One thing I find so sad is the phenomenon of parents who appologize for calling to check in on their child... "im so sorry to bother you, I promise I will get her a watch soon" or "I hate to be a pain, suzy forgot her phone, what time should I pick her up?"
It disconnects parents from other parents. The watches keep kids tethered to their parents... AT. ALL. TIMES. And the parents live in their little bubbles. This is a recipie for disaster on so many fronts, not the least of which is depression and anxiety. Parents dont hang out anymore. They aren't making new parent friends. I mean, I do... but im quite extroverted and still I find myself seeming pushier than I used to be... also lonlier.
I think we shouldnt be appologizing for making real connections with people. Especially when it involves our own kids. Its not rude to call another parent. Its not weird to ask to get to know another parent before a sleepover. It IS strange and a bit creepy to plant a speaker on your childs wrist so you can ALWAYS be with them.
I’m in a book club with other moms in their 40s and 50s. Each week some of the other moms get distracted by texts and phone calls from their kids who are at home. The kids are not home alone, the dads are there, so these calls are completely unnecessary. These constant interruptions break the flow and make it impossible to have a deep conversation. Hence more loneliness and feelings of disconnection among the moms. This never happened in book clubs I was in a decade ago when the kids didn’t have their own phones.
The constant tethering of kids to their parents through technology can create isolation rather than connection. It’s sad that parents feel the need to apologize for simple, caring gestures like checking in on their kids. This technology-driven separation can lead to loneliness and missed opportunities for building a supportive community.
Real connections are vital, and we shouldn’t feel awkward or intrusive for wanting to know the parents of our children’s friends. I find that encouraging more face-to-face interactions and fostering relationships between parents can help combat the loneliness and anxiety that seem all too common today. It’s all about creating a balance where technology supports us without isolating us. Your thoughts?
I’d love to share my own experience flexing the off-base muscle. We’re in Montana for a month with my 5 and 7 year olds. Right before coming on the trip I read Free Range Kids and it stuck with me. We signed them up for an outdoor camp that requires kids to ride their bikes without training wheels to the lake nearby (about 2 hilly miles each way) where they swim, eat lunch when they’re ready and have a pretty open experience. My 5 year old JUST learned to bike on two wheels the week before arriving and I was terrified thinking of them both out in the world biking and swimming without me. The counselors assured me she’d be fine and they’d take it slow but I was panicked all day. They came home and told me about jumping off the dock, learning to bike in a big group and begged to go back. She’s now on her second week of camp and SO proud of herself and I’m really proud of myself too for enabling them both to have that off-base experience that pushed them past anything they’ve done in their more comfortable routines.
It makes me so much more cognizant of the importance of free play away from screens (especially social media) for children. This post specifically made me think about how important it is to place trust in your children. Both so your own “trust muscle” is exercised and so the children develop independence and confidence. I had always thought that I would try to minimize my future children’s screen time, but these sources are making me realize that it’s crucial for children to have free play and learn independence early.
Thanks for this important piece Lenore! I would like to add my encouragement for parents to excerise the "trust muscle": Neither I nor my 16 year old son have a smartphone (landlines still meet all our needs:). He loves to go for long countryside runs, bike rides, jaunts in the nearby woods. He simply tells me where he is generally going and around what time he'll likely be back. This untethered freedom has allowed him to develop confidence and independence, solve potential problems in creative ways, and it helped me to trust his sense of judgement and reliability.
I LOVE that statement "it helped me to trust his sense of judgement" 👏👏👏
All the time when kids go from the pool over to the playground 100 yards away, its like "call me if you have a problem"... "be careful..." "do you have your water bottle??" And when I say nothing I get "the look" and I'm like "she's fine! I trust her judgement" ...thats like a statement of child abuse these days 🤦🏻♀️
Sounds a lot like what childhood used to be. How dare you trust your child to start making adult decisions and practice these things without you. It's outrageous that he might be, *gasp* autonomous.
What you describe is pretty similar to mine and my husband's upbringing as we got older. I'll keep it in mind for the future.
I'm not disagreeing with the argument that technology makes parents more anxious and overprotective / over-involved with their children, but I think this essay misses the *major* factor in how smartphones negatively affect parents, parent-child attachment, and child mental health.
Parents who are addicted to their phones are more likely to IGNORE their children for their phones, to be less attentive, to be snappy with small kids when they try to attract their parents' attention away from the phone. It's part of a larger pattern of "technology" and "modernity" (broadly speaking) separating parent and child, especially in the critical years of brain development and attachment formation in the first three years of life.
"Last month, in a post wondering “Are Millions “on the Spectrum” Now?”, Dr Naomi Wolf observed:
“I saw lots of affluent younger moms pull a plastic covering, like a clear Zip-Lock bag designed for baby humans, right over the toddlers in their strollers — rain or shine — and, as if the moms have closed up a business venue for the day, they’ll then wedge their phones against the push-bars of the stroller and walk the stroller, with their eyes glued to the screens.”
