Baby, Unplugged

One Mother’s Search for Balance, Reason, and Sanity in the Digital Age

Description

A charming, meticulously researched, and illuminating look at how technology infiltrates every aspect of raising children today, filled with helpful advice parents can use to best navigate the digital landscape, and ultimately learn to trust their own judgment.

There’s an app or device for nearly every aspect of parenting today: monitoring your baby; entertaining or educating your toddler; connecting with other new parents for tips, tricks, and community—virtually every aspect of daily life. But it isn’t a parenting paradise; the truth is much more complicated. 

The mother of two young daughters, journalist Sophie Brickman wondered what living in a tech-saturated world was doing to her and her children. She turned to experts, academics, doctors, and innovators for advice and insight. Baby, Unplugged brings together Brickman’s in-depth research with her own candid (sometimes hilarious) personal experience to help parents sort through the wide and often confusing tech offerings available today and to sort out what’s helpful and what’s not.

Filled with relatable and entertaining stories as well as practical takeaways, Baby, Unplugged is destined to become a touchstone for parents today, giving them the permission to forge their own path through the morass of technological options, to restore their faith in themselves, and to help them raise good, social, and engaged people in the modern world. 


This blend of investigative journalism and laugh-out-loud memoir provides a much-needed roadmap for modern parenthood, with answers to the tough questions, including:


  • The Quantified Child: Are baby monitors, smart socks, and data-tracking apps a source of reassurance or a driver of parental anxiety? Brickman investigates when data is helpful and when it gets in the way.
  • A Digital Village: From massive Facebook groups to mom-matching apps, this book explores whether online communities can ever replace the real-life support new parents desperately need.
  • Smart Toys, Smarter Kids?: A deep dive into the world of “enriching” electronic toys and educational apps, sorting the genuinely beneficial from the high-tech junk.
  • Trusting Your Gut: Learn how to cut through the noise of conflicting advice and endless options to restore faith in your own judgment as a parent in a tech-filled world.

About the author(s)

Sophie Brickman is a writer, reporter, and editor who has written for The New Yorker, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Elle, Saveur, The Guardian, San Francisco Chronicle, and other outlets. Her work has also appeared in the Best Food Writing and the Best American Science Writing anthologies. Her first book, Baby, Unplugged, about the intersection of technology and parenting, received a starred Publishers Weekly review and landed her a spot on Good Morning America. Plays Well with Others is her first novel. She lives in New York City with her husband and three children.

Reviews

“Well-researched and unvarnished conclusions.” - Wall Street Journal

“If you feel overwhelmed by your digital existence, definitely make time to unplug and read this book.” - Boston Globe

“Equal parts informative and entertaining, journalist Brickman’s debut explores parenting in these tech-drenched times…..For parents wondering whether to bring gadgets into the nursery, this will be an invaluable tool." - Publishers Weekly (starred review)

“Sophie Brickman has crafted a comprehensive, personal, hilarious exploration of all the ways technology touches our children’s lives, for better and for worse. Baby, Unplugged explains the terms and conditions of our wired families; read this book before you touch one more ‘on’ button.” - DAVID L. HILL, MD, former chair of the American Academy of Pediatrics Council on Communications and Media

“In Baby Unplugged, Sophie Brickman doesn’t shy away from uncomfortable conversations or uncomfortable conclusions about herself, her generation or why technology is often compensating for historic failures to support parents and kids. This is a book for parents, grandparents and anyone who loves kids or is curious about childhood, including their own. It is also fantastically well-written, both challenging and fun to read and deserves a place on your bookshelf.” - CHELSEA CLINTON

Baby, Unplugged is a heartfelt, thoughtful, and warmly humorous odyssey through parenting in the Digital Age. Sophie Brickman looks to science for guidance, makes decisions from knowledge rather than fear, and humbly shares her mistakes and successes. We can all benefit from her journey.” - MICHAEL RICH, MD, MPH, director of the Digital Wellness Lab, Boston Children’s Hospital/Harvard Medical School

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