Bidirectional and temporal associations between daily reports of parental burnout, parenting experiences, and motivations for family screen use.

Parental burnout has detrimental consequences for both parents and children, highlighting the importance of identifying accessible resources that buffer against parental burnout. Digital media may be one tool that parents use to regulate their day-to-day emotions, but existing research that primarily relies on global estimates of typical media use limits our understanding of real-time processes. In the current study, 401 predominantly White, college-educated parents of infants 12-24 months old completed 21 daily diaries reporting on parental burnout symptoms, parenting experiences, and motivations for family media use. Temporal network analysis revealed different findings across time scales (same-day vs. next-day) and levels (within- vs. between-subjects). On days when parents reported more burnout symptoms (i.e., exhaustion, distance, overwhelm) compared to their usual levels, they also reported using more media to regulate their emotions on the same day. Exhaustion, specifically, predicted parents' regulatory media use the next day, though there were no between-person links. Using media to connect was associated with feeling less distant from children in general and on the same day. Parents who found their children more difficult to manage used more media to regulate their own emotions on the same day, but less overall. These patterns and differences across networks suggest that media use may be an adaptive short-term strategy that parents use when feeling more burned out or struggling in their parenting role. Understanding why a specific strategy might be adaptive for parents can inform targeted guidance to help parents better manage their day-to-day parenting-related emotional challenges.