Attentional networks as moderators of the relationship between digital technology use and mental health among Cuban university students

The intensive use of digital technologies has become a central element of university life, with potential implications for mental health. There remains a need to understand the cognitive mechanisms that modulate these relationships. The objective of this research is to analyze the relationship between the use of and attitudes toward digital technologies and mental health (anxiety, depression, and perceived stress), as well as the moderating role of the alerting, orienting, and executive attentional networks in Cuban university students. A total of 250 university students participated, selected through non-probabilistic sampling, from different fields of knowledge. Attention was assessed using the Attentional Network Test (ANT), while anxiety, depression, and stress were measured using the GAD-7, PHQ-9, and PSS-10 instruments, respectively. ICT use and attitudes were grouped through exploratory factor analysis. Moderation analyses with conditional effects estimation were conducted. Digital communication and social mobile phone use, as well as attitudes of technological dependence, were positively associated with higher levels of anxiety, depression, and perceived stress, whereas recreational and informational digital consumption did not show significant associations. Formal moderation by attentional networks was not supported. Exploratory inspection of simple slopes revealed directionally consistent patterns, particularly for the orienting network in relation to stress, that are theoretically coherent and warrant investigation in future studies specifically powered to detect interaction effects. These findings underscore the relevance of socially oriented digital use as a risk factor for psychological distress in constrained-connectivity contexts, and highlight the need for future research integrating attentional functioning, emotional regulation, and digital literacy.