A new study looks from the Norwegian Institute for Public Health examines the mental health and academic progress of middle school-aged girls when phones are banned in schools. From the abstract:

“How smartphone usage affects well-being and learning among children and adolescents is a concern for schools, parents, and policymakers. Combining detailed administrative data with survey data on middle schools’ smartphone policies, together with an event-study design, I show that banning smartphones significantly decreases the health care take-up for psychological symptoms and diseases among girls. Post-ban bullying among both genders decreases. Additionally, girls’ GPA improves, and their likelihood of attending an academic high school track increases. These effects are larger for girls from low socio-economic backgrounds. Hence, banning smartphones from school could be a low-cost policy tool to improve student outcomes”.

How much can American parents and educators extrapolate from a Norwegian study? According to economist Tyler Cowen, quite a bit: He concludes that while grades go up just “a very modest amount,” bullying levels falls pretty significantly, for boys as well as girls. The impact is greatest for students from low-income households.

One caveat, via Cowen: “In the United States at least, parents seem to hate cellphone bans, because they cannot reach their kids at will.”