Smart Phones and Social Media Access: What to Know Before The Genie Is Out of the Bottle
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Members of the Families Connected Parent Advisory at a tour of allcove, Beach Cities
We thank the members of our Families Connected Parent Advisory for sharing their lived experience around giving their children devices and access to social media. Their hope, and ours, is to help South Bay parents and caregivers avoid the negative mental health and behavioral impact smart phones and social media can drive.
When your kid says “everyone has an iPhone” know that’s not true. Also, know even more who have given their 3rd - 7th grader a smart phone wish they hadn’t. Why?
“The things they lose far outweigh any benefit of getting a smart phone before 8th grade.” Examples include building problem solving skills, connecting with family in real time, avoiding damaging access to things they “can’t unsee”, and staving off obsessive thoughts of FOMO and anxiety about perceived social slights and adequate sleep. (Scroll to the bottom for more insight provided by the Social Media and Youth Mental Health, U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory)
“Before 16, they aren’t developmentally equipped to use social media for good, or behave appropriately on the variety of platforms smart phones place in the palm of their hand.”
“Tech changes so quickly that they will not be at a disadvantage if they don’t have a smart phone until 8th or 9th”
Know that you have the ability to help build your child’s resilience, bolster their self-control and foster digital citizenship in advance of giving them a smart phone.
“The most important thing? Modeling healthy use ourselves.”
“Acknowledge and discuss the challenges with social media and screen time use and ask why they consider it important to them, including what they believe makes them feel connected, and what could be damaging.”
“Let them know that the ultimate goal is to hand autonomy over to them, once they have the tools to self-monitor. Until then, give them incremental steps along the way that are age-appropriate.”
“Don’t disparage or dismiss their desire for access and autonomy around smart phone and screen use. That push for autonomy is in their nature. And as their parents, it’s on us to prepare them and help them avoid negative consequences of use.”
“Together as a family, establish guidelines and limits that make sense. Involve your teen in that process.”
When you do decide the time is right, know that there are age-appropriate controls and boundaries you will need to establish to reduce their potential harm and maximize success.
“Using iPhone Parental Controls, you can shut down the phone before bedtime and approve what apps are downloaded. Consider insight into those apps great opportunity for your own education and understanding about what interests your child and the world available to them.”
“As parents, we are the ones handing our children the phones. When the rules we’ve established aren’t being complied with, we do have the right to limit their screen time, or take their phones away. We know that’s not easy.”
“As parents, we also have to understand that even with the best parental controls and appropriate monitoring, our kids are ten steps ahead of us, which comes back to staving off use until they are developmentally ready and have begun to develop resilience and balance.”
Click HERE or on the image below to access trusted resources to help support you in staving off early access to smart devices, and helping your teen manage social media and screentime in healthy ways.
Looking for more insight? Here are key take aways from the Social Media and Youth Mental Health, U.S. Surgeon General’s Advisory:
Adolescence and childhood represents a critical stage in brain development that can make young people more vulnerable to harms from social media.
There is growing evidence that social media use is associated with harm to young people’s mental health.
Adolescent social media use is predictive of a subsequent decrease in life satisfaction for certain developmental stages, including for girls 11-13 and boys 14-15.
Adolescents who spend more than three hours a day on social media faced double the risk of experiencing poor mental health outcomes, including symptoms of anxiety and depression.
Potential risk of harm from content exposure includes risk-taking challenges, self harm, body dissatisfaction and low self-esteem.
When asked about the impact of social media on their body image, nearly half (46%) of adolescents aged 13-17 said social media made them feel worse.
In a review of 36 studies, a consistent relationship was found between cyberbullying via social media and depression among children and adolescents.
Nearly 6 in 10 adolescent girls say they’ve been contacted by a stranger on certain social media platforms in ways that make them feel uncomfortable.
A systematic review of 42 studies on the effects of excessive social media use found. A consistent relationship between social media use and poor sleep quality, reduced sleep duration, sleep difficulties, and depression among youth.
Nearly 70% of parents say parenting is now more difficult than it was 20 years ago, with technology and social media cited as the top two cited reasons.
Advice from the Center for Humane Technology on how parents can foster positive mental health practices and online citizenship:
Makes the trivial seem urgent: Notifications (vibrations, red dots, flashing lights, banners) constantly trigger the salience network, effectively fooling us that something new but trivial is urgent.
Encourages seeking without fulfillment: Technology often capitalizes on the potency of wanting, providing endless possibilities for seeking but few experiences that satiate. We might find fleeting pleasure, but no enduring satisfaction.
Forces us to multitask: Social media inspires this multitasking, which affects our cognitive control, emotions, and, ultimately, our brains. These platforms keep us continuously engaged, triggering repetitive, automated behavior and weakening activation in the prefrontal cognitive control regions of our brains. A National Academy of Sciences working group found that media multitasking among youth is associated with poorer memory, increased impulsivity, and changes in brain function.
Weaponizes fear and anxiety: Negative information garners more attention and shapes emotion and behavior more powerfully than positive information. It is unsurprising that social media content generating fear, anger, and disgust spreads much faster than positive content.
By, Laura Short McIntire, SBFC’s Program Director
Laura facilitates the Families Connected Advisory and co-hosts the Families Connected Parent Chat.
