Projects
(1) UMN Teen Social Media Study
Xiaoran Sun, assistant professor of Family Social Science and PI of our lab, has been awarded a National Institutes of Health grant entitled, "Adolescents' Social Media Management Strategies: Bidirectional Links to Objective Social Media Use and Mental Health Outcomes" (1R01MH138929). The grant is a 4-year award funded by the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) for a total amount of $2,750,433.
- This NIMH-funded study is focused on:
- how adolescents manage their social media use on a daily basis,
- how their social media use management strategies influence their actual social media use,
- and how their strategies and their use of social media interact with their mental health.
We are actively looking for participants to join this study! If you are between the ages of 13 to 17, have a smartphone, and use social media at least once a week, please contact us at TeenSocialMedia@umn.edu.
(2) Family Screenome Study
We study how adolescents and their parents use smartphones, and how their smartphone use impacts their family relationships and well-being.
- We use the Screenomics approach to collect real-time, high-intensity (every 5 seconds over up to 6 months) smartphone data from adolescents and parents. Our ongoing projects include:
- Understanding the discrepancy between objective and self-reported smartphone use patterns
- Understanding the longitudinal associations between adolescents’ objective smartphone use and their well-being
- Understanding how adolescents use their smartphones during school hours
- Understanding how adolescents and parents use their smartphones overnight
This work is supported by the University of Minnesota's Grant-in-Aid of Research, Artistry, and Scholarship, and the Stanford Maternal and Child Health Research Institute.
Refereed Journal Articles
(Graduate student co-authors are italicized)
Sun, X., Molaib, K., Xu, T., Ram, N., Reeves, B., Desai, M. & Robinson, T. N. (in press). Association of objectively measured social media use with weight concerns and dieting in adolescents. Manuscript in press, JAMA Pediatrics.
Molaib, K. M., Sun, X., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2025). Agreement between self-reported and objectively measured smartphone use among adolescents and adults. Computers in Human Behavior Reports, 17, 100569. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chbr.2024.100569
Sun, X., Dworkin, J., & LeBouef, S. (2023). Late adolescents’ texting experiences with family: Mixed-Method analysis for understanding themes and sentiments. Adolescents, 3(3), 581-593. https://doi.org/10.3390/adolescents3030041
Dworkin, J., Sun, X.,LeBouef, S., & Keyzers, A. (2023). Associations among parent technology use, locus of control, and child problem behaviors. Family Relations, 72(2), 443-457. https://doi.org/10.1111/fare.12811
Sun, X., Haydel, K. F., Matheson, D., Desai, M., & Robinson, T. N. (2023). Are mobile phone ownership and age of acquisition associated with child adjustment? A 5‐year prospective study among low‐income Latinx children. Child Development, 94(1), 303-314. https://doi.org/10.1111/cdev.13851. [top 10% downloaded article]
Sun, X., Ram, N., Reeves, B., Cho, M. J., Fitzgerald, A., & Robinson, T. N. (2023). Connectedness and independence of young adults and parents in the digital world: Observing smartphone interactions at multiple timescales using Screenomics. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 40(4), 1126-1150. https://doi.org/10.1177/02654075221104268
Invited Talks at University of Minnesota
Sun, X. (2025, October). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development: A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk, Family Social Science Research Colloquium, University of Minnesota, Saint Paul, MN.
Sun, X. (2025, March). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development: A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk, Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2025, March). Using Screenomics to Study Adolescent Smartphone Use and Mental Health. Invited talk for the AI and Data Science for Mental Health workshop, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2024, November). Using Screenomics to Study Adolescent Smartphone Use and Well-being. Invited talk for the AI Data Science for Healthcare workshop, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2024, October). Using Screenomics to Study Adolescents’ and Parents’ Smartphone Use and Well-being. Invited talk for the GroupLens Lab, Department of Computer Science and Engineering, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2024, October). Adolescents’ and Parents’ Smartphone Use: Findings from Screenomics. Invited talk for the Culture and Family Life Lab, Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2024, May). Using Screenomics to Study Adolescents’ and Parents’ Smartphone Use and Well-being. Invited talk for the Health Psychology Interest Group (H-PIG), Department of Psychology, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Invited Talks at Other Institutions
Sun, X. (2025, October). The Adolescent and Family Screenome Study: IRB, Consent/Assent, Ethics, and Data Storage. Invited talk, Demystifying Data Donation Methods to Advance Digital Health Research, University of Virginia—TYDE & University of California, Irvine—CERES, online.
