← KIDing Around with Dr. Candice
KIDing Around with Dr. Candice
Ep. 110: Managing Family Media Use and Keeping Kids Safe Online
00:48:25
Dr. Candice chats with Dr. Jenny Radesky, develop…
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- [00:03]
A
Hey there, I'm Dr. Candice Jones, board certified pediatrician and you're listening to the kidding around with Dr. Candice podcast. I can't wait for you to meet my expert guest and hear our topic today from the all too important world of children's health. So let's get started. Hey everybody. Welcome to kidding around. I'm Dr. Candice and thank you so much for listening. Today we are talking about or going to give you some tools that you need as parents and caregivers to keep your kids safe when using digital media, digital technology and online, especially social media. And I've had several episodes on various topics in this realm. But it's always time to have an update and get fresh new information. And we have an expert, Dr. Jenny Radesky. She is a developmental behavioral pediatrician at the University of Michigan and she is the co medical director of the American Academy of Pediatrics center of Excellence on Social Media and Mental Health. And so I know she's going to give us some wonderful tools to make sure our kids are safe when using any digital platforms. So thank you so much Dr. Radesky for coming to kid around with me today.
- [01:32]
B
Great, thanks Dr. Jones.
- [01:35]
A
So my first question is kind of a baseline question on how digital and social media impacts our children's well being, their health and just kind of bring everybody up to speed on what are some of those benefits and risk that we see.
- [01:55]
B
Well, let's think about it. You know, when we think about digital media or social media, this is such a constantly changing concept, right? Like, so when I was a child in the 80s, digital media was TV, VHS had just come out, right? The Internet and email started when I was like in high school and college. So it, it really has accelerated since, since then. And so I think that parents often feel overwhelmed with the fact that there's so many products, so many different trends to be keeping up with that we're being asked to do more with our technology like through work. And we kind of feel immersed in it, especially since the COVID 19 pandemic put so much of our work online or virtual and school online as well. So let's start first by saying we can't treat this all as a monolith, right? It's not just one big lump of media. Its effects on kids are going to depend on how it's designed. So you know, this was true even back in the 80s is that if you had really well designed media like Sesame street, that was good for kids development, it taught them early literacy skills, letters, numbers, it was associated with better social and emotional development. But if you just watched a lot of like violent TV or age inappropriate tv, like, you know, watching talk shows and stuff like that, that was linked with worse, let's say, language development and worse aggressive behavior. So even back in the TV days, we knew that the content of what was in media really mattered for kids. Now there's a couple more things to keep track of. So one is, is it mobile? Are you walking around with it in your pocket? Are kids taking it, you know, in every little space or moment of downtime that they have? So we'll talk about that a little bit as we talk about kind of healthy habits around media, is carving out some boundaries around it. So it's not just your, your constant companion kind of getting in the way of other stuff. Number two is that social media is designed in a couple new ways that are introduced, Some new risks and some new benefits. One, it connects us with so many people all around the world, which means that teens can find communities that are much more diverse than they would usually interact with. They can hear stories that they wouldn't have otherwise heard. But it also means that you're connected with a lot of people who might be trolls or might be, you know, harass you. You may find an affirming community based on your identity or your, your culture or your experience. But at the same time, you may have to deal with a lot of junk that you're waiting through as you're trying to connect with that community. And then there's also algorithms, right? So we should talk a little bit today about artificial intelligence and algorithms, because so much of the online spaces now are automated, meaning a computer is deciding what is recommended to kids. And that can be fun in that you're discovering all these new influencers or funny dog videos. But it can also mean you may be taken down that rabbit hole or, you know, given more and more extreme content that may not be good for you. And so we can talk a little bit more about how to talk with kids, about what's on your feed, you know, what is this machine telling you you should be watching? And so my, just to sum all of that up, my big picture message to parents is the effect that it has on kids really depends on, on what the content is, how you use it and integrate it into your day, and then how you kind of help your kids understand it and be critical thinkers about media. Because, you know, if they're just eating all this up without stopping to think what effect it's having on them, you know, that they're not going to have as healthy of a relationship with media. And we, you know, we're at the point where kids are going to need to learn to use media to participate in school, participate in their jobs, participate in our culture, you know, and online entertainment. And so we really are at the point where we have to be mentors and coaches to help them have smart relationships with it.
