← Solutions with Henry Blodget
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- [00:01]
Dr. Jean Twenge
How does F1 turn data into insights at 200 mph? AWS is how fans get inside the strategy. AWS powers next level innovation for millions of businesses.
- [00:16]
Henry Blodgett
This message is brought to you by Apple Card. You left your wallet in the car or was it at home? No need to panic. With your iPhone you can tap to pay using Apple Card with Apple Pay and earn unlimited daily cash back when you do. Apple Card is ready when you need it. Subject to credit approval. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA, Salt Lake City branch terms and more@applecard.com.
- [00:44]
Dr. Jean Twenge
We have massively underprotected kids in the online world, then overprotected them in the physical world. I'm not saying kids shouldn't be on the Internet at all. We just gotta, we gotta bring those things back into balance.
- [01:00]
Henry Blodgett
If you are a parent like me or thinking of becoming a parent, you probably have been noting with some trepidation the reporting of rise in teenage loneliness and depression and feelings of worthlessness. Many academics are persuaded that these trends are caused by our newfound addiction to electronic devices, including including smartphones and even PCs in school. Our guest today, Dr. Jean Twenge, a professor at San Diego State University, has written about this topic for 10 years. She has some very specific solutions for parents as to what to do and she outlines them in a new book called 10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High Tech World. So here's my interview with Dr. Twenge. Gene, welcome. So great to have you. Thank you for joining us and for your work in general, speaking on behalf of all parents, including me, who has had a lot to learn about this topic, why do we need rules in a high tech world as parents?
- [02:00]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Because there's so little regulation, say of social media or the Internet that parents have to be the front line. And the other argument I've heard as well, why don't we just talk to kids? Well, of course we should talk to kids, but we also need to have rules because talking is usually not enough, partially because they're up against so much social pressure and the algorithms that are designed to keep them online and on social media as long as possible.
- [02:30]
Henry Blodgett
And in your book, in the first chapter, you include a lot of charts that are very frightening that coincide with the mass adoption of smartphones and so forth. Talk us through some of those. Why is this so important?
- [02:43]
Dr. Jean Twenge
So I got interested in this because I research generational differences. I work with these big surveys of teens that go back decades and around 2012 I started to see some troubling trends that more and More teens were saying they felt lonely, that they felt left out, that they felt like they couldn't do anything right, that their life wasn't useful. Then it turned out clinical level depression doubled among teens between 2011 and 2019. So even before the pandemic. Also, the more time a teen spends on social media, the more likely it is that they'll be depressed. So you put it all together. We have an adolescent mental health cris. One of the primary causes is that teens are spending a lot more time online, a lot less time with their friends in person, and less time sleeping. That's a terrible formula for mental health. And it's something that they're doing or not doing every single day. So it makes sense it would have a big impact on their wellbeing.
- [03:41]
Henry Blodgett
And you make a strong case. Seemingly a lot of evidence backing it up. But how strong is the science? Because you do seem to have critics who say it's not nearly as big a deal as you say, or even that it's not in any way anything more than correlation rather than causation. How strong is it?
- [03:59]
Dr. Jean Twenge
So when I first started making this argument in 2017, what I mostly had was that correlational data plus what we call time series, that you saw this huge increase in teen depression at the time that smartphones and social media became common. And that's sometimes called a natural experiment. And the other thing that's good about that is the reverse causation idea of like, oh, kids are depressed and that's why they're spending more time on social media. It doesn't make a lot of sense in that context. You'd have to say teen depression increased for some completely unknown reason, and that's why teens bought smartphones and started using social media more. It doesn't make a lot of sense, you know, a lot of confounding variables, you know, that you have to think about in correlational studies, also not relevant for time series. Since then, we've also got a lot more experimental data. So people who give up or, or cut back on social media use, and then after three weeks or a month, they tend to feel happier and, and less depressed. So it's, it's, it's all of those types of studies put together. The totality of the evidence is much stronger now than it was in 2017, and in my view, definitely shows causation.
- [05:09]
Henry Blodgett
Just from what you're saying here, it sounds like you certainly are convinced. Sounds like it's still a question, like it hasn't been proven that so that.
- [05:16]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Everybody agrees it's really hard to prove anything, you know, a hundred percent in science that's just not the way the language is used. You know, there, and there's, there's, and I always have to be clear about this too, you know, there's, there's a difference between scientific causation and legal causation. There's also a difference in, you know, what each individual parent needs to decide what, what they want to do with their kids. I have met parents who have said I don't even care, I don't even care what the science says. I just know that when I gave my kid a phone or I see my kids friends on phones, that that's not what I want my kid's life to be.
