The Facts on Screentime, Upper Back Pain, and How to Avoid Tech’s Nasty Side Effects
A quick experiment before we go on with the rest of this article: do you know how much time you spend in a day looking at your phone? Before jumping into the screen time tracking feature on your device, what would be your guess?
Our Screen Time Adds Up
In 2024, adults averaged over 4 hours of daily screen time, with over 2.5 hours exclusively devoted to social media! Social media brings a lot of great things to our day. It can educate us, connect us, and provide an escape when we need one. In fact, just today Instagram taught me that I have been loading garbage bags into the can incorrectly for my entire life! However, even with all these positives, social media can be a real pain in the neck (literally) for our posture.
As an Egoscue Therapist writing this article, the easy thing for me to say would be to stop scrolling, texting, emailing, sharing, and to go for a walk. But let’s be realistic – technology is here to stay. So let’s explore how to avoid upper back pain and tightness to better prepare ourselves for the realities of our digital world.
First, how can screen time lead to upper back pain?
Added Pressure on Back and Neck
When looking at our devices, body positioning is crucial. On average, for every inch our head shifts forward of our shoulder position, we add 5-10 pounds of pressure onto the upper back and neck; specifically, on the muscles of the upper back and neck which are responsible for keeping our head upright against the downward pull of gravity. Over time the extra work really adds up! Putting so much extra weight on the upper back and neck for the previously mentioned 4+ hours of screen time? Ouch.
Breathing
The position of our upper body, neck, and head also has a significant impact on our breathing. When we round our shoulders forward and tilt our head down, we restrict the natural movement of our ribs and diaphragm. With our natural breathing mechanism restricted, we take shallow breaths, recruiting the muscles in our upper back and neck to breathe. These muscles are intended to assist with breathing, not do the whole job. Given this is an activity we repeat roughly 20,000 times per day, you can imagine how quickly these muscles end up overworked, extra tight, and achy.
Breathing is also tightly tied to our nervous system function so it’s no wonder restricting our breath can increase feelings of stress and anxiety. It is common for stress to further increase the tension in our neck and shoulders, creating a vicious cycle that makes it more challenging to relax and feel at ease.
So what do we do about it?
We just identified the type of body positioning we want to avoid, so what would be better? While it is not always feasible depending on the setting you’re in, the easiest first solution is to elevate the device to be more in line with your natural eye line, instead of down below your head. The less we ask our head and neck to look down as we use the device the less pressure we put on the upper back and neck. A great way to do this when sitting is to use a pillow to rest your arms higher relative to your head and neck. This screen positioning also applies to the computer at our desks, the better we can set the screen to 90 degrees with our natural spine andhead position the better!
A quick personal story: I had a friend ask me why their Oura ring was showing their pre-bedtime reading as a “stressful” activity on their mind and body. After a little digging, I realized my friend was leaning back against her headboard, slouched forward, while reading. A simple shift – laying flat instead of sitting slouched – changed the Oura ring reading overnight. That is how quickly our body positioning can affect our physiological state.
What else can we do?
Our bodies are perfectly capable of looking down. We are designed to be able to do just that. So, to be clear, that motion is not the problem. Ideally, the burden of supporting the head’s weight is shared beyond just the muscles of the shoulders and neck, with the lower spine and pelvis working to create a stable platform for this effort. Misalignments in our posture and changes in the S-curve of our spine limit the body’s ability to work collaboratively, concentrating the stress and strain of the head’s weight on the upper body and increasing the likelihood of pain.
Timing is also important! The positions we spend a lot of time in have a large impact on our body, as our muscles start to adapt and compensate for the demand – or lack thereof – of these positions. Having a way to reset and give the body another stimulus that will help bring it back to a balanced and aligned position goes a long way to mitigate the effects of spending lots of time sitting and staring down at our tech devices.
That is where an Egoscue menu comes in (you knew I’d get here eventually!). A few minutes of posture-improving exercises ensure not only a good reset after using our devices but we’ll also have a better prepped body for whatever we get ourselves into.