- [06:12]
A
So true. And that's, that's something that adults need to learn as well.
- [06:18]
B
Absolutely.
- [06:18]
A
We gotta teach it to our kids, but we have to grasp that too. That's, it's key. So I hope your adults heard it and applied it to yourselves as well, because I see some adults that never put their phone down. Phones down too. So that's very important. And I love how you, you know, it's clear there are benefits, there are risk, and how are we going to tease through that and strike some balance and protect ourselves? And that's what we're going to talk about today. So moving to, you know, we always, the American Academy of Pediatrics always gives wonderful recommendations. Right. To keep kids healthy. And we've had media use, you know, guidelines and guidance. And a big one that I think caught on and people talked about a lot was screen time, you know, limiting screen time, age based. Two hours here, an hour here, no more than six here. You know, there was like this, these, these, this guidance that we were all talking about as pediatrician and sharing with families. And so some of that has changed. Can you give us an update on some of those recommendations around screen time and current media guidelines? Just some of the key concepts, because we don't expect you to go through the whole policy statement.
- [07:30]
B
Yeah, yeah. And as like I said, the media and technology are evolving so much themselves that the biggest thing I can say is that if you're only thinking about time, screen time, that's only one dimension. There's so many other things that we as parents need to be thinking about. So the biggest questions I get are usually how much time per day? And sure, that's great. You should be thinking about what sort of limits you want to carve around media or boundaries to set around it so that it doesn't just take up every moment of the afternoon. And the reason you don't want it to take up the whole afternoon is because we talk to each other less then and kids play less and kids get outside less, they move their bodies less, they don't sleep as well. And moving your body, sleep, talking and connecting with your family, those are the three major things that are Sources of resilience in kids. So it's not to judge parents who are like, well, I just leave the TV on all day and that's just how it goes in my house. It's not about judgment. It's really about giving parents the agency to kind of put their hands on the wheel and say, hey, how do I want to be connecting with my kids and making opportunities for them? And where does media play a role in my house or not? Okay, so back to the screen time question though. The new guidelines in 2016, which was seven years ago for older kids, like school age and middle school and high school, they really eliminated the time limit. Really thinking more about, okay, what do you, your child need to get done in a day, A good night's sleep, get their homework done, you know, have some time with friends or family, whatever clubs or other, you know, sports or activities they want to do that are meaningful to them. And then the rest of the time, great, you can fill that in with media. Just try not to multitask all the time. And what's more important in those older years is really the how of media use. Is it, Are you being a good online citizen in terms of, you know, watching what you post and not feeding into online drama or toxicity? Are you being aware of when advertisements are trying to change your mind about something or get you to click on something unhealthy like vaping? There's a lot more than just time when you're raising a teen. And then for the younger kids, we still had a recommendation of about an hour a day of entertainment screen time. The time that you're just sitting down and playing a bubble popping game on an iPad, or you're, you know, watching some silly cocoa melon videos or something like that. But don't worry about the educational screen time. If you were, you know, in a preschool classroom where they were using learning apps like, don't worry about that. You don't need to count that. If you're sitting and watching, you know, Sesame street or PBS Kids. Daniel Tiger. That's not as that we know that's, that's value added for kids to be watching the good stuff. It's really, we were trying to help families just limit, you know, the, the junk food type of, you know, more empty calories, like fun, but not as, not as great for kids content. I still think that's hard. The feedback I get, and I was one of the authors of that policy statement, is that this is hard. Especially during the pandemic, media played such a purpose in keeping Kids safe and occupied while parents were working, while they were being cared for, maybe by elderly grandparents who couldn't move around as much and play with them. So I think as we are revising the guidelines over the next year or two, because we are just starting to pick up a plan for a revision, we're really going to be thinking about that. What is doable for families? How do we get a message across to help them create some boundaries without them feeling like they're a bad parent if they haven't met some sort of strict hourly guideline? You know, it's hard. Public health guidance is hard because you can make it overly nuanced. I'm sure anyone