Abstract

Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by persistent deficits in social communication and interaction across multiple contexts, along with restricted, repetitive patterns of behavior, interests, or activities. Recent studies examining the role of screen time in showing autistic-like symptoms, suggest that excessive early digital exposure may contribute to autistic-like symptoms in children . In this study, as an umbrella review, all the systematic reviews which have studied the relationship between excessive use of digital devices and autistic-like symptoms were reviewed. For this aim The systematic search yielded 219 initial records. After duplicate removal, 72 articles underwent rigorous title/abstract screening, resulting in the exclusion of 66 non-qualifying articles. Full-text review of the remaining 6 articles led to the exclusion of 3 systematic reviews that did not focus on the ASD-screen time association. The final analysis included 3 qualifying systematic reviews. Findings of this umbrella review reveal a complex and nuanced relationship between screen time and autism spectrum disorder. While some studies indicate a potential association and emphasis on some factors like content, context, ASD measure and screen type, others report conflicting results or find no significant correlation.