This is an extreme example. Most of the parents and nannies I observed on the long walks I took with my daughter, strapped in a wrap to my chest, were not on their phones (Wolf is in New York, I’m in Vancouver, and I imagine that would make a difference). But most were in strollers, and covered in some way. And it’s striking how much more my daughter got out of walks merely because she was strapped to my chest, her face near mine. She was more of a participant when I started conversations with other caregivers or chatted with my husband or a friend, she looked around at the world more, she put her hands on my face and demanded my attention. Strangers were more likely to come up and say “hi” to her. And she still got some great naps, pressed firmly against my body, her ear to my chest, listening to my heart.
The first “smartphone” was introduced in 1994, and the first iPhone in 2007. While researchers such as Jean Twenge and Jon Haidt have done a good job of discussing how smartphone use has negatively impacted children and teenagers’ mental health, they oddly—to my knowledge—do not discuss how smartphone use by parents might be playing a role: from 2006 to 2009, the number of 30-49-year-olds who were on social networks rose from 6% to 44%.
“I see many children on the streets of New York in their strollers, facing away from their mothers or nannies who are on their cell phones or who look disengaged themselves; they are anything but present. The babies have a glazed look in their eyes, which is the result of feeling disconnected from the person who is central to their secure attachment. This kind of emotional withdrawal is the basis for depression in older children, adolescents, and adults. In my consulting room I see the same look in the eyes of my adult patients who have experienced absent mothers.”
— Erica Komisar, Being There: Why Prioritizing Motherhood in the First Three Years Matters (2017), page 156
The “freeze” response to trauma is the dissociation response, which includes escaping into fantasy through books, TV, video games, and daydreams. Childhood emotional neglect—which includes being ignored by your primary caregiver(s)—is a significant trauma."
I totally agree. Parents' smartphone addiction is the elephant in the room in this whole discussion. And I do not blame parents for being addicted to their smartphones--I blame the culture that's normalized this, a culture created by the tech giants who want one thing: our unending engagement. Battling my own smartphone addiction, I actually took a drastic step and got a dumbphone a few months ago and it's been the best decision I've made in years--for myself and my whole family. I wish I'd done it a long time ago.
Smart :-/ I was good at staying off my phone when my daughter was under two, but since getting on Substack I've been pretty bad as well. Trying to be better.
I wonder if the stigma against "mom shaming" (ie parent shaming) and the fact that writers like Haidt, Lukianoff, and Twenge (and others) sell their books mostly to parents (I assume?) is a reason why they don't seem to want to touch this point. Twenge in particular frustrates me because 15+ years ago she wrote a bunch of articles and books about the "narcissism epidemic" that has supposedly been growing in magnitude since the 1980s, but now seemingly refuses to make the connection between that "narcissism epidemic" and the skyrocketing rates of poor mental health among the children of the same people ...
Substack can be a huge problem for me as well! I can only access it on my laptop now which has definitely helped. I commend you for staying off your phone when your daughter was really young. I was terrible about it during the infancy/early toddler years, and I carry a lot of guilt for that. My kids are 5 and 3 now and I finally have gotten a grip...better late than never!
I hear you on the parent shaming thing. But I think there's a way to talk about this without it being shaming (it's definitely tricky though). Cal Newport does it really well in Digital Minimalism. We are addicted to our phones not because of poor willpower but because the tech companies have literally spent billions of dollars researching how to make their products addictive. For years and years I beat myself up for my inability to cut down on my screentime...then one day it was just like, you know what? I'm done feeling guilty about being addicted to a device that was designed to be addictive. I just need to get rid of this thing altogether rather than expecting myself to miraculously manifest a herculean willpower and suddenly be able to hold better boundaries around my phone. In other words, shaming myself --which I did lots of for YEARS--had zero effect in changing my behavior. Only once I let go of the shame and accepted that it was the device that was the problem, not me, did I actually feel empowered enough to make this drastic change!
Haha I don't have the Substack app on my phone for this reason too! But I do a lot of research for my own Substack on it :-/ reading articles etc. Bad habit. About to have kid #2 so need to get my act together!
I was a stay at home mom and this does not offend me in any way. There is no shame in being a stay at home mom, and the point she was making is that they are/were able to go about their day without being anxious about where their child was and what their child was doing. Any stay at home mom offended by that phrase may need to take a moment and reflect.
I am a grandmother now and it is disheartening to see the technology taking away so many freedoms children once lived with. I have also learned that stay at home moms need to just own what they do and continue to do what they do without listening to those who judge them as "just chilling". I am also a retired teacher, ( I was a stay at home mom of 3 until I went to work when my youngest was 11), who hears that I just babysat all day and had summers off... Those who don't know better judge those that know better... Food for thought for those who work inside their home taking care of their families.... I have learned to just own what I do/did and not listen to the gallery!
My 15-year-old son was out on his e-bike on a trail after dark with his friend. Bike broke and they figured out how to get the several miles home. Both had phones; neither even thought of calling us for help as it was just an inconvenience and not a real emergency.
They have been free range kids since they were in preschool and take great pride in figuring out and solving their own problems.
And still - I like being able to have Find My when they are out exploring; if they aren’t home by the agreed-upon time I can check where they are, and if there is a real emergency they can call for help.