listening to me talk is like, okay, I'm counting like 15 different things I should be thinking about as a parent. How about just a screen time rule? But at the same time, if all we talked about was screen time, we'd be missing all this other important stuff. That's, that's part of growing up in a digital world. So if I needed to distill it into just a couple memorable things, I use the five Cs and this is something our center of Excellence is trying to promote in the next year. The five Cs are C for child. Who is your child? What are they working on developmentally? What do they like to play? You know, do you fight with them a lot about media? It's a lot about understanding who is your child and how is their relationship with media and trying to kind of tailor your approach to your parenting based on what developmental stage they're in. The second C is content. We've already talked about why positive, pro social, educational, high quality content is much better than the kind of junk that a content creator or an influencer might post on YouTube. The third is calming. So using media for calming is associated with worse emotional health over time. So if we start to use media as this coping tool where it's how we calm ourselves down rather than working on other ways of calming ourselves down, that's getting in the way of emotional health. The fourth C is crowding out. Like, what is. If you're using a lot of media, what's it getting in the way of that your family loves to do together? And the fifth C is conversations. This would be something that shouldn't feel taboo or stigmatized in our families. I don't want families to feel super panicky about it. Just have open conversations with kids to help them process what they're seeing and help them be kind of responsible users of their devices or social Media accounts, if and when they get them.
- [13:54]
A
That's excellent. Thank you for that. Five C's. That's good. So let's talk about. That's a tool right there, the five Cs, people.
- [14:03]
B
Yeah.
- [14:03]
A
Write that down and remember it.
- [14:06]
B
I know it's hard. I know people might be like, what was C number two? So remember, like, who's your child? Replay calming them down, crowding out and conversations. Right. So just thinking about all those different ways that media interacts with our kids.
- [14:21]
A
And I can maybe find a link to HealthyChildren.org to the center and find that in a blog or something and put it on the show. Note, I will definitely do that in the resource section. So we'll do that. So that's one amazing tool. Let's talk about some more tools because we promised that we were going to give parents some tools on keeping their kids safe. You've already done that, but there are some actually applications that you can use, and one is the Family Media Plan. Can you tell us about that and just educate parents how they can use that and how it can be helpful?
- [14:53]
B
Yeah. The Family Media Plan is an online tool. It's on HealthyChildren.org MediaPlan and it contains dozens, if not over a hundred different tips of ways to work with your family to try to have healthy media habits. And it's not all throwing all 100 at you at the same time. You kind of choose who's in your family. You can like plug in their names and choose little avatars for them and put in their age range. Then we filter the guidance based on age range and based on what you say you care about the most. So if you really care about, you know, finding better content or helping your kids learn more about kindness online, or having better balance in your family, you can click a few of those areas. And then we give you a list of different tips to try. And we also list the science behind those tips. Right. They're all based on evidence, but they're worded in a very practical way of like, you know, have a sit down, have a family meeting, use these sorts of words to talk about this media topic. You know, try out this, try out that. So they're very practical. My advice to parents is kind of look through and just choose a few tips to try and do it, even talk about it with your kids. I'll sometimes in the clinic room, show it to families and say, okay, I want you to sit next to, you know, David and sit there together, read these through and use it as a Conversation starter. Because a lot of these tips come from the best practices of pediatricians we knew or families who've really been able to feel like they have some balance around media. Now, the media plan, like I said, it contains so many tips that you don't want to try and do it all at once. You kind of pick a few that you and your kids agree upon. You can save it and print it and maybe put it on your fridge, come back and revisit it. You know, is this working for us? What's working, what's not? And then pick new tips in the future if you. If you're feeling like you're stuck.
- [17:05]
A
Yeah. So I'm sitting here grinning because we. My daughter. Daughter and I did it last night in preparation for this interview. Now, I've done it before with my son, who's now 15. I probably did it with him about maybe three years ago because I think it's been out now since 2016, and I think it's been revised. It looked a little different this time.
- [17:26]
B
Yes, it is newer, and that's why we packed it with many more practical tips.