- [05:50]
Henry Blodgett
Right. And so given that. And are you, do you think there should be government regulation?
- [05:58]
Dr. Jean Twenge
I do.
- [05:59]
Henry Blodgett
Of social media?
- [05:59]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yes.
- [06:00]
Henry Blodgett
And what would that look like?
- [06:02]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Well, one thing that could be done is to verify age. So as you know from the book, I think kids should really be 16 or older to use social media. But let's set that aside for a minute and say how about we just take existing law from the 1998 law COPPA, which was a compromise with the tech companies that set the age of Internet at adulthood at 13. That's not even enforced. Kids can just check a box or lie about their birthday and they're on. So we have 10 year olds, 11 year olds, 12 year olds routinely on these platforms. So how about we just verify each even for that very low bar of 13? That would be a good regulation to just actually get behind existing law.
- [06:48]
Henry Blodgett
Talk us through the rules and there's some specific ones that I want to ask you about. But these are 10 very common sense rules. Talk us through some of them.
- [06:56]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, well, we can start with social media. So rule three is no social media until 16 or later. And a few people have said, you know, do you think even 16 is too low and yeah, you could make a case for 18. Absolutely. You know, you have to sign a contract when you open a social media account to sign away your data. You know, it's kind of a big deal. It's a much bigger deal than taking a field trip. And a 17 year old still needs a parent's signature to take a field trip. You know, what other legal contract can you sign when you're not 18 as a minor, other than that one? So you can make an argument for that. I think 16 is a good compromise position. There's a lot of maturity that happens between 13 and 16. So that's why I think parents should follow that of doing everything they can to keep their kids off social media until they're 16 or older. Given the toxicity on the platforms, given that the algorithms are designed to keep people on them for as long as possible and keep coming back as long as possible. Gallup found a year or two ago that the average US teen spends almost five hours a day using social media. That is way too much.
- [08:07]
Henry Blodgett
And what are some of the things that it does that you're worried about?
- [08:10]
Dr. Jean Twenge
So it's a really, really long list. It is a long list. So we can start with the time spent aspect that it can absolutely interfere with sleep. So crowds out hours for sleep and also disrupt sleep. If you're looking at it right before bed or you have that phone next to you and then you're getting notifications overnight. So that interference with sleep is huge at the generational level. It's also interfered with teens having a social life with each other, getting together with each other in person. As social media and electronic communication became more popular, teens getting together with their friends in person was cut in half. And they're just not developing those social skills, those emotion regulation skills, all of those things that you develop from face to face communication in real time in the same room or space. So they're, they're missing out on that. Then there's all of the other aspects around, you know, Metazone research, finding big issues with body image and eating disorders on Instagram, the, you know, really disturbing content that's out there. Because it's not just the content, it's that on most of these platforms, teens don't even have to seek out that disturbing content. The way the algorithm works is if you look at it longer, it serves up more of it to you. And for most people, but especially for teens and children, they're going to look longer at things that are sexual and inappropriate or violent or disturbing. And then the algorithm serves up more of that content.
- [09:56]
Henry Blodgett
And one of the things you do very effectively in the book is you basically air the objections that you hear from both adults, but and children, including your own children, saying, come on, mom, everybody has this. We need to be modern children, not your age. But I go back to my own childhood and the big scourge then that everybody was worried about was television. How awful it's making us all stupid. There were not to the same degree, but there were body image issues and what we were celebrating on TV and so forth, and isolation. We should be out. Then there were periods where everyone was bemoaning the Fact that all my kids do is hang out with their friends at the mall and so forth. So are you persuaded or why are you persuaded that this is much different than what seems to be an age old feeling of parents that whatever new technologies have come along since they were kids are terrible.
