Technology isn’t going away.

In fact, it’s becoming more and more entrenched in everything we do. For our kids, it’s all-encompassing. It’s how they do homework, connect with their friends, watch videos, play games, and learn about sex.

There, I said it.

This week, we’re going to take a deep, collective breath, put our “big-parent pants” on, and deal with an uncomfortable reality.

It’s my pleasure to welcome Therapist Dr. Laura Anderson, as we address the alarming truth about screens and their impact on our children. As an expert counselor on the subject, Laura brings us the scary stats and shares the critical warning signs parents need to immediately put on their radar. (Plus, she offers-up reasonable solutions for keeping our kid’s screen time in check.)

What You’ll Learn in this Episode:

- Wake-up call ~ Research results to slap us in the face
- How technology chemically & structurally changes the brain
- Recognizing the negative signs of damage
- Determining appropriate screen-time based on age group
- The benefit of transparent, random tech-checks

Listen to the Full Episode:

Featured on the Show:

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- 6 risks with technology and kids and 6 strategies to utilize immediately to address those risks
- Dr Laura Anderson’s Website – www.drlauraanderson.com
- Dr Laura Anderson’s Facebook Page – Common Chord Psychology Services.
- Facebook Business Page – Sundae Schneider-Bean LLC
- Facebook Group – Expats on Purpose

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Full Episode Transcript:

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Hello, it is 8 am in New York, 3 am in Johannesburg and 8 pm in Bangkok. Welcome to the Expat Happy Hour. This is Sundae Schneider-Bean from www.sundaebean.com. I’m a solution oriented coach and intercultural strategist for individuals and organizations and I am on a mission to help you adapt and succeed when living abroad and get you through any life transition

So what would you give up first before your phone? Coffee, bathing, sex?

You might be surprised or maybe not that I came across a survey on the internet about iPhone users and 40% said they’d give up coffee before they would their phone, 18% percent said they’d stop bathing every day and 15% said they’d rather give up sex.

I think we have a problem with our phones.

That says so much because we are adults and we’re making good decisions and we still would rather go without bathing then our phone. Coffee I think is a really hard dilemma, and don’t make me choose between my phone and my coffee by the way.

Grown adults, educated, good problem solvers, solution-oriented, rational, and we struggle with phone addiction.

Here’s the thing, while we’re doing that we’re telling our kids to put their iPads away.

We have our own problems, but what are we creating with our children. Studies show that excessive use of technology can chemically and structurally change our children’s brains. And think about it, I mean when I was a kid, I would play on Pac-Man and my dad would give me rolls of 25 cents, quarters in the US and I would play this game for an hour every, I don’t know 3 months when I got near a big Pac-Man game.

Things are changing, times are changing and the demands that are put on us as parents are changing.

As a parent of two young boys, I can’t tell you how often I think about this. This is probably on the top of my parenting questions is, “How do I handle technology in the home so that my kids use it responsibly for school, for assignments, for learning, for entertainment. But not that they stumble across things that are deeply inappropriate or start engaging in games that are going to change the way that they engage in the family and with others.”

I know I’m not alone, so what I have done today for Expat Happy Hour is, I’ve invited a specialist who can help us understand how we can work with our kids and tech so that we’re feeling good about how we are raising our kids today.

It is my heartfelt pleasure to welcome Doctor Laura Anderson back to Expat Happy Hour again. You might recognize her from a previous episode where we talked about gender expansive kids. She’s back as a clinical child and family psychologist who is specialized in serving globally mobile families. And today she is going to share with us her growing expertise on screen use with kids.

I had the pleasure of working with Dr. Anderson in Bangkok during a presentation that we did together on technology and how we can leverage it for the good as globally mobile families and what we can do to avoid the bad.

Sundae: So Laura, thank you so much for joining us today and welcome back to Expat Happy Hour.

Laura: Thanks for having me Sundae, it’s wonderful to be here again.

Sundae: So listen, today’s topic is on, I’m pretty sure every single parents mind. My sixth grader came home this year with a Macbook, they have screen time in school, now they’re doing their homework on their computers and much of it is legit, multimedia, etc, etc. But I feel like my kid has access to a Google, like a Gmail account, a laptop and the internet and I’m scared.

So tell us, I’ve invited you on to talk about screens and teens or tweens and younger, we want to know as parents, especially parents who are living abroad and are interacting with people from all over the world with different cultural backgrounds, different priorities. We might even use our screens as a little bit of a babysitter in transitions when it’s hard to sit in a hotel or an empty house with no container.

Tell me, let’s start with the stuff that scares the pants out of us. What should we as parents need to know about our children and screens?

Laura: Wow, yes, it’s one of those. I’m trying to hit that sweet spot where today people live with the idea that they should probably be a little scared. They should be a lot of scared because we’re getting more and more information about how much impact technology and screen time and the various risks associated with some of those screen times can really impact develop...