- [17:30]
A
Yes. Yes. I really like the new one. And my daughter and I did it. She's six. She'll be seven and two days after Christmas. But she enjoyed that conversation, enjoyed picking the stuff for her. And she was very honest, like, oh, I don't have a problem with that. Oh, yeah, I need to work on that. You tell me that a lot. And so she. It made sense to her. Like, mom, you've been telling me this. You know, I'm a PDF.
- [17:57]
B
I love that no kids have opinions about this. Right. They are immersed in this all the time, and they have a lot of knowledge that sometimes we may not even know. So, yeah, I would love it for. Be a. For it to be a conversation starter between parents and their kids just to help you wonder about what do they think about this? Do they understand? Do they see this as a problem? Do they not? Do they see it as something they wish they could change but don't know how to? And what do they think of these tips? Are they realistic? Are they not? So I really like the idea of getting the kids buy in.
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A
Yeah.
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B
And when you have buy in, they're much more likely to follow the rules because they feel like they helped make them up. Right. Absolutely. Right. So, and this is. I'm a developmental behavioral pediatrician, so I know when I'm dealing with a child who's hyper or impulsive or a little defiant, if a parent comes in hot and Comes in wanting to control things and is like, you've got to do this and this is what's going to happen, and it's my way or the highway. That child is much more likely to either feel really negative about themselves or push back. And it can be a real power struggle. And that's what we're hearing from families. Media is such a power struggle in families. So the more you can take a collaborative problem solving approach where you talk about how you see the problem, you give them a chance and ask them questions about how they see it. And you ask them, all right, how would you want to handle it? And let them come up with some things. Sometimes you're surprised. I asked my kids, you know, I think we're arguing a lot about video games on weekends. Yes, it's hard to kind of get you guys off of the video game console. What can we do? Because I don't want to just keep on coming in and raising my voice louder the next time because you're not paying attention to me. And just by the way, the reason we have to raise our voice is because when kids are using media, their mind is absorbed in what's going on. And media right now is like, frictionless. It's just like, whoosh. It's so easy to just get absorbed and keep your mind on that. So when someone else is kind of like yammering at you, it's hard to pay attention. So it kind of sets parents up for failure to be coming into a room and to try to talk to a kid who's looking at a screen. So we talked about this, and by the way, they also said, yeah, but when we're trying to talk to you, when you're on your screen, it's equally as hard, right? So it opens up this conversation of like, yeah, wow. It is really hard to focus on screens and these people right next to you at the same time. That's like a common human experience. Right now we're all struggling with it. So my kids said, well, why don't you let us bring the kitchen timer into the living room? Why don't you let us write out our plan for who's playing and for how long? And we'll have the same time limits, but our goal will just be less arguing and then we'll get right off. And I was like, okay, challenge accepted.
- [21:11]
A
Go ahead and win.
- [21:12]
B
Show me you can do that. And so far, the major thing that's helped, I'll be honest, is the Nintendo parental controls. So when I learned about that app through my work at the center of excellence and it gives this little annoying ringer on the screen when they've reached their time limit. That has really helped, but you know, probably wouldn't work as well if we hadn't had those conversations or those, you know, me trying to put my kids in the driver's seat and for them to exert some self control over their video games.
- [21:49]
A
So I love that you segued beautifully into that because that's a tool. You know, parental controls are amazing tools. And so you mentioned there's one on Nintendo. If there's any others you know about, please share them with parents. And it's not just about getting them off or giving them a break. There could be controls for privacy like setting the privacy settings or all other safety measures. So tell us a little bit about that.
