The Daily Telegraph - Features
Five ways to make your children more robust
Tech has made our kids fragile. But what can we do to help, asks Charlotte Lytton
Jonathan Haidt has a very clear message for parents: keep your children away from smartphones and social media, at all costs. In his new book, The Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood Is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness, Haidt lays the blame for poor mental health at the door of technology companies, who he says have designed “a firehose of addictive content”, fundamentally disrupted childhood and “changed human development on an almost unimaginable scale”.
A social psychologist and the Thomas Cooley Professor of Ethical Leadership at New York University’s Stern School of Business, Haidt says that the social-media platforms that came to prominence over the past decade have had more harmful effects on girls, while video games have been deleterious for boys. This proliferation of internet use alongside the reduction in unsupervised play among children are the “twin sources” responsible for the mental-health issues currently plaguing Britain’s under-18s, he adds. “Overprotection in the real world and underprotection in the virtual world are the major reasons why children born after 1995 became the anxious generation.”
One in five children in the UK have a “probable mental disorder”, according to NHS figures, while last month, MPs and health leaders warned of a “devastating explosion” of such conditions, with emergency referrals rising by more than 50 per cent since 2021 – equivalent to 600 referrals each week.
To counteract this disturbing upward swerve, Haidt and others are proponents of developing an “anti-fragile” mindset. “We are not helpless, although it often feels that way because smartphones, social media, market forces and social influence combine to pull us into a trap,” Haidt says. Here are his tips for raising resilient children:
Let kids roam free
Haidt says there has been a “well-intentioned and disastrous shift towards overprotecting children and restricting their autonomy in the real world”. Children need free play to thrive, he adds, noting that the decline began in the 1980s and 1990s. “That occurred at the same time that the personal computer became more common and inviting as a place for spending free time.”
Kids need to be able to play unsupervised in order to learn, connect and understand how to take turns – but “overprotecting or rescuing children every time they face a challenge can hamper their development of problem-solving skills”, explains Lucy Russell, clinical psychologist and founder of They Are the Future, a parental support network. “It can mean they don’t have the confidence to face new or tricky challenges,” which she says can contribute to anxiety.
Build tech-free foundations…
There are two main actions we can take to protect against a tech-filled childhood, Haidt says. Namely: banning smartphones before year 10 (age 14-15) and social-media access pre-16. “Let children get through the most vulnerable period of brain development before connecting them to an avalanche of social-comparison and algorithmically chosen influencers.”
Phone-free schools, as suggested in new Government guidance, “is the only way to free up their attention for one another and for their teachers”, he adds.
When it comes to having that “phone-free conversation” with your kids, psychologist Louise Goddard-Crawley advises against “approaches such as ‘you’ll thank me one day’. Instead, initiate conversations about social-media access and smartphone usage early, setting a positive example.”
… and get support
Joining forces with other parents to regulate phone or social-media use can help in setting boundaries. “It might avoid children having FOMO [fear of missing out] if their friends are allowed on later than they are,” Russell says. “It’s much easier to enforce boundaries around screen time if your friends’ families have similar rules.”
Goddard-Crawley adds that “teachers can help out by teaching students how to use tech responsibly, making sure there’s plenty of face-to-face time in class, and giving options for learning that don’t always involve screens. They can also help kids think critically about what they see online.”
Don’t let sleep slip
For Haidt, tech-induced sleep loss is what he calls one of four “foundational harms” (alongside social deprivation, addiction and attention fragmentation). “The screen-related decline of sleep is a likely contributor to the tidal wave of adolescent mental illness that swept across many countries in the 2010s,” he writes.
“Disrupted sleep affects children’s moods, mental health and cognitive abilities. Therefore it can directly impact their resilience to the challenges of everyday life,” Russell adds. She advises “no tech in the bedroom, no tech in the hour (at minimum) before going to bed, and regularly talk to your child about the vital importance of sleep for health and wellbeing”.
‘Rescuing children every time they face a challenge hampers their problem-solving skills’
Prioritise real-world experiences
Part of the problem with laserfocus on the interior worlds of smartphones and social media is that they remove the ability to find joy in the likes of nature, Haidt says. (He ran an experiment on his own students, urging them to go for a walk outside without their phones before submitting written reflections, which “were among the most beautiful I’ve seen”.)
For Russell, “one of the biggest problems with screen use, social media and gaming is instant gratification” – an immediate buzz that might have otherwise been achieved with a walk outside, or physical activity. “This is going to impact resilience because children won’t be used to persisting in order to achieve a goal or get a feeling of satisfaction. I advise parents to try to balance their children’s screen time with time spent doing a ‘slower’ activity.”