summary The explosion of digital technology ownership in the past decade has led to a dramatically increased screen exposure for children. In the United States, over 95% of families with children have a smartphone, TV, and desktop monitors, which has raised a growing concern about the impact of screens on children's health. Excessive screen exposure has been closely associated with increased eye problems, sleep disorders, obesity, and cognitive impairments among children. Due to these concerns, World Health Organization (WHO) has recently (April 2019) suggested that children between 2 and 4 should have less than 1 hour of sedentary screen time per day. However, there is an evidence gap between actual screen time in research and parental control and assessment from measurement tools. Existing methodologies of assessing screen exposure lack construct validity, as they heavily rely upon self-report, smartphone applications, or research technologies (e.g. eye- tracking glasses). Self-report is prone to reporting bias. Smartphone applications lack the capability of measuring cumulative, concurrent screen exposure across multiple screen types and are not able to confirm the identity of user (the same child or his/her parents). Research technologies, such as eye-tracking glasses, can be invasive to children and are limited to the measurement of regions of selective visual focus. Currently, there is no effective and minimally invasive tool that can be used to provide objective and accurate measurement of both sedentary screen use and screen exposure across multiple screen types. This project seeks to develop a wearable device and robust AI algorithms to provide objective and accurate screen time measurement for children. Aim 1 will develop a minimally invasive device and computer vision methods to detect screen exposure patterns and differentiate various screen type. Aim 2 will testify the design in a free-living environment on children. The proposed work will provide an important new tool to objectively and comprehensively measure children's cumulative and discrete free-living screen exposure in quantity and duration. We anticipate this technology will serve as a universal screen-time measurement tool and benefit parents, preschool teachers, and interest groups in their management and advocacy of child(ren)'s sedentary activities and media use. We also anticipate our tools will help academic researchers, clinical psychologist, and consumer researchers via providing objective measures in behavioral study and therapy.


Issue Date FY	Funding FY	Legal Entity Name	Legal Entity Address	Legal Entity City	Legal Entity State	Legal Entity Zip Code	Legal Entity COUNTY	Legal Entity COUNTRY	Assistance Listing	Award Code	Budget Year	Action Date	Action Type	Action Amount

Issue Date FY: 2026 ( Subtotal = -$1,465 )
2026	2022	THE TRUSTEES OF THE STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY	ONE CASTLE POINT ON HUDSON	HOBOKEN	NJ	07030	HUDSON	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	2	2/9/2026	CHANGE OF GRANTEE / TRAINING INSTITUTION / AWARDING INSTITUTION	-$1,465
														Subtotal = -$1,465

Issue Date FY: 2024 ( Subtotal = $0 )
2024	2022	THE TRUSTEES OF THE STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY	1 CASTLEPOINT ON HUDSON	HOBOKEN	NJ	07030	HUDSON	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	2	8/8/2024	CHANGE OF GRANTEE / TRAINING INSTITUTION / AWARDING INSTITUTION	$0
														Subtotal = $0

Issue Date FY: 2023 ( Subtotal = $0 )
2023	2022	THE TRUSTEES OF THE STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY	1 CASTLEPOINT ON HUDSON	HOBOKEN	NJ	07030	HUDSON	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	001	2	6/22/2023	CHANGE OF GRANTEE / TRAINING INSTITUTION / AWARDING INSTITUTION	$168,266
2023	2021	UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA	301 ROSE ADMIN BLDG	TUSCALOOSA	AL	35487	TUSCALOOSA	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	1	6/22/2023	NEW	-$168,266
														Subtotal = $0

Issue Date FY: 2022 ( Subtotal = $181,628 )
2022	2022	STEVENS INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY (INC)	1 CASTLE POINT ON HUDSON	HOBOKEN	NJ	07030	HUDSON	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	001	2	9/23/2022	CHANGE OF GRANTEE / TRAINING INSTITUTION / AWARDING INSTITUTION	$181,628
2022	2021	UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA	301 ROSE ADMIN BLDG	TUSCALOOSA	AL	35487	TUSCALOOSA	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	1	9/23/2022	NEW	$0
														Subtotal = $181,628

Issue Date FY: 2021 ( Subtotal = $172,059 )
2021	2021	UNIVERSITY OF ALABAMA	301 ROSE ADMIN BLDG	TUSCALOOSA	AL	35487	TUSCALOOSA	USA	Child Health and Human Development Extramural Research	000	1	8/3/2021	NEW	$172,059
														Subtotal = $172,059

Grand Total All Awards = $352,222

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Assessing Children's Screen Time with Wearable Sensor

Award Number: R21HD104164

ORGANIZATION: NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF CHILD HEALTH AND HUMAN DEVELOPMENT

OPDIV: NIH

AWARD CLASS: DISCRETIONARY

AWARD ACTIVITY TYPE: SCIENTIFIC/HEALTH RESEARCH (INCLUDES SURVEYS)

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE START DATE: 08/01/2022

PERIOD OF PERFORMANCE END DATE: 07/31/2025

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