- [22:18]
B
So I recommend that parents look at the Common Sense Media Guide. It's like the guide to parental controls. And we can, I'll give you a link to it. Commonsensemedia.org is the website, they're a non profit that creates guidance and tips and reviews of media for families. And what they've done is they've combined all of these like Parents Guide to Tick Tock, Parents Guide to Fortnite, you know, Parents Guide to Roblox, Snapchat, et cetera. And they compiled all this because each of these platforms has slightly different settings. And so for parents it's like we're like, oh great, I have to learn like five different languages to figure out how to do the settings on this one and then go and learn fresh how to do it on this one. So they spell it all out for you. They have a little video tutorial and it helps you both with privacy settings. So like on Roblox, you want to have that on private for your kids so they're not just chatting with any random person who's in that same Roblox world as them. You know, same with any sort of multiplayer game. Talk with your kids about who they can chat with. If for example, it was Snapchat, you can set, you know, who your child's contacts are so they're not getting contacted by random people who might be drug dealers or might be, you know, a friend of a friend of a friend, but who's kind of toxic and rude. And some of them have more content filters, some of them have more time limits, so you kind of go in and explore. And it's even better again to do this with your child to say, oh look, TikTok has these settings. I think this would Be good for you. You're 14. You don't want to be fed every random thing that could possibly be shown to someone on TikTok because some of it is, is not that great. Why don't we try setting these and then we'll talk again in a week or two about how it's going.
- [24:25]
A
I love that. So you do have some control to protect your kids. So let's look at those parental controls. I love common sense media. I do have that link. I will share that in the show. Note. Go through it, find out what your kid is on. That's why we have to have these conversations. Find out what your kid is on, look at it, educate yourself and then have your child, you and your child go through those controls and protect them. We're going to backtrack a little bit because sometimes these things, speaking of Snapchat, are done on phones. Right, right. And as a pediatrician, and I know you as a developmental pediatrician, we are seeing kids younger and younger and younger with their own phones or practically co opt their parents most of the time. And so the question when, and I get asked this a lot personally and professionally, you know, what is a good time to give my child a phone? And so there's a phone ready quiz and can you tell us about that?
- [25:25]
B
Yeah. And so we get asked this question all the time. What's the right age for a phone? And like plenty of other experts in the world, we say there's no one perfect age. Kids have different levels of readiness based on their maturity, their responsibility. But there's also family factors. Like families tell us the number one reason they usually want to get their child a phone is for convenience. Giving their child more independence, coordinating pickups, you know, really practical logistical reasons. They don't get the phone, being like, oh, I really want my kid to discover weird stuff on social media. You know, they, they kind of want it more for the communication aspects. So you can get a flip phone, you can get one of those little kind of starter watches that are becoming more commonly available through the major carriers. Some of those like the gab watch, the gizmo, the pinwheel, sometimes they're, you know, a little more expensive or you have to get a separate plan. So it's not a perfect fit for everyone. But we consider those to be kind of starter phones because they have fewer functionalities. It's kind of Talk, text, maybe FaceTime, maybe a limited number of apps that the parent has to approve before installing. Many parents are like, well, I just need to give them my hand. Me down smartphone because I don't want to pay a couple hundred dollars. I've got this old phone and here's my new phone. So what you can do if it's an Android or an iOS Apple phone, is there are settings that you can put to, for example, prevent downloads. You, you can kind of set a password or have some sort of family settings so that the child needs to ask you or get your permission before they download something. And that helps parents have a little bit more knowledge of what is my child playing? What are they downloading? You can have a conversation of like, why do you want that game? Does it have in app purchases? Are you going to be begging me for a credit card to then pay for all that stuff? What is Roblox? How did you learn about it? Can you show it to me? Let's watch a video on YouTube to decide if this is good. I know it's extra work for the parent, but it, it helps you monitor so that you're not surprised because like you said just a few minutes ago is that sometimes times in clinic with kids, I always, when I see them on a device, I'm like, oh, what are you playing? You know, show me what you're playing, what's your favorite game? And they'll be like, you know, shooter zombie 3000 or something. And the parents are like, what? Where did you find that? We said no shooter games or something. And it's because the app stores have made it so easy for kids to just install whatever, even if it's not in their age, you know, age appropriate range. So I do think more friction, more controls on downloads and purchases is important. Kids, especially younger kids, don't know the value of dollar yet, right? They see all that online currency and they just think it's all fun and exciting. And so you really need to have conversations about what do we spend money online for and