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The ongoing pandemic has led to major shifts in our everyday lives, including how much time we spend staring at screens. That’s true for many children, too. Between remote learning and other childcare challenges, kids have been forced to learn, communicate, and entertain themselves using screens of all kinds. Dr. Neha Navsaria, a Washington University child psychologist, offered guidance to families who want to reduce screen time while using technology in healthy ways.
What are the consequences of all this screen time for children? We still don’t have enough data to say that there’s been a clear negative impact. It’s also hard to tease apart what is a function of the pandemic, but I think it’s become more of the norm for kids to be using their phones and having significant screen time. We have a lot more parents who are working from home. Kids are seeing those models. We’re raising kids now in a society where computers, phones, and all methods of social media are important to everyday work. So I think it’s important that we start thinking about how we, as parents, prepare kids to interact with all of these things in a healthy way.
What kinds of things can parents do to set a good example? There are two separate pieces: modeling and parenting strategies. Modeling means stepping back and looking at what we are showing to our kids. What are we modeling to our children about our own technology use? I think it’s important to step back and think, What am I saying to my child, and what is my child actually observing me do? There are lots of reasons that you could be on your phone as a parent. You could be pulling up a recipe, for example. But a child might see you scanning your phone and not understand what you’re doing. So one thing I recommend to parents is to be vocal about how you’re using phones and technology, and to help them see that not everything you do is tied to social media, playing games, or things of that nature.
Along those lines, does it help for kids to see their parents untethered from their phones? Yes. Another thing I recommend is to establish some technology-free time as a family. Not only does that set an expectation for everybody, but it also doesn’t put your child in the spotlight. Everybody has to put things aside. That technology time can be more parent-child connection time. We have so much data that tells us that when parents and children spend time together, it not only improves kids’ sense of self-esteem and their mood, but it also creates a positive relationship in the family. During those technology-free times, it’s also OK for a parent to admit to a child, Oh, I really wish I could check this on my phone, but I can’t, because that also communicates to a child that this isn’t easy.
And what about parenting strategies? The American Academy of Pediatrics has guidelines on how much time young children should spend in front of screens. A lot of parents come into my clinic and talk about how they only let their kids watch an hour of TV a day. I think it’s good that parents adhere to those guidelines, but the flip side is that they may be overlooking the skills they could be developing in children to help them cope. For example, I’ll tell parents to give their kids guidelines and then say to them, When the timer goes off or when I give you a reminder, I want you to do your best to turn it off or put it away. That way, they learn to walk away from it themselves. To walk away from something that tempting and exciting, that’s a skill.
Are there any other skills that parents can try to build? I think it’s important for parents to also recognize that technology also serves a purpose. When we take it away, particularly as a consequence for something that’s happened, we forget to replace it with something that could be a more healthy way to serve that purpose. The device can be a crutch for kids. When you take the crutch and don’t replace it, you haven’t given them anything else to lean on. A lot of teenagers, for example, use the internet and social media for their social networking. So if the consequence of something is to take the phone away, we also need to think how we can still respect the fact that the child still needs some type of social interaction. It’s important to identify the purpose that different things serve.
What's the right age to give a child a phone or tablet? The recommendations are that you want to avoid it with kids under 2. But you also have to be mindful of what you’re modeling. If kids see that their older sibling is using the tablet, there should be some leeway because that’s when power struggles are going to happen. So you want to follow the guidelines, but you also want to determine how those guidelines fit with your child’s environment.
I imagine parental involvement matters, too. That’s the other main piece. Watch what they’re doing. Comment on it. Create limits and teach them to step away from it.