Lenore's excellent piece serves as an introduction to the much greater problem of the confluence of electronic parent helicoptering and the K-12 Surveillance State and the evolution of K-12 school Guidance Counseling into (therapeutic) Counseling.
Life360, Find My iPhone, Gaggle, and Lightspeed might be much greater contributors to the decrease in childhood agency, resilience, and independence than TikTok, Instagram, and SnapChat. Jonathan Haidt is focusing resources and attention on the wrong social media app culprits.
I coach competitive high school debate. Last year, one of my debaters related a story to me that opened my eyes to how harmful digital surveillance by adults is. They and a partner were practicing after school, scrimmaging in a practice round against another pair in preparation for an upcoming tournament. They were using a shared Google Doc to communicate strategy while delivering and listening to speeches. Things weren't going well for them and one of them typed to their partner "this really sucks. I think i'm going to kms".
They survived, but the next day their school counselor called them down to discuss suicidal ideation. "kms" is shorthand for "kill myself". Our school system uses the surveillance apps Gaggle and Lights peed to monitor all activity on school devices, wifi, and applications and that student's counselor had received a phone notification the moment the student typed "kms" on their school Chromebook. In a sense, Gaggle's notifications are no different than any social media notification.
I asked them if they were concerned that the State was watching them à la Big Brother. The response: "No. They just care."
Curious, I asked them if they had Life360 on their phone? "OMG! It's the bane of my existence!" As it turns out, though, the student didn't hate it because it enabled their parents to track them 24/7 and even set up notifications if they strayed outside of a geographic zone and when they arrived at planned destinations — the app drained their phone battery.
I asked them if they were concerned that their parents were watching them à la Big Brother. The response: "No. It just shows they care."
I asked this high school sophomore if they were going to delete the app once they went off to college? They hesitated a bit before saying, "If my parents let me."
I then asked if they would delete it when they graduated from college? Longer hesitation followed by a somewhat strangled, incoherent response.
My discussions with college students and graduates confirm the research that shows that these Gen Zers do not throw off these apps that allow not only Friends and Family to track them, but school administrators, when they reach adulthood. In fact, they not only get used to the constant surveillance, but welcome it and take comfort in it!
My final question to my debater — which turned out to be rhetorical — was, "What kind of person do we become if we grow up always aware that an adult authority figure is constantly watching us and ready to swoop in to save us from even the most insignificant of bad choices?" Like coming out of the wrong school door after wrestling practice?
Jonathan Haidt, Zach Rausch, and Greg Lukianoff know, since they wrote the valuable The Coddling of the American Mind, The Canceling of the American Mind, and The Anxious Generation.
Lenore's piece focuses on the social media apps parents use that undermine childhood agency and independence. We need to recognize that K-12 school administrators have their own social media apps that complement them. (Don't tell me that school counselors don't have their own FOMO excitement when they get a phone tone announcing a student's "bad digital choice" — Abigail Shrier's "Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren't Growing Up" should warn us sufficiently about that)
This is why focusing only on the social media kids use seriously misses out on the dangers of the apps adults use and Lenore touches on in this piece.
what a fascinating perspective on the student's part, that surveilling your children shows them you care. I have a friend who tracks her children and grandchildren, even her close friends, constantly, and she frets as to their whereabouts, insisting that they are safer because of it. I understand her perspective, but I can't see myself ever aligning with it.
I completely agree with you. Recently I overhead two women in their mid-twenties discussing how their Dads still have access to their phones location at all times. Parents who track their tweens will be tracking their adult children. And telling a child they need to be tracked for their own safety sends the message that the world is incredibly dangerous. So we're telling kids every single day that the world is dangerous and then we're surprised they're anxious and blaming tiktok!?
This type of tracking also makes the parents more anxious, because they never learn to go without it. It starts even before the kids themselves have phones, with nurseries and schools now sending regular updates on a child's day to the parents phone through an app.
I recently saw an advert for a ring door bell, which showed someone sitting on a beach on holiday looking on their phone at doorbell footage of their car back home. It said something about "peace of mind". And I thought: that's not peace of mind, that's paranoia.
Fantastic article. We are slowly letting our older children (8, 10, 12, and 14) have more independence with biking around the trails in the areas in our neighborhood as well as biking to a friend’s house about half a mile away. All without a phone/watch/any way of communicating with us.
One thing that has helped me be more okay with giving them more and more freedom is that a friend of mine is even *more* comfortable giving her children opportunities for independence and that sort of thing is contagious. What our friends do becomes more acceptable for us to do, too. In this case, it’s been extremely positive peer influence. So here’s to a whole lot more parents letting their kids do things without them!
