The author's 8-year-old daughter, Rosie, has a “child's license,” indicating that she has her parents' permission to ride her bike around her hometown in Texas.
Michaeline Doucleff
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Michaeline Doucleff
The author's 8-year-old daughter, Rosie, has a “child's license,” indicating that she has her parents' permission to ride her bike around her hometown in Texas.
Michaeline Doucleff
Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt says American children suffer from a toxic combination of too much screen time and too little autonomy.
In his new book, anxious generation, Haidt argues that these two important factors have combined to create the mental health crisis currently facing American teenagers. According to a study by KFF, a health care policy research institute, one in five adolescent girlfriends report symptoms of anxiety or depression. Mr. Haidt's book offers a series of recommendations to reverse both of these factors.
For example, Hite offers this advice to parents of children ages 6 to 13: “Practice moving your kids out of your sight so you can't reach them. Drop your kids off at school with them while you make dinner for a friend.” Even if it's necessary. Even if you don't have it, go to the grocery store and buy more garlic. ”
But as many parents know, increasing children's independence while delaying access to smartphones can be much more difficult than it seems.
Parents face resistance from many directions: school policy, neighbors, other parents, and even the law. Some parents have been prosecuted. So I wanted to talk to Mr. Haidt, a professor at New York University's Stern School of Management, about the details of implementing some of his recommendations.
I started the conversation by telling a story about my daughter, who was 7 years old at the time.
This conversation has been edited for length and clarity.
Last summer, my husband and I taught our daughter to walk or bike to the local market on her own. Within a few months, police stopped her not once but twice. Her first time, the police put her in the back of a police car and took her home, and she was so scared.
How do you give children more independence when law enforcement, neighborhoods, and communities aren't used to it?
Parents need to act collectively.
Step 1: State laws need to be changed to make it clear that giving children autonomy cannot itself be considered evidence of neglect.We've already passed that law in eight states. [Utah, Texas, Oklahoma, Colorado, Virginia, Connecticut, Illinois and Montana]. It is also being considered in many other places.
Step 2: Next, you need to change the group-level norms. And we can do that with something called Let Grow Experience.. Encourage elementary school administrators to download materials from Let Grow. [a nonprofit organization that Haidt co-founded to foster childhood independence]. This material provides teachers with instructions for assigning specific types of homework to children. The teacher tells the children: “Go home, talk to your parents and find out what you think.” can However, this has never been allowed. What you think you can do. ”
Like riding your bike to the store a few blocks away?
that's right. Children agree with their parents about what the task is. And the child will do this type of task once a month for 6 months.
The great thing about this challenge is that it changes the norm. Before I knew it, it was common to see my 8-year-old carrying her quart of milk. It's normal to see 9-year-olds riding bicycles. That's how you change the norm.
So after the second police incident, we actually went to the Let Grow website and printed out a little report. license It's something kids can carry around with them, saying their parents have given them permission to walk around town. And our daughter loved it too.
Oh, nice! It was my invention.
Thank you very much. It went well. In fact, we thought about going to the police with other parents and talking about how we want our kids to be able to walk and ride around the neighborhood without any problems.
Oh, I should have put that in the book. So, yeah, if a school implements a Let Grow Experience, they can have 10 parents go to the police station and say, “You know what? ”
In your book, you also recommend waiting until at least high school to give your kids a smartphone. As a parent, I've already heard parents talking about giving their 9-year-old a smartphone. How can I bring up the topic of being late without being judgmental or angry with other parents? I'm worried that I'll damage my children's friendships.
Why not suggest that your 9-year-old get a flip phone that only has phone and text functions? I can't access the internet.
Parents think the only choice is to have a smartphone or no phone. I thought so too. So when my son was in fourth grade, I gave him my old smartphone and started walking to school. It never occurred to me to give him a more basic phone. So it was just a failure of imagination. And interestingly, most of today's parents are millennials who grew up with flip phones. Foldable phones allow you to stay connected. It did them no harm. We see no evidence that flip phones have harmed Millennials. So give your 9 year old a flip phone.
Therefore, flip phones allow parents to communicate with their children when they are away from home without giving them access to the Internet and all the risks associated with it, such as the risk of bringing strangers into their lives. You will be able to communicate.
Yes, what businesses can actually use are devices linked to the internet. [and strangers] Delivered directly to your child. And that's really, really bad.
Oh, I hope many parents agree to this and make the switch to flip phones easier. I know I'll try.
It takes concerted action like this to change things. Parents are now feeling hopeless. But they shouldn't feel that way. Things will change quickly because we all want to change.
Last question: of anxious generation Especially when they are in junior high school, they pay attention to smartphones. But for many young children, iPads and game consoles can consume nearly all of their time outside of school. A developmental trajectory in which children acquire the habit of using screens from a very young age, and even when they actually have a mobile phone, it is difficult to regulate them because they have become accustomed to looking at screens for long periods of time. Is there one?
What you are describing is what I call a phone-based child. It doesn't start with your first smartphone. It starts from the first screen. When we talk about phones in this book, we don't just mean smartphones, but any device that can connect to the Internet.
If you keep all your children in the house alone because you're afraid to let them explore the neighborhood independently, they'll likely get bored. But what if we made more of an effort to spend time with other kids without screens? They'd come up with games to play. Send them outside and they'll find something to do. You know, there was a crime wave in the '60s and her '70s, but parents still let their kids go outside to play. Although many parts of the country are much safer today, we are still very afraid to let our children outside. If we take away screens from children, we must also give them freedom to go outside.
This article was edited by Jane Greenhalgh.