Sun, X. (2025, May). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development: A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk, School of Psychology and Cognitive Science, East China Normal University, Shanghai, China.
Sun, X. (2025, April). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development: A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk, Institute for Advanced Computational Science, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY.
Sun, X. (2025, February). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development:
A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk for the SMART (Social Media and Resilient Teens) Program, Texas A&M University, online.
Sun, X. (2025, January). The Digital Context of Adolescent Development: A Screenomics Approach. Invited talk, Department of Psychology, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA.
Presentations at Professional Meetings and Conferences
Sun, X. (2023, June). Smartphone Behaviors and Youth Mental Health: Two Longitudinal Studies. Invited talk for the 3rd Wenqin Child Development Forum, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
Contributed Papers Presented at Professional Meetings and Conferences
(Graduate student co-authors are italicized)
Lee, C. T., Sun, X., Xu, T., Molaib, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2025, November). Longitudinal associations between objectively measured overnight smartphone use and daytime sleepiness among adolescents. Paper to be presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Baltimore, MD.
Rineman, R. M., Sun, X., Xu, T., Lee, C. T., Molaib, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2025, November). Impacts of overnight smartphone use on sleep outcomes among parents of adolescents: A passive sensing approach. Paper to be presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Baltimore, MD.
Chi, Y., Cho, M.J., Molaib, K. M., Sun, X., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2025, June). Beyond Apps: Modeling Full Distributions of All Screen Content Over Time to Understand Adolescents' Smartphone Use and Mental Health. Paper presented at the 75th Annual Conference of the International Communication Association, Denver, CO.
Sun, X., Nielsen, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2024, November). Describing adolescents’ overnight smartphone use with high-intensity smartphone data. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.
Rineman, R. M., Xu, T., Nielsen, K. M., & Sun, X. (2024, November). What about the parents? Overnight smartphone use in parents of adolescents. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.
Park, E., Sun, X., Nielsen, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2024, November). Longitudinal associations between adolescents’ smartphone distraction management during family time and their relationships with parents. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.
Nielsen, K. M., Sun, X., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2024, November). Accuracy of self-reported smartphone use among adolescents and their parents. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.
Hanson, A. N., Sun, X., Nielsen, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2023, November) Parent and adolescent perceptions of parent smartphone addiction: A longitudinal descriptive analysis.Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Orlando, FL.
Sun, X., Nielsen, K., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2023, April). Adolescent social media use and weight concerns: A longitudinal Screenomics study. Paper presented at Annual Conference of Society for Research on Adolescence, San Diego, CA.
Sun, X., Reeves, B., Ram, N., Cho, M. J., Fitzgerald, A., & Robinson, T. N. (2020, November). Pulling closer or pushing away? Ambivalence in the dynamics between young adults and parents in the digital context. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, virtual conference.
Sun, X., Robinson, T. N., Ram, N., Reeves, B., Cho, M. J., Chiatti, A., Lee, J., Roehrick, K., Yang, X., & Fitzgerald, A. (2020, July). Parent-young adult communication in the digital world: A Screenomics paradigm. Paper presented at 6th International Conference on Computational Social Science (IC2S2), virtual conference.
Posters or Exhibitions
(Undergraduate & graduate student co-authors are italicized)
Wang, Y., Sun, X., Molaib, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2025, July). Adolescent smartphone distraction management in different contexts: A latent profile analysis. Poster to be presented at the Children and Screens: Digital Media and Developing Minds Congress, Washington, D.C.
Long, J. & Sun, X. (2024, April). How adolescents use smartphone and social media overnight: Objective observations from passive sensing and gender difference. Poster presented at the National Conference on Undergraduate Research, Long Beach, CA.
Xu, T., Sun, X., Nielsen, K. M., Ram, N., Reeves, B., & Robinson, T. N. (2024, April). Adolescents’ perceptions of COVID-19 media messages and their preventive health behaviors. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of Society for Research on Adolescence, Chicago, IL.