We were out to dinner with my 2 grandsons, age 9 and 7. We rode our bikes downtown to the restaurant on a multiuse path. They finished dinner before us, and I suggested they take their bikes and explore. They were familiar with the path which was along the creek but had never gone alone. There was one spot where they had to cross a road to continue on the path that we had done many times together, so I knew they understood waiting until the cars stopped at the crosswalk before continuing. I had forgotten that the 7yr old's helmet strap had become undone. I could see them out the window and noticed that he was working on something, yes, he, on his own, got the strap back on and put on his helmet. While they were out exploring, out of sight, friends came into the restaurant and sat with us and had a drink. After a while they came back and we were still chatting with friends. I suggested they go down to the ice cream shop and get some ice cream. "You have to order and pay, bring back the change" was all I said. They came back in a bit, cone and change in hand. We enjoyed a drink with friends and they enjoyed some independence. Win-Win
This article reminds me of a few misadventures I had while a novice driver. In the first one, I got into a ditch while turning on a snowy road. Within minutes, a farmer turned up on a tractor and towed me out, no charge, big smile. Worse than that, I was on my way home, late in the evening, when my radiator went bad and I had to pull over on a highway. I walked to the nearest house and asked if I could use their phone. No problem! They allowed me to wait in their home until my dad picked me up and the car was still there in the morning. It strikes me that he world has lost some helpfulness in the intervening years, and that makes me sad.
Thank you for this article. I'm 36 years old and have not had a cell phone for the last 2 years (I've never owned a smart phone.) I'm expecting my first baby in a couple of months. The general reaction from those around me is "well you will have no choice but to get a cell phone now." In their world, a cell phone is the epitome of safety and the only way to communicate. But in fact, my desire to resist a smart phone, let alone a cell phone altogether, is stronger than it has ever been. I'm not even a parent yet and I'm already dreading these confrontations.
There are families who are unconventional with technology and have thriving kids. You'll get pressure from people, but it's okay to follow your instincts. Maybe these stories will encourage you if you have to deal with confrontations.
the compulsory desire to whack oneself repeatedly upon the head with a bat is somewhat less than that of checking one's smartphone 24/7, though I do see your point.
well using a baseball bat (to the head) is not an addictive activity, using a phone is. It is particularly addictive to young, immature, underdeveloped brains. It DOES become the activity of choice for many kids, at the expense of experiencing (and being open and available to) other more valuable and even critical developmental activities. Parents, this is on US!!
Well driving on the wrong side of the road is illegal, there's that! Phones are designed to be addictive, it's their business model. This is well-known by medical experts. It's all about educating parents on the effects of too much screentime on kids, and positive alternatives. There is a cost to too much screentime!
Everything is addictive when the person has an addictive personality, which is what John Dewey's educational philosophies were based on. Most addictions are spun off of that to the television beginning with its use to babysit infants.
Exactly! And we are seeing that play out younger and younger! The difference with TVs and smartphones are that one is passive, the other is not, One is interactive the other is not. One requires action from the user, the other does not. Did you know that 90% of adult addictions start in the teenage years?
When my kid was tiny, and I was still hovering under them as they climbed higher and higher on the playground, another mom put her arm on my shoulder and said, “They’ll be ok. See how they test their footing before they move? And they keep looking around? They’ve got this, mama. You can give them space. Breathe.”
I have always been grateful for her. That lesson stuck.
We have to exercise our trust muscles little by little as they grow their independence muscles.
That’s the journey.
And oh, community helps. The wisdom of other parents whose kids have survived and thrived makes such a difference.
God bless Jon Haidt. The world is a better place because he is in it.
Jon—and associates—beautifully describe so many perspectives and choices that can make parenting much more effective. There is, however, still a missing ingredient. No matter how perfectly we engineer seeds, and till or drill the earth, and fertilize, it’s all useless until we add water. And children need love—unconditional love, without impatience or irritation—as much as the soil needs water to produce crops. Our discussions about phones and independent play and more are lovely, even elegant, but they won’t create happy children without that single thing that children need.
So what are the real solutions, simply expressed?
1. No phones or social media at all—no unobserved use of the Internet at all—for any minor child living at home. The kids simply don’t need it. Phones are destroying the real joy of life for children and parents, as Jon has said.
2. Teach parents how to unconditionally love their children, which very few parents can do. No indictment here, they just don’t know how. Controlling children or enabling them is not loving them. And parents don’t have to figure out unconditional love and guidance on their own. Just go to the free and agenda-free websites RealLove.com and RealLoveParents.com. I have nothing to sell. But I do offer thirty—30—years of intense experience with teaching parents and children all over the world. It’s love they need, not social media or phones or indulgence or entertainment.
One thing I find so sad is the phenomenon of parents who appologize for calling to check in on their child... "im so sorry to bother you, I promise I will get her a watch soon" or "I hate to be a pain, suzy forgot her phone, what time should I pick her up?"
It disconnects parents from other parents. The watches keep kids tethered to their parents... AT. ALL. TIMES. And the parents live in their little bubbles. This is a recipie for disaster on so many fronts, not the least of which is depression and anxiety. Parents dont hang out anymore. They aren't making new parent friends. I mean, I do... but im quite extroverted and still I find myself seeming pushier than I used to be... also lonlier.
I think we shouldnt be appologizing for making real connections with people. Especially when it involves our own kids. Its not rude to call another parent. Its not weird to ask to get to know another parent before a sleepover. It IS strange and a bit creepy to plant a speaker on your childs wrist so you can ALWAYS be with them.
This is such an interesting point Nyla. I had not thought about how phones can break the connection between parents with other parents.