- [10:53]
Dr. Jean Twenge
So if it was just parents saying, hey, I don't like this stuff, we'd be having a very different conversation. Instead, it's that young people themselves are suffering and are telling us that they're suffering through both what they're saying in terms of the symptoms and feelings and emotions they're having and their behaviors. So suicide rate has gone up among teens, the rate of self harm has gone up and depression and depressive symptoms have gone up. Unhappiness, just across the board. So they themselves are telling us that this is a problem. So there's a couple things that are, that are, we can talk about. TV is a great example of something where, you know, two things are true. First, smartphones are different because you can bring them to school, you can bring them into a social situation. The algorithms on these platforms are much stickier than the, you know, happy days having, you know, a special episode. And then maybe that's coming up next when it's just very different. Sure, you may want to watch that, but there's a natural stopping point at the end of an episode as opposed to the endless scroll on social media. And it's just not as compelling or engaging or addictive. You know, choose which word you want to use. Um, and TV among teens never moved beyond about two hours a day. And social media is now at five. And overall screen time, according to common sense, media is closer to nine or ten hours a day. See, that's a big difference between that and maybe two, two and a half hours a day on watching television, which is what the average used to be across the whole week. The other piece is when people say, oh, you know, everybody made those same arguments about television. They often say that with the idea that none of it was true. It was true. Television did make us stupid. Look at what it's done to politics. Look at what it has done to the sense of community and community groups. So one of my intellectual heroes is Robert Putnam, who wrote the book bowling alone in 2000. And it's an amazing book with making the case of like, why did community groups fall apart in the US and it's like 800 pages long, 800amazing pages. And at the end of that 800 pages, the conclusion he comes to about why did the American community Fall apart was television.
- [13:19]
Henry Blodgett
Well, television may have made me an idiot. And I remember the battles with my mother who was trying to regulate it. And we started it two hours a week and we just worked away at it and finally we got her to four hours a week and then it was okay to watch Nova because that was science and so forth. So those dynamics have been going on for a while. And again, one of the things you do so well in the book is you talk about all the different areas of pushback. One specific thing that I wanted to ask you about is your first rule, first chapter is you are in charge. Why is it that we need to be told that?
- [13:55]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, well, parenting has changed. So again, you know, I'm by training in my most of my careers as a generations researcher and parenting has changed in a lot of really positive ways. We are more involved with our kids, we talk to our kids more as people, you know, we're more loving. However, we're also softies. We're just a lot more likely to cave into our kids. Your example of your mom is great. What parent today would be able to get away with saying you could have two or four hours of screen time a week?
- [14:29]
Henry Blodgett
Inconceivable.
- [14:30]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Inconceivable. It's just we find it much harder to say no to our kids. You know, we want our kids to be happy. However, we need to think long term, not just short term, about what's going to make them happy in the long term. And one thing that I tell parents about this is, you know, I teach college students and I give talks at college campuses. So college age students whose parents put restrictions on them in terms of smartphones and social media are grateful. They say that to a person that they are so grateful that their parents did that. And those who gave their gave had that access early on often then look back on that and say, I was way too young. What were they thinking?
- [15:20]
Henry Blodgett
And I, you know, I think back in college also and one of the things that happened to me was I did have a group of friends. It was a performance group where after singing performance or whatever, we'd sit around and talk. And what I was amazed about was pretty much everybody else in the group watched a whole lot more television than I did and I was not riding the reference train. And all of these different discussions of shows where people could come up with lines and everything else. I felt like I was out of it in a way. And that was the first time where I felt like, you know, maybe it would have been better if I'd Been able to watch a little bit more TV because it's like the center of our culture. And that seems to be one of the arguments that kids make all the time is, mom, how can you do this to me? I'm the only one in the whole class not, you know, the worst, strictest mother in the world. So why is there anything to that? Are we teaching them modern skills if we give them smartphone in an unfettered way?
- [16:16]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Look, you know, skills like having an attention span, being able to talk to other people, being able to think, those are always going to be necessary. Social media platforms, other platforms, they're designed to be extremely easy to use. You can learn how to use them in five minutes. So if they don't use them up until they're, say, 16 or 18, that's not going to be a deficit. The other thing that comes to mind came to mind as you were talking. So I'm a Gen Xer. I remember some of those discussions in college as well. That's not how social media and the Internet work. As much as the feeds are individualized. Gen X was the last generation to have that unified pop culture experience. So they have a somewhat common language of memes, but they are exposed to that even if they're not on social media. And I know this from my, from my own kids. So they, you know, and it's, it's not, it's just this funny phrases that they, that they trade around. And you don't have to be on social media to learn those. The other thing is, I think it's a huge myth that teens have to have social media to communicate with each other, get information. They have the rest of the Internet and they can text and call if they want to communicate one on one. And then they're not subject to that social media algorithm and all of that content.