is it worth it? Okay, so if you also, if your child has a smartphone and you, you also want to have some, you can put some time limits on different apps through those sorts of settings. You can, you know, set that they can't be contacted, like privacy settings. And then I also think some of the newer phones have downtime settings so that you can say, you know what, this device is going to sleep, you know, out of your room, it's going to sleep in the device charging place over here and it's going to have downtime settings so that you can't even access apps after like 10pm or something like that. So I really, this is a Very different conversation than I would have had with you 10 years ago. When there weren't these screen time downtime, you know, settings, it was much harder to get a device that had all that. So that's at least an improvement. I realize I'm not answering that question of what age. Right. So we could talk about all the settings you can put on the device. Studies have shown that when kids, in one study, they followed kids for five years in elementary into middle school and they looked at what age they got a phone and they looked at their emotional health and there was no correlation between the age at when they got a phone and their emotional well being. And I think that's because there's so many different factors that play into whether a phone is a problem or not. A strict age cutoff is not what we recommend. In studies where they've interviewed teenagers and they said, what do you think is the right age to get a phone? A lot of the kids say somewhere around 11 or 12. I think they expect, they say a phone's a lot. It's a lot more than I expected. You need some maturity and some responsibility to do it. They had consensus. There's no ideal age, but it's really important that it's when you're more independent from your parents. It's when your parents think you're ready and are willing and able to enforce rules and help you out with it. So even kids said, we want parents involved. And then the last very practical piece is that once they're more responsible and are not like losing their mittens and hats and backpacks every week, you don't want them losing a $400 phone.
- [31:27]
A
Right.
- [31:28]
B
So that can be maybe one incentive if you have a middle schooler who's like, I want a phone, I want a phone. And you're like, you can't even remember to feed your pet dog or fish.
- [31:44]
A
Yeah, come on.
- [31:44]
B
We're going to have to work on some of these areas of responsibility. And then the last thing that's in that phone ready quiz is how is their relationship with media right now? Are you constantly arguing about it or do they follow tech rules? Okay. Because if they don't and you already feel like video gaming is a problem, TV's a problem, the phone is going to follow that same pattern. Yeah. So, you know, you may want to hold off more. And you know, how accountable is your child if they do something wrong? Do they apologize or do they blame someone else? So, you know, if they see someone who's having a hard time, do they make Fun of them or do they stand up for them? Because those are the sort of behavioral traits that they'll show those online. And so you. You want to have a little bit more of that social and emotional maturity, too, by the time that they have a lot more independence with their phone. So that's why I like the idea of these starter devices, so that you can say like, okay, here's your on ramp. I'm giving you access to just like, texting and calling and maybe some maps. And if you can be kind and follow the rules, you know, we can talk about maybe adding a few mobile games to that. To that phone.
- [33:09]
A
Right.
- [33:09]
B
Or giving you a little bit more time, you know, per day. And I think it. It has to be that kind of graded independence where over time, you let your child have more and more because that's developmentally appropriate. By the time they're 16, you want them to be pretty independent with their phone use and. And be. But also feel like, I can. They can come to us if they need to talk about something.
- [33:32]
A
I love it. Let me just say, I love all of your phrases. I know your patients have fun with you. You are truly a developmental pediatrician on ramp. Parents coming in hot. Junk food media. I'm just laughing. I'm chuckling the whole time. I'm like, I love these phrases. I'm going to use them. Parents, you can use those, too. They're really good.
- [33:53]
B
Well, that's it. But also, you need to make parenting somewhat fun and relatable because you know what? Parents come into clinic feeling guilty. They feel like the world is judging them and that they've done something wrong because their child's struggling. And that is, you know, and I have. I have kids with developmental differences, too. So I know that feeling, too, of one being like, what have I done? You know, it's all on your shoulders. And that's so unique to kind of Western American parenting, too, is that we think it's all about, you know, on our shoulders, it's all our responsibility, instead of there being collected, active community support for us. But that's a whole other
- [34:34]
A
the.
- [34:37]
B
But I think that being able to put all of this in terms that are not. And words that are not morally loaded, that are not panicky, that are more, you know, intuitive to parents of like, okay, like, I taught them how to ride a bike. It took some time. I needed to watch over them. You know, I help them be a safe swimmer. I'm going to teach them how to drive. Like, these are metaphors that don't make us feel as guilty. Right, right. So that's. I appreciate you saying that because I do think the words we use really matter in making parents feel guilty and afraid of this topic compared to something that they feel like they can handle or are willing to at least try and have a more open mindset when they talk to their kids about it.