I’m in a book club with other moms in their 40s and 50s. Each week some of the other moms get distracted by texts and phone calls from their kids who are at home. The kids are not home alone, the dads are there, so these calls are completely unnecessary. These constant interruptions break the flow and make it impossible to have a deep conversation. Hence more loneliness and feelings of disconnection among the moms. This never happened in book clubs I was in a decade ago when the kids didn’t have their own phones.
Yes! Very insightful and I believe accurate.
Nyla, you've highlighted an important issue.
The constant tethering of kids to their parents through technology can create isolation rather than connection. It’s sad that parents feel the need to apologize for simple, caring gestures like checking in on their kids. This technology-driven separation can lead to loneliness and missed opportunities for building a supportive community.
Real connections are vital, and we shouldn’t feel awkward or intrusive for wanting to know the parents of our children’s friends. I find that encouraging more face-to-face interactions and fostering relationships between parents can help combat the loneliness and anxiety that seem all too common today. It’s all about creating a balance where technology supports us without isolating us. Your thoughts?
Excellent! Great insight.
I’d love to share my own experience flexing the off-base muscle. We’re in Montana for a month with my 5 and 7 year olds. Right before coming on the trip I read Free Range Kids and it stuck with me. We signed them up for an outdoor camp that requires kids to ride their bikes without training wheels to the lake nearby (about 2 hilly miles each way) where they swim, eat lunch when they’re ready and have a pretty open experience. My 5 year old JUST learned to bike on two wheels the week before arriving and I was terrified thinking of them both out in the world biking and swimming without me. The counselors assured me she’d be fine and they’d take it slow but I was panicked all day. They came home and told me about jumping off the dock, learning to bike in a big group and begged to go back. She’s now on her second week of camp and SO proud of herself and I’m really proud of myself too for enabling them both to have that off-base experience that pushed them past anything they’ve done in their more comfortable routines.
Rachel, that's a wonderful story of embracing new challenges and growing together as a family.
How has this experience changed your perspective on giving your kids more freedom and encouraging their independence?
The Anxious Generation, this substack, and posts like this are absolutely changing how I will parent when I have my own children in the future.
In what ways, Zion?
It makes me so much more cognizant of the importance of free play away from screens (especially social media) for children. This post specifically made me think about how important it is to place trust in your children. Both so your own “trust muscle” is exercised and so the children develop independence and confidence. I had always thought that I would try to minimize my future children’s screen time, but these sources are making me realize that it’s crucial for children to have free play and learn independence early.
Thanks for this important piece Lenore! I would like to add my encouragement for parents to excerise the "trust muscle": Neither I nor my 16 year old son have a smartphone (landlines still meet all our needs:). He loves to go for long countryside runs, bike rides, jaunts in the nearby woods. He simply tells me where he is generally going and around what time he'll likely be back. This untethered freedom has allowed him to develop confidence and independence, solve potential problems in creative ways, and it helped me to trust his sense of judgement and reliability.
I LOVE that statement "it helped me to trust his sense of judgement" 👏👏👏
All the time when kids go from the pool over to the playground 100 yards away, its like "call me if you have a problem"... "be careful..." "do you have your water bottle??" And when I say nothing I get "the look" and I'm like "she's fine! I trust her judgement" ...thats like a statement of child abuse these days 🤦🏻♀️
Sounds a lot like what childhood used to be. How dare you trust your child to start making adult decisions and practice these things without you. It's outrageous that he might be, *gasp* autonomous.
What you describe is pretty similar to mine and my husband's upbringing as we got older. I'll keep it in mind for the future.
I'm not disagreeing with the argument that technology makes parents more anxious and overprotective / over-involved with their children, but I think this essay misses the *major* factor in how smartphones negatively affect parents, parent-child attachment, and child mental health.
Parents who are addicted to their phones are more likely to IGNORE their children for their phones, to be less attentive, to be snappy with small kids when they try to attract their parents' attention away from the phone. It's part of a larger pattern of "technology" and "modernity" (broadly speaking) separating parent and child, especially in the critical years of brain development and attachment formation in the first three years of life.
https://thecassandracomplex.substack.com/p/the-lost-girls-and-boys
Excerpt from the essay linked above:
"Last month, in a post wondering “Are Millions “on the Spectrum” Now?”, Dr Naomi Wolf observed:
“I saw lots of affluent younger moms pull a plastic covering, like a clear Zip-Lock bag designed for baby humans, right over the toddlers in their strollers — rain or shine — and, as if the moms have closed up a business venue for the day, they’ll then wedge their phones against the push-bars of the stroller and walk the stroller, with their eyes glued to the screens.”
This is an extreme example. Most of the parents and nannies I observed on the long walks I took with my daughter, strapped in a wrap to my chest, were not on their phones (Wolf is in New York, I’m in Vancouver, and I imagine that would make a difference). But most were in strollers, and covered in some way. And it’s striking how much more my daughter got out of walks merely because she was strapped to my chest, her face near mine. She was more of a participant when I started conversations with other caregivers or chatted with my husband or a friend, she looked around at the world more, she put her hands on my face and demanded my attention. Strangers were more likely to come up and say “hi” to her. And she still got some great naps, pressed firmly against my body, her ear to my chest, listening to my heart.