- [17:36]
Henry Blodgett
And that was another thing that I was struck by with your book, is you, you do seem to be painting a much more nuanced picture than some of the arguments 10 years ago or five years ago, which seem to be to ban smartphones completely. But you seem to be saying no phones are good at a certain age with some restrictions. It's social media you gotta watch out for. It's unfettered Internet you've gotta watch out for. Talk about that.
- [18:03]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah. And, you know, I should, I should say I have a lot of respect for the folks who say, hey, you know, keep your kids away from all screens. And my, my view, just from my own experience in talking to other parents, is you can do that. Fairly effectively until kids are about in middle school. Then unless you're homeschooling them or sending them to a school that doesn't have any tech, they're going to get a school laptop. And often at that age too, that's when they start taking a bus or, you know, that's often when parents, you know, or they're doing sports or there's some other reason why, you know, they need some sort of phone. So I just, I think you have to acknowledge that reality, you know, to an extent, but try to still delay as long as you possibly can, giving them any device of their own and then when they have it, to make sure that it's training wheels, you're not just, you know, throwing them into the water, expecting them to swim in a toxic river. So you, you have to have it gradually introduced and only when they're ready. 300 sensors, over a million data points per second. How does F1 update their fans with every stat in real time, AWS is how, from fastest laps to strategy calls, AWS puts fans in the pit. It's not just racing. It's data driven innovation at 200 miles per hour. AWS is how leading businesses power next level innovation.
- [19:46]
Henry Blodgett
This message is brought to you by Apple Card. Does this sound familiar? You're in line at checkout, cart full of items, your toddler is screaming for a treat, and then you realize you left your wallet in the car or was it at home? No need to panic. With your iPhone in hand, you can tap to pay using Apple Card. With Apple Pay and you'll earn unlimited daily cash back when you do so if your credit card isn't Apple Card, maybe it should be subject to credit approval. Apple Card issued by Goldman Sachs Bank USA Salt Lake City Branch terms and more@applecard.com first it was one alleged truck boat. Back in September, U.S. military forces conducted a kinetic strike against positively identified trend aragua narco terrorists.
- [20:38]
Dr. Jean Twenge
11 on board were killed. When you flood American streets with drugs.
- [20:42]
Henry Blodgett
You are terrorizing America. Then a second strike in the Caribbean, then another and another. Almost every week for two months in total, more than a dozen ships have been hit and at least 57 people left dead. We're going to kill them.
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Dr. Jean Twenge
You know they're gonna be like dead. Okay.
- [21:03]
Henry Blodgett
And Trump is still upping the ante. He's sending warships to the coast of Venezuela. But the question is why? And what's Stephen Miller got to do with it? Okay, I'm Estad Herndon filling in around here for the next few months. That and More on Today explained from Vox. So let's talk a little bit more about parenting because I talk a little bit more about why is it that your first rule has to be you're in charge. What's happened to parents over the last 30 years? Because I again, my parents struggled. They wanted us to like them and so forth. But I don't feel like they had the same angst around imposing the rules that you're talking about as modern parents do. Why is it that.
- [21:55]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, I think a lot of it has to do with individualism. So this is, you know, again from my background as a generations researcher, that we have more focus on the self, less on social rules, less focus on authority. And I think it's just really hard for a lot of parents to step into that role of being an authority figure. It was for me, you know, just that idea of like, wait, I'm in charge here. Took me a little bit to get used to, but I realized fairly quickly that it worked better. If you do have that sense of authority, it doesn't mean being mean or, you know, not being loving. You can do both. So I go over the four parenting styles that have been studied in research in that chapter and I give them the names of sea creatures after some folks who call the authoritative, which is generally considered to be the best parenting style. They call that dolphin parenting. So firm but flexible. So firm but loving. That's the idea. So the firm but flexible is for like the skin of a dolphin. That's where the dolphin idea comes from, apparently. As opposed to, say, a permissive parent, which I call a sea sponge parent. They just give in to everything. They're just total softies or tiger shark, where it's my way or the highway and I'm not going to be loving, but I'm going to be very, very firm. And I'm not even going to explain the rules to you. And then the fourth is uninvolved, where not showing love and also not having rules. So fish parenting, like you lay the eggs and then leave. So really, lots of research in psychology has shown that that authoritative or dolphin parenting is the best approach. Get to know your kids, show them you love them, tell them the rules. Because kids thrive on structure, even teenagers. And yeah, teenagers are going to push back. That's their job is to push boundaries. But you stay firm. It actually works better. You know, it invites less argument if the rule is clear and consistently enforced. And then you get the pushback and you have a straightforward answer. That's what I found.