(3) Machine Learning for Family Research
With an interdisciplinary background in data science and human development and family studies, our lab is also dedicated to understanding how we can use machine learning to advance discoveries in developmental and family research.
Our current project, funded by the Spencer Foundation, conducts machine learning analysis on large-scale, national longitudinal datasets to build predictive models based on adolescent experiences in predicting their developmental outcomes, including educational and career achievements and well-being.
Refereed Journal Articles
Sun, X. (2024). Supervised machine learning for exploratory analysis in family. Journal of Marriage and Family: Mid-Decade Special Issue on Theory and Methods, 86(5), 1468-1494, https://doi.org/10.1111/jomf.12973
Sun, X., Ram, N., & McHale, S. M. (2020). Adolescent family experiences predict young adult educational attainment: A data-based cross-study synthesis with machine learning. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 29. 2770-2785. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-020-01775-5
Invited Talks at University of Minnesota
Sun, X. (2023, April). Machine Learning for Human Development and Family Research. Invited talk for the Minnesota Population Center, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2022, November). Machine Learning for Human Development and Family Research: An Overview and an Example. Talk for the Machine Learning Seminar Series, Data Science Initiative, College of Science and Engineering, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN.
Invited Talks at Other Institutions
Sun, X. (2024, May). Introduction to Machine Learning for Developmental Psychology and Family Research. Invited talk for the Department of Psychology and Behavioral Sciences, Zhejiang University, virtual.
Sun, X. (2022, February). Introduction to Machine Learning for Human Development and Family Research. Invited talk at NICHD SBSBeat (Social and Behavioral Sciences Branch Education and Training) Seminar.
Love, B. & Sun, X. (2021, July). Big Data & Data Mining Approaches for Psychology Research. Invited talk for the UCL (University College London)-PKU (Peking University) Summer School in Experimental Design in Psychology.
Presentations at Professional Meetings and Conferences
Sun, X. (2024, November). Revealing Unseen Insights: Employing Machine Learning for Comprehending Psychological Well-being in Individuals and Families. Invited discussant for symposium at the National Council on Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.
Sun, X. (2022, November). Uncovering Hidden Perspectives: Using Machine Learning to Understand Fathering, Fatherhood, and Child Care Quality. Invited discussant for symposium at the National Council on Family Relations, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X. (2020, November). Introduction to Machine Learning for Family Research: Basic Concepts, Common Algorithms, and Application Examples. Workshop at the National Council on Family Relations, virtual conference. (137 registered attendees)
Contributed Papers Presented at Professional Meetings and Conferences
(Graduate student co-authors are italicized)
Chen, S., Chen, Y. Xu, T., & Lee, C. T., Sun, X., (2025, November). From Family Context to Achievement in Diverse Adolescents: Uncovering Hidden Family Experience Patterns with Unsupervised Machine Learning. Paper to be presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Baltimore, MD. [Awarded the 2025 NCFR Best Abstract by a Student/New Professional Award in the Research & Theory Section]
Yu, H., Sun, X., Tang, Y., Chen, S., Xu, T. (2025, November). From Family Experiences to Childfree: Exploring the Decision Not to Have Kids at Young Adults with Supervised Machine Learning. Paper to be presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Baltimore, MD.
Sun, X., Updegraff, K. A., Cahill, K., & Umaña-Taylor, A. J. (2022, November). Identifying key contextual factors in Latinx parents’ depressive symptoms: A machine learning approach. Paper presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Minneapolis, MN.
Sun, X., & Ram, N. (2019, March). Family experiences in adolescence predict young adult educational attainment: A machine learning approach. Paper presented at Biennial Meeting of Society for Research in Child Development, Baltimore, MD.
Posters or Exhibitions
(Undergraduate & graduate student co-authors are italicized)
Tang, Y., Sun, X., Yu, H., Chen, S. (2025, November). How Adolescence Family Experiences Predict Adulthood Marriage Decisions: Analysis with Supervised Machine Learning. Poster to be presented at the National Council on Family Relations, Baltimore, MD.
Xu, Y., Atugonza. V., Park, E., Long, J., Xia, P., & Sun, X. (2024, November). Social determinants in adolescence of young adult educational attainment: A systematic review of Add Health studies. Poster presented at the National Council of Family Relations, Bellevue, WA.