In a written testimony to the US Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation, Dr Jared Cooney Horvath argued that if federal policy keeps incentivising large-scale digital adoption in schools without demanding “independent efficacy evidence, privacy protections, and developmental safeguards”, we may cause long-term educational harm and compound the damage already done to children’s brains.
“Over the past two decades, the cognitive development of children across much of the developed world has stalled and, in many domains, reversed.
“Literacy, numeracy, attention, and higher-order reasoning have declined despite increased school attendance and expanded public investment,” Horvath said.
The expert noted that although digital tools now consume a significant share of instructional time, assessment, homework, and student attention, the evidence to date from international assessments and sweeping research studies shows that increased screen exposure in classrooms is actually linked with poorer learning outcomes.
“Over half of our children now use a computer at school for one to four hours each day, and a full quarter spend more than four hours on screens during a typical seven-hour school day.
“Unfortunately, studies suggest that less than half of this time is spent actually learning, with students off-task for up to 38 minutes of every hour when on classroom devices,” Horvath elaborated.
While in some limited circumstances digital tools can bolster ‘surface-level’ skill acquisition, in most academic contexts screens only slow learning, diminish depth of understanding and weaken retention, he added.
This is primarily because digital platforms are engineered to capture attention, fragment our focus and speed up task switching, Horvath said.
Taking a macro view of the situation, the neuroscientist went on to chart trends in cognitive performance over the 20th century.
While improved steadily across generations, the mid-2000s saw cognitive performance begin to plateaued and then reverse in many Western nations.
This is a telling turning point, Horvath suggested.
“At the same time, classroom environments underwent a rapid digital transformation. One-to-one device programs, cloud platforms, online assessments, adaptive software, and constant connectivity became standard practice in many districts - often without independent longitudinal validation,” he said.
Drawing on data from PISA, TIMSS and PIRLS, Horvath asserted that:
“Collectively, these assessments involve millions of students over decades and converge on the same conclusion: heavy classroom screen exposure is not improving learning outcomes at scale.”
Looking at PISA results over time, Horvath notes that when students self-report their classroom computer use, higher daily screen exposure “consistently corresponds” to poorer scores in reading, maths and science.
“The relationship is monotonic: more screen time, lower performance. Apparent small advantages sometimes reported for minimal computer exposure disappear once test mode effects are accounted for.”
The expert flagged that when the assessment moved from paper to online delivery, students with poor digital skills experienced artificial penalties in their results – this created the illusion that moderate screen use benefitted students, rather than genuine learning gains.
PIRLS historically shows poorer reading performance among students with high device use in class, the expert flags.
Turning his attention to TIMSS, Horvath said we see a similar pattern emerge amongst younger students.
That is, frequent use of computers in class correlates with significantly lower maths and science results – and that this shows across both high-income and middle-income countries.
Meanwhile, PIRLS historically shows weaker reading performance among students with high device use in class, Horvath added.
“More recent data out of the US confirm that even modest daily digital exposure is associated with lower reading comprehension,” he warned.
Late last year Horvath’s new book The Digital Delusion: How Classroom Technology Harms Our Kids' Learning - And How To Help Them Thrive Again was published, where he draws on decades of neuroscience and education research to dismantle what he sees as the core myths fuelling the edtech movement.
The book is said to offer a “practical playbook for putting people – not programs – back at the centre of education”.
Horvath’s insights appear to have struck a chord with many educators.
Anna Simmonds, a Psychology and Science teacher from Camberwell Girls Grammar School in Melbourne, recently took to LinkedIn to offer her take.
“I’ve read a lot of buzz about this book and it totally lives up to it. I devoured this book – I couldn’t put it down, it is littered with underlined passages and annotations,” she wrote.
“It trumped any of my usual go-to holiday reads and that’s saying a lot! Thank you Jared Cooney Horvath, PhD, MEd for this important work and raising a spotlight on tech in education.”
The teacher said it spoke “so many truths” and that now she aimed to be even more intentional about how and when to use technology in her classroom.
In his testimony, Horvath also pin-pointed a perceived flaw in edtech meta-analyses that report small positive effect sizes.
“…education research systematically inflates positive effects because comparison conditions vary widely and often lack rigorous baselines.
“When educational interventions are benchmarked against established instructional methods, meaningful impact typically begins around moderate effect thresholds…”
He contended that most digital interventions fall below this range, particularly in:
- One-to-one device programs;
- Fully online instruction;
- General classroom technology integration; and,
- Programs targeting disadvantaged populations.
Do tech tools have greater positive impact on learning outcomes that ordinary classroom instruction?
Horvath appears sceptical on this one.
“Only narrowly constrained tools (such as adaptive drills for foundational skills and targeted remediation) consistently approach meaningful gains.
“These tools succeed because they automate repetition in well-defined domains, not because they enhance deep learning.”
The expert puts forward seven practical recommendations for policymakers to improve accountability and protect students.
The first is that all federally-funded edtech must demonstrate its learning benefits through independent, replicated trials before being deployed to schools or renewed.
Another hones in on bolstering student data protections, as well as funding for research that focuses on long-term cognitive and academic impact studies rather than short-term engagement metrics.
“This is not a debate about rejecting technology. It is a question of aligning educational tools with how human learning actually works.
“Evidence indicates that indiscriminate digital expansion has weakened learning environments rather than strengthened them …
“Our responsibility is not to maximize screen exposure, but to maximize the cognitive capacity and long-term flourishing of the next generation,” he concluded.