The first “smartphone” was introduced in 1994, and the first iPhone in 2007. While researchers such as Jean Twenge and Jon Haidt have done a good job of discussing how smartphone use has negatively impacted children and teenagers’ mental health, they oddly—to my knowledge—do not discuss how smartphone use by parents might be playing a role: from 2006 to 2009, the number of 30-49-year-olds who were on social networks rose from 6% to 44%.
“I see many children on the streets of New York in their strollers, facing away from their mothers or nannies who are on their cell phones or who look disengaged themselves; they are anything but present. The babies have a glazed look in their eyes, which is the result of feeling disconnected from the person who is central to their secure attachment. This kind of emotional withdrawal is the basis for depression in older children, adolescents, and adults. In my consulting room I see the same look in the eyes of my adult patients who have experienced absent mothers.”
— Erica Komisar, Being There: Why Prioritizing Motherhood in the First Three Years Matters (2017), page 156
The “freeze” response to trauma is the dissociation response, which includes escaping into fantasy through books, TV, video games, and daydreams. Childhood emotional neglect—which includes being ignored by your primary caregiver(s)—is a significant trauma."
I totally agree. Parents' smartphone addiction is the elephant in the room in this whole discussion. And I do not blame parents for being addicted to their smartphones--I blame the culture that's normalized this, a culture created by the tech giants who want one thing: our unending engagement. Battling my own smartphone addiction, I actually took a drastic step and got a dumbphone a few months ago and it's been the best decision I've made in years--for myself and my whole family. I wish I'd done it a long time ago.
Smart :-/ I was good at staying off my phone when my daughter was under two, but since getting on Substack I've been pretty bad as well. Trying to be better.
I wonder if the stigma against "mom shaming" (ie parent shaming) and the fact that writers like Haidt, Lukianoff, and Twenge (and others) sell their books mostly to parents (I assume?) is a reason why they don't seem to want to touch this point. Twenge in particular frustrates me because 15+ years ago she wrote a bunch of articles and books about the "narcissism epidemic" that has supposedly been growing in magnitude since the 1980s, but now seemingly refuses to make the connection between that "narcissism epidemic" and the skyrocketing rates of poor mental health among the children of the same people ...
Substack can be a huge problem for me as well! I can only access it on my laptop now which has definitely helped. I commend you for staying off your phone when your daughter was really young. I was terrible about it during the infancy/early toddler years, and I carry a lot of guilt for that. My kids are 5 and 3 now and I finally have gotten a grip...better late than never!
I hear you on the parent shaming thing. But I think there's a way to talk about this without it being shaming (it's definitely tricky though). Cal Newport does it really well in Digital Minimalism. We are addicted to our phones not because of poor willpower but because the tech companies have literally spent billions of dollars researching how to make their products addictive. For years and years I beat myself up for my inability to cut down on my screentime...then one day it was just like, you know what? I'm done feeling guilty about being addicted to a device that was designed to be addictive. I just need to get rid of this thing altogether rather than expecting myself to miraculously manifest a herculean willpower and suddenly be able to hold better boundaries around my phone. In other words, shaming myself --which I did lots of for YEARS--had zero effect in changing my behavior. Only once I let go of the shame and accepted that it was the device that was the problem, not me, did I actually feel empowered enough to make this drastic change!
Haha I don't have the Substack app on my phone for this reason too! But I do a lot of research for my own Substack on it :-/ reading articles etc. Bad habit. About to have kid #2 so need to get my act together!
You're a strong mom, Meghan.
I think the jury's out on that one, but I'm TRYING.
Please don't perpetuate the damaging myth that stay-at-home-parenting, even if you have school aged children, is "chilling for six hours a day".
I was a stay at home mom and this does not offend me in any way. There is no shame in being a stay at home mom, and the point she was making is that they are/were able to go about their day without being anxious about where their child was and what their child was doing. Any stay at home mom offended by that phrase may need to take a moment and reflect.
Thank you for the reframe. I see what you're saying now, but I don't think that was clear from the language used.
I am a grandmother now and it is disheartening to see the technology taking away so many freedoms children once lived with. I have also learned that stay at home moms need to just own what they do and continue to do what they do without listening to those who judge them as "just chilling". I am also a retired teacher, ( I was a stay at home mom of 3 until I went to work when my youngest was 11), who hears that I just babysat all day and had summers off... Those who don't know better judge those that know better... Food for thought for those who work inside their home taking care of their families.... I have learned to just own what I do/did and not listen to the gallery!
teaching and raising kids are two of the toughest jobs out there. i tip my hat to you!
Thank you.
I agree with you. It was an odd bit to place in an otherwise great article.
My 15-year-old son was out on his e-bike on a trail after dark with his friend. Bike broke and they figured out how to get the several miles home. Both had phones; neither even thought of calling us for help as it was just an inconvenience and not a real emergency.
They have been free range kids since they were in preschool and take great pride in figuring out and solving their own problems.