- [35:29]
A
Absolutely. And more received by the young people too, because they.
- [35:32]
B
Absolutely.
- [35:33]
A
She's cool. That's cool. Points. I'll go to her. I'll listen to her. I'll talk to her. Okay. So I love it. I love it. So our last question. Are there any more tools that I missed that you use that you think is helpful that parents really need to know about?
- [35:49]
B
So, you know, I think that the new website for our center on social media and youth mental health, which is AAP.org SocialMedia, is going to be a growing site of more tools and tips. Currently it's been active for about six months. And what we do is we accept questions from anyone, parent, teacher, young person. If you have a question about media and mental health, you can ask it. And then we do an evidence based review. It takes us a couple weeks so that we can really make sure we're giving people an evidence based answer. But then we write it up in a more down to earth tone with, with language like we were just talking about practical ideas. And then we post our answer. Nothing identifiable about the person who asked the question, but we post the answer so other people can benefit from it. One of the questions we got just a week ago was what's the right age for a phone? Right. So that'll be posted probably in the next week or two. We've gotten really unique ones that are like, what do I do if my 8 year old stumbles upon pornography? You know, how am I supposed to react? We've gotten broader ones that are like, how can I talk to my school about my kids school about having a phone use policy that's going to keep them from being distracted. So any question is great. I'm happy if parents visit the website and just look at previously answered questions or submit one of their own. But that's another resource we'll be adding more and more. So hope that that's something that parents start to use as a go to source.
- [37:43]
A
There are some very good questions on there. I have looked at it multiple times and it is, that's a very good idea and very helpful information even for me as a pediatrician and as a mom. So I definitely am glad you mentioned that. The last question I have is about advocacy and you mentioned something like how do I talk to my school about this or that with media and phones. Can you some points if they want to work with their school or do something in their community or at a local or state or federal level. For instance, there's the Senate bill Kids Online Safety act. And as pediatricians, our Council on Communications and Media works very hard at a legislative level to advocate for safe holding these platforms accountable, not to target kids, to keep kids safe. Safe. And so there's so many levels of advocacy. Can you talk to us about that?
- [38:46]
B
Yeah. So let's start with federal. Right now in the United States, the only law that addresses children's digital media safety is from like 1993. So it's really old. It's the Children's Online Privacy Protection act. And it really just focuses on data collection I websites at the time and it talks about, you know, making sure that any child directed platform is, gets a parent's consent before collecting data. And parents listening to this might be like, oh my gosh, I've never given consent. I mean everyone's used to these cookies notifications now. But, but yeah, it was, it's not been well enforced and it's kind of outdated because there's so many other ways that children interact with media that goes beyond just their data. So there is an update to COPPA that has been introduced in the Senate. They call it like COPPA 2.0. That would update the age. It's not just kids under 13. They're bringing the age up. There's been discussions of 16 or 18, but really to give teenagers the protection too. Because if you think about it, teenagers data is probably a gold mine for marketers who are like, ooh, who's going to, you know, buy my diet pills and who's going to buy my makeup and you know, who's, who's going to buy my clothes? And so trying to give kids protections to not be targeted. And then the other major bill that has some momentum is the Kids Online Safety act. And this is much more like you said about accountability. It asks big platforms to say, number one, this is the number of kids who use our platforms. Because a lot of times big platforms are kind of agnostic. Like they kind of ignore the fact that kids use their platforms for a long time. YouTube even said our platform's not for little kids, even though there's tons of little kid content on it. So it's only recently that they've put in more protections because the government has asked them to so it would say, it would ask for basically accountability audits where the big platforms have to say, we're doing our best to make sure that kids are not recommended harmful content. So this might be a self harm video, an eating disorder video, something with a lot of like violence or hostile, you know, hate speech or negativity and that we are protecting their safety in terms of contact from predators and other strangers. And they just would need to kind of give a report to the government to say, here's the measures we're taking, here's how effective we've been, here's the rates of kids having negative experiences on our platforms. And currently there are laws in the European Union and the United Kingdom that have very similar qualities. So all of these companies