- [24:02]
Henry Blodgett
And then the Other thing you talk about, which I found fascinating, one of the last rules is, hey, in the real world actually go the other way back up and give them more freedom. And this is another thing that has changed a lot since my childhood. I was allowed after school to be outside in the park in New York where lots of bad things might happen. Three hours later I'd come home completely unsupervised, totally normal. You have this marvelous anecdote about a woman who put her whatever year old, nine year old on a subway or allowed him to go to Bloovingdale's and immediately when that becomes public, she gets labeled the worst mom in the world. How could this happen? Why is it that even as parents have become super wimpy about creating any rules for their precious individual children and not wanting to get in the way, we have gone and helicoptered the crap out of them or we can't do anything. And why is it okay, which was very interesting to actually back off and let them have room in the real world but close in on them on digital.
- [25:07]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, well, we have massively underprotected kids in the online world and then overprotected them in the physical world. So we have to bring things back into balance because as, as you said, I'm not saying kids shouldn't be on the Internet at all. Right. Just. Yeah, but with parental controls, once they're a certain age and same thing, kids should be able to walk home from school assuming it's safe and within certain parameters. So we just gotta, we gotta bring those things back into balance. But yeah, that's rule eight is give your kids real world freedom for a bunch of reasons. So first that builds resilience. So each think about the things that kids do in the real world like walking home from school or going to the park and playing and the skills that that develops. So what skill are they developing being on TikTok three hours a day? Maybe they're watching a couple of videos that are kind of interesting and they learn a few things. But are what is what they're learning even, right? And most of the time that's just time flushed down the toilet. When if they're learning how to cook and do their own laundry and make their own decisions and be independent and learning how to roll with it when things go wrong and time with people in person, those are really, really useful skills. I mean, just as one example, I teach college students. I, you know, give talks on a lot of college campuses. Everywhere I go, more of the staff on college campuses tell me I have more and more students who can't make even simple decisions without texting their parents. So we're not raising children or raising adults. Someone told me that when my kids are really little, and it's stuck with me ever since, and now that My oldest is 18 and I'm the parent of an adult, I really see how that is true.
- [26:50]
Henry Blodgett
And another thing you said that was fascinating as an aside, was that actually first let me ask you, what was the reaction in your own family to this?
- [26:59]
Dr. Jean Twenge
To what exactly?
- [27:00]
Henry Blodgett
To your implementing some of these rules and figuring them out as they go, as you went?
- [27:05]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, so I'll take one, which is give the first smartphone with the driver's license. So we came up with that as my oldest got older. So she's, I always say, and I mean this with, with love and as a compliment, she's a unique individual. So she was okay with having a flip phone and she had a flip phone when she got her driver's license. But then, you know, a little bit after you got her driver's license realized, yeah, she's getting lost, might be a good idea to get her a smartphone. And it kind of clicked for me that that made so much sense to tie those events together, getting the driver's license and getting the Internet enabled phone. And I always want to be clear, I'm not suggesting that means kids don't have any Internet access. They can do that on their laptops. And if they need a phone, it doesn't have to be a smartphone. There's flip phones. There's also basic phones designed for kids. My 15 year old and 13 year old still have those. So that made a lot of sense. And yes, I've certainly had those conversations. So my 15 year old's about to turn 16. So she said, well, can I get the smartphone when I turn 16 even if I don't have my driver's license? Well, the, the answer to that's no. It's not just being 16, it's having that independence of that driver's license actually needing a smartphone. Because that's the other piece. Do kids really need an Internet enabled phone? I mean, truly, do they need it? Maybe they need a phone, but do they need an Internet enabled phone until they start driving? I would argue no, they really don't.
- [28:33]
Henry Blodgett
And so I this idea that your daughter is going to continue to come back at you and argue and make.
- [28:40]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Cases, that's the thing.
- [28:41]
Henry Blodgett
Okay. You imposed it and that was that.
- [28:43]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Right. Because she, and she asked, and I didn't mind her asking you know, hey, can I get it when I'm 16, even if I don't have the license? But then it's like, no, the rule is when you get your license. And that was the end. And I think it's because it's one event. It's not like. And because I've heard a lot of other people say this, you know, oh, when's the best time for a kid to get a smartphone? To get their first smartphone? And a lot of other experts say when they're ready. What exactly does that mean? You're gonna be having an argument with your kid every single day that they're ready. But if it's tied to an event, just like we do with driving, you have to be a certