Senior garda backs age limit on smartphones
‘I would hate it if strangers contacted my grandchildren’
A SENIOR garda has revealed he is personally in favour of an age restriction on smartphone ownership.
Chief Superintendent John Kerin’s comments comes as a European report said smartphones are undermining the ability of parents to monitor their children’s internet use.
Speaking at a joint policing committee meeting, Mr Kerin said children should be banned from having smartphones but added that he did not know how a ban would work.
‘Personally, I am in favour [of an age restriction] but how would you enforce such legislation?’ said Chief Superintendent Kerin. He said he did not have an age in mind over a ban, stating that different children mature differently.
The comments came as the meeting in Ennis, Co. Clare, was told how cyber bullying is on the rise albeit from a very low base.
The garda said he has two grandchildren aged four and 11 ‘and I would hate to see them being accessed online by people they don’t know’.
He told the meeting it was up to parents to monitor their children’s online activity, adding that he couldn’t ‘see how any agency would be able to enforce’ a ban.
Separately, research by EU Kids Online has said it is much harder for parents to police smartphone use than monitoring what children watch on television.
Smartphones, which are deemed ‘more personal’ and harder to police in a family setting, are undermining the ability of parents to monitor their children’s internet use, said a report by the research network.
Its report, called How Parents Of Young Children Manage Digital Devices At Home, said today’s ‘digital parents’ are facing a tougher challenge when it comes to monitoring screen time. The report explores the five methods of ‘parental mediation’ – the various ways mothers and fathers try to manage and regulate their children’s experiences with digital media.
It showed that when it came to nine to 16-year-olds’ internet use, most Irish parents prefer a restrictive approach – setting rules that limit time online, place of use, as well as content and activities.
Until recently, said the authors, most past research concentrated on the parental mediation of children’s television experiences.
The EU Kids Online report notes that now researchers, policy-makers and parents themselves are asking whether similar strategies can be adapted to the internet and other digital media, or whether new strategies are needed including the use of software to filter, limit or monitor children’s online activities.
‘Compared with television, online and digital devices may be harder for parents to manage, for several reasons,’ reads the report.
‘First, they are more technologically complex. Second, market innovations pose parents with the continual imperative to update and adapt their habits. Insofar as parents are themselves less familiar with some digital devices or services, they may feel outsmarted by their often-skilled children.
‘Third, as digital devices become ever more personalised and portable, traditional strategies of media co-use or supervision become less available or effective.’
In terms of effectiveness, the report’s findings suggest among the strategies used by parents that only active mediation – which focuses on sharing and discussing online activities – and restrictive mediation are linked to a drop in a child’s exposure to online risks.
It emerged yesterday that dozens of school principals back the Irish Daily Mail’s campaign for a minimum age for smartphone ownership. In the past two weeks, 92 principals from across the country told this paper they back the idea of an age restriction.
Smartphone ownership among children has been linked to higher risk of anxiety, depression and suicide – as well as grooming and early sexualisation.
Some principals who would like to see an age restriction have questioned if it is possible to make one workable – but are still clear that they would like to see one in place if it were possible.
The support from principals, who are at the front line of dealing with the effects of smartphones on children, will give further impetus to the growing campaign to have a minimum age set by law – just as it is for drinking, gambling, driving or getting married.
‘Parents are being outsmarted’