are already having to do this and adapt to what Europe and the UK are asking for. So we really need those same sort of accountability mechanisms at home. One clear reason, you know, there have been these whistleblowers from big platforms like Meta, where people on their child safety teams have kind of come forward and said, hey, we were trying to do things to improve kids well being. We were trying to reduce their negative social comparison, we were trying to reduce unwanted harassment. We designed these features and then we brought it to leadership. And they didn't adopt it, they didn't make it the default setting for teens because it would get in the way of our bottom line. And so that's been more evidence that we really need the government to have some accountability so that the, the tech platforms are really doing designs that are in the best interest of kids, not the best interest of their bottom line and their revenue. So hopefully in the next session we'll get, you know, some more hearings or you know, votes on these sorts of bills. The takeaway for parents is that you can definitely call your senator or your congressperson and say, what are you doing about kids in media? You know, we need the same protections that Europe and the UK have in terms of kids data and the accountability that platforms are treating kids right then. So on the state level there's also some state bills that have been passed like California had one and Maryland and other states have had. So parents can look to see if there's state level bills with the same sort of protections because if we can't get one passed federally, then at least maybe your state could be one that has it. And then the other thing we need on a school and community level is for some common sense, collaborative conversations about the role of phones in schools. This is a hot button topic and I know that like school board meetings are already hot button enough right now. So coming at it with a standpoint of including kids in the conversation, how do they want some boundaries around tech use in school, Making sure that there's input from anyone from teachers to administrators to parents, and then also hearing the concerns about like who's going to enforce this and are parents worried that they might not be able to get in touch with their kids in the middle of the day if there's an emergency? And that's unfortunately the main thing that keeps, you know, the phones in the pockets of kids when they're in a school day. So that's something that I'm hoping in the next couple years there'll be more uniform guidance, maybe from the Department of Education, maybe from teachers unions or something else that that helps give some really clear cut guidance on phone use policies. But right now it is a pretty much a school by school, district by district conversation, but so worth because there's so much digital media in classrooms, from edtech and devices to smartphones, they should at least be using it as a learning opportunity for kids to reflect on their relationship with their phones. And parents can also ask, what sort of digital citizenship curricula do you have in your school? Because that's been recommended now to be just a uniform part of the curriculum in school so that kids can have healthier relationships with tech.
- [45:59]
A
That's very important, that digital literacy is very important. Thank you so much. This is updated, very good practical information and hopefully everybody will sit down as a family. Go through some of this talk with your kids on an ongoing basis because they're developing so you have to revisit it. But definitely some tools were given today to help you keep your family safe. Thank you so much, Dr. Radesky. We will put all the links in the show notes so you won't have to worry about missing any of this information. Any final words?
- [46:39]
B
I'd say we've talked a lot about ways to have boundaries and ways to keep kids safe, but also have some fun with media in your home. You don't have to be afraid of it. Media tells amazing stories, especially when it's a beautifully produced movie or you know, or just a hilarious video that you sit with your kids on the couch and giggle together. So the more you use it as a shared experience, it gives you those opportunities to talk about it and to learn what your kids think about what they just saw on the screen. And it could be your favorite movies from you when you were a kid. It could be updated movies that have some topics in it that you don't even know how to talk about, but you're like, oh, but if I have them watch this, then that gives me an opening to talk about racism or, you know, a reproductive health or bullying or other stuff that I just don't know the words for. So I do encourage families to use media together and have fun with it and then also be role models. Like you said at the very beginning of how to put it down, it doesn't own us. We are the ones in control and role modeling that and even teaching it out loud to our kids and saying, you know what, really, even our devices at home, we're going for a walk is really good, a really good lesson to be teaching kids right now because they just feel as immersed in it as we do.
- [48:09]
A
And with that said, thank you all for listening and we'll talk soon. I hope you enjoyed this episode. If so, please share it, rate it, review it, and like it. And thank you so much for listening.