I found this article because of what the series Adolescence made me realise.
With phones, my main worries aren’t around the kinds of content my kids are consuming. For years, including before their pre-phone lives, we’ve talked about how what you put into your head can influence how you think and see the world, and how what is put out into the world isn’t necessarily real.
My worries aren’t massively about social media either. We’ve talked about it a lot with them, and they’ve talked to us about being on the all year school whatsapp groups (yes, they exist and generate 100’s of meaningless messages daily, often late into the night). My kids left them very quickly (and never have phones late, even with our 16 year old, downtime kicks in at 9:30). The DM side of things is a bit more concerning as they get older, but we’re talking about that more too.
My two big worries are about what it’s doing to their brain and attention spans, and the precious childhood time wasted.
That last one is a particularly potent trigger for me. One of the ways I diverge from the norm is my near-constant need to be doing things. TV of an evening doesn’t help me unwind. The best way I know to relax is a hot bath and a book, because when you’re in a bath you can’t get stuff done. When I feel this trigger getting pulled, I try to remind myself that I also spent hours messing around, playing video games and all that. I try to limit my nag to one and succeed probably 50% of the time, but at least I’m in control.
When it comes to what it’s doing to their brains, I’m definitely not in control. So I dug into this area of screens, brains and kids. Not a proper study, but I swam through a lot of unqualified, overly repeated crap before I hit currents of fresh insight. On the brain front, it’s just too early to really know what’s really happening. But experts keep talking about the following fundamentals -
The brain adapts to its environment, neuroplasticity.
If you don’t practice it, you lose it. Like those things my son’s trying to remember to pass exams, like I did. 30 years on, most of it’s left my brain because I’ve not needed it.
Filling space and time instead of letting the mind wander isn’t what the brain has evolved to cope with.
That’s when I found this article and realised my thinking was too narrow. Just read -
“But they are all missing the point, according to clinical psychologist Meg Jay, author of The Twentysomething Treatment: a revolutionary remedy for an uncertain age (Fourth Estate), who has spent 25 years working with young adults. She argues that Gen Z’s mental health issues are not about their phone use at all, but are a reasonable response to the environment they are growing up in and the uncertainty they face about their future. This generation are facing adulthood with the knowledge that many will never be able to buy their own home. In big cities, even renting their own place is out of reach for many young people on zero hours contracts – often with huge student debt – and no clear career progression. Jay points out that the young adult brain skews uncertainties into what can look like negative thinking and catastrophising. And I agree – that’s not clinical anxiety, it’s situational; Gen Z are anxious about something in particular.”
Now read the rest because it will help you understand the world your kids are growing up in. It will give you a shock, but not as much as when you ask your kids. We asked our kids (13 & 16) about how they feel about the future, one responded ‘I try not to think about it, the future’s looking pretty bad’.
Hard as it is, we have to face it so we can stay connected, something we’re making a concerted effort to with our teens - playing card games after dinner, going to an exhibition, for a walk or watching films. Making the effort is a change. When they’re little, you’re connected all the time, it doesn’t take effort. It’s funny how it changes.