BBC News Online: UK

Children ignore mobile phone health warning

Last year the government's Stewart Report warned against children using mobiles because of the unknown effects of microwave radiation on developing brains.

But the study, by the Centre for Science Education at Sheffield Hallam University, found that 90% of the under-16s own a mobile and one in 10 spend more than 45 minutes a day using it.

Researchers interviewed 1,000 pupils - the number surveyed for the Stewart Report - 941 of whom were under 16 - the age range the report targeted.

The results showed that more than two thirds of the children have had their phones for between one and three years.

Text messages are sent and received by 96% of the children surveyed - with 16% sending 10 or more a day.

The research was conducted by the Pupil Researcher Initiative (PRI), a curriculum development project from two of the UK's Research Councils.

PRI's Tony Sherborne, who devised the survey, said: "I'm amazed by how much time some students spend on their mobiles.

Dr Alan Preece, a medical physics researcher at Bristol Oncology Centre, said: "Until such time as the research assures us there are no health effects, short or long-term, then the more children themselves are informed, the better."