Scoping review of research on evidence-based digital media interventions for youth

Digital media shape young people’s education, relationships, and leisure, bringing opportunities (e.g., learning, creativity, social connection) and risks (e.g., cyberbullying, misinformation, commercial exploitation). This scoping review mapped digital media interventions for young people and/or their caregivers that have been empirically evaluated and described what has been tested, for whom, where, and using which methods. We identified 120 peer-reviewed publications reporting 131 intervention evaluations from 38 countries between 2006 and 2024. Overall, 68.7% (n = 90) reported at least one statistically significant improvement in an intended outcome. Quasi-experimental designs predominated (72.5%; n = 95), whereas experimental designs were less common (27.5%; n = 36). Interventions more often focused exclusively on risk reduction (45.8%; n = 60) than exclusively on opportunities (25.2%; n = 33); 29.0% (n = 38) addressed both. Across 34 target domains, literacy-related aims dominated, particularly media literacy (n = 37), followed by cyberbullying (n = 23) and online safety behaviour (n = 9). Coverage across populations was uneven: among interventions with determinable sample ages (n = 97), most targeted adolescents (70.1%; n = 68), with limited evidence for early childhood (4.1%; n = 4). Few interventions targeted special educational needs (3.8%; n = 5), and ethnicity/race was rarely reported (13.7%; n = 18). Schools were the most common implementation context (74.8%; n = 98); structured pre-intervention training was reported for teachers in 22.9% (n = 30) and for parents in 4.6% (n = 6). These patterns indicate priorities for future trials: broader age coverage, consistent reporting of participant characteristics, and clearer documentation of implementation support.