And still - I like being able to have Find My when they are out exploring; if they aren’t home by the agreed-upon time I can check where they are, and if there is a real emergency they can call for help.
It’s all a matter of how you use the tool!
Lenore's excellent piece serves as an introduction to the much greater problem of the confluence of electronic parent helicoptering and the K-12 Surveillance State and the evolution of K-12 school Guidance Counseling into (therapeutic) Counseling.
Life360, Find My iPhone, Gaggle, and Lightspeed might be much greater contributors to the decrease in childhood agency, resilience, and independence than TikTok, Instagram, and SnapChat. Jonathan Haidt is focusing resources and attention on the wrong social media app culprits.
I coach competitive high school debate. Last year, one of my debaters related a story to me that opened my eyes to how harmful digital surveillance by adults is. They and a partner were practicing after school, scrimmaging in a practice round against another pair in preparation for an upcoming tournament. They were using a shared Google Doc to communicate strategy while delivering and listening to speeches. Things weren't going well for them and one of them typed to their partner "this really sucks. I think i'm going to kms".
They survived, but the next day their school counselor called them down to discuss suicidal ideation. "kms" is shorthand for "kill myself". Our school system uses the surveillance apps Gaggle and Lights peed to monitor all activity on school devices, wifi, and applications and that student's counselor had received a phone notification the moment the student typed "kms" on their school Chromebook. In a sense, Gaggle's notifications are no different than any social media notification.
I asked them if they were concerned that the State was watching them à la Big Brother. The response: "No. They just care."
Curious, I asked them if they had Life360 on their phone? "OMG! It's the bane of my existence!" As it turns out, though, the student didn't hate it because it enabled their parents to track them 24/7 and even set up notifications if they strayed outside of a geographic zone and when they arrived at planned destinations — the app drained their phone battery.
I asked them if they were concerned that their parents were watching them à la Big Brother. The response: "No. It just shows they care."
I asked this high school sophomore if they were going to delete the app once they went off to college? They hesitated a bit before saying, "If my parents let me."
I then asked if they would delete it when they graduated from college? Longer hesitation followed by a somewhat strangled, incoherent response.
My discussions with college students and graduates confirm the research that shows that these Gen Zers do not throw off these apps that allow not only Friends and Family to track them, but school administrators, when they reach adulthood. In fact, they not only get used to the constant surveillance, but welcome it and take comfort in it!
My final question to my debater — which turned out to be rhetorical — was, "What kind of person do we become if we grow up always aware that an adult authority figure is constantly watching us and ready to swoop in to save us from even the most insignificant of bad choices?" Like coming out of the wrong school door after wrestling practice?
Jonathan Haidt, Zach Rausch, and Greg Lukianoff know, since they wrote the valuable The Coddling of the American Mind, The Canceling of the American Mind, and The Anxious Generation.
Lenore's piece focuses on the social media apps parents use that undermine childhood agency and independence. We need to recognize that K-12 school administrators have their own social media apps that complement them. (Don't tell me that school counselors don't have their own FOMO excitement when they get a phone tone announcing a student's "bad digital choice" — Abigail Shrier's "Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren't Growing Up" should warn us sufficiently about that)
This is why focusing only on the social media kids use seriously misses out on the dangers of the apps adults use and Lenore touches on in this piece.
what a fascinating perspective on the student's part, that surveilling your children shows them you care. I have a friend who tracks her children and grandchildren, even her close friends, constantly, and she frets as to their whereabouts, insisting that they are safer because of it. I understand her perspective, but I can't see myself ever aligning with it.
I completely agree with you. Recently I overhead two women in their mid-twenties discussing how their Dads still have access to their phones location at all times. Parents who track their tweens will be tracking their adult children. And telling a child they need to be tracked for their own safety sends the message that the world is incredibly dangerous. So we're telling kids every single day that the world is dangerous and then we're surprised they're anxious and blaming tiktok!?
This type of tracking also makes the parents more anxious, because they never learn to go without it. It starts even before the kids themselves have phones, with nurseries and schools now sending regular updates on a child's day to the parents phone through an app.
I recently saw an advert for a ring door bell, which showed someone sitting on a beach on holiday looking on their phone at doorbell footage of their car back home. It said something about "peace of mind". And I thought: that's not peace of mind, that's paranoia.
Fantastic article. We are slowly letting our older children (8, 10, 12, and 14) have more independence with biking around the trails in the areas in our neighborhood as well as biking to a friend’s house about half a mile away. All without a phone/watch/any way of communicating with us.
One thing that has helped me be more okay with giving them more and more freedom is that a friend of mine is even *more* comfortable giving her children opportunities for independence and that sort of thing is contagious. What our friends do becomes more acceptable for us to do, too. In this case, it’s been extremely positive peer influence. So here’s to a whole lot more parents letting their kids do things without them!
We were out to dinner with my 2 grandsons, age 9 and 7. We rode our bikes downtown to the restaurant on a multiuse path. They finished dinner before us, and I suggested they take their bikes and explore. They were familiar with the path which was along the creek but had never gone alone. There was one spot where they had to cross a road to continue on the path that we had done many times together, so I knew they understood waiting until the cars stopped at the crosswalk before continuing. I had forgotten that the 7yr old's helmet strap had become undone. I could see them out the window and noticed that he was working on something, yes, he, on his own, got the strap back on and put on his helmet. While they were out exploring, out of sight, friends came into the restaurant and sat with us and had a drink. After a while they came back and we were still chatting with friends. I suggested they go down to the ice cream shop and get some ice cream. "You have to order and pay, bring back the change" was all I said. They came back in a bit, cone and change in hand. We enjoyed a drink with friends and they enjoyed some independence. Win-Win
This article reminds me of a few misadventures I had while a novice driver. In the first one, I got into a ditch while turning on a snowy road. Within minutes, a farmer turned up on a tractor and towed me out, no charge, big smile. Worse than that, I was on my way home, late in the evening, when my radiator went bad and I had to pull over on a highway. I walked to the nearest house and asked if I could use their phone. No problem! They allowed me to wait in their home until my dad picked me up and the car was still there in the morning. It strikes me that he world has lost some helpfulness in the intervening years, and that makes me sad.
Thank you for this article. I'm 36 years old and have not had a cell phone for the last 2 years (I've never owned a smart phone.) I'm expecting my first baby in a couple of months. The general reaction from those around me is "well you will have no choice but to get a cell phone now." In their world, a cell phone is the epitome of safety and the only way to communicate. But in fact, my desire to resist a smart phone, let alone a cell phone altogether, is stronger than it has ever been. I'm not even a parent yet and I'm already dreading these confrontations.
There are families who are unconventional with technology and have thriving kids. You'll get pressure from people, but it's okay to follow your instincts. Maybe these stories will encourage you if you have to deal with confrontations.
https://screenstrong.substack.com/p/your-teen-will-have-friends-without
https://www.afterbabel.com/p/modern-luddites-on-being-a-digital
https://screenstrong.substack.com/p/can-you-raise-a-teen-today-without
Blaming phones for making us anxious is like blaming the baseball bat for the headache it caused by hitting ourselves over the head with it.
the compulsory desire to whack oneself repeatedly upon the head with a bat is somewhat less than that of checking one's smartphone 24/7, though I do see your point.
They are comparably damaging to the user.
true enough!
well using a baseball bat (to the head) is not an addictive activity, using a phone is. It is particularly addictive to young, immature, underdeveloped brains. It DOES become the activity of choice for many kids, at the expense of experiencing (and being open and available to) other more valuable and even critical developmental activities. Parents, this is on US!!
Driving on the correct side of the street is equally addictive for the same reason.
If using a phone is addictive, perhaps CPS should take children away from parents that addict their children to them.
Well driving on the wrong side of the road is illegal, there's that! Phones are designed to be addictive, it's their business model. This is well-known by medical experts. It's all about educating parents on the effects of too much screentime on kids, and positive alternatives. There is a cost to too much screentime!
Everything is addictive when the person has an addictive personality, which is what John Dewey's educational philosophies were based on. Most addictions are spun off of that to the television beginning with its use to babysit infants.
Exactly! And we are seeing that play out younger and younger! The difference with TVs and smartphones are that one is passive, the other is not, One is interactive the other is not. One requires action from the user, the other does not. Did you know that 90% of adult addictions start in the teenage years?
Kindly cite the source of the 90% datum.
Finally someone said it!
We are our own cause 😹
We always have been.
Best article on the parent side -they install fear and feeling of incompetence by always intervening or overseeing.
This started before phones with the millennial parents who wanted to micromanage their kids perfect life experiences.
When my kid was tiny, and I was still hovering under them as they climbed higher and higher on the playground, another mom put her arm on my shoulder and said, “They’ll be ok. See how they test their footing before they move? And they keep looking around? They’ve got this, mama. You can give them space. Breathe.”
I have always been grateful for her. That lesson stuck.
We have to exercise our trust muscles little by little as they grow their independence muscles.
That’s the journey.
And oh, community helps. The wisdom of other parents whose kids have survived and thrived makes such a difference.
God bless Jon Haidt. The world is a better place because he is in it.
Jon—and associates—beautifully describe so many perspectives and choices that can make parenting much more effective. There is, however, still a missing ingredient. No matter how perfectly we engineer seeds, and till or drill the earth, and fertilize, it’s all useless until we add water. And children need love—unconditional love, without impatience or irritation—as much as the soil needs water to produce crops. Our discussions about phones and independent play and more are lovely, even elegant, but they won’t create happy children without that single thing that children need.
So what are the real solutions, simply expressed?
1. No phones or social media at all—no unobserved use of the Internet at all—for any minor child living at home. The kids simply don’t need it. Phones are destroying the real joy of life for children and parents, as Jon has said.
2. Teach parents how to unconditionally love their children, which very few parents can do. No indictment here, they just don’t know how. Controlling children or enabling them is not loving them. And parents don’t have to figure out unconditional love and guidance on their own. Just go to the free and agenda-free websites RealLove.com and RealLoveParents.com. I have nothing to sell. But I do offer thirty—30—years of intense experience with teaching parents and children all over the world. It’s love they need, not social media or phones or indulgence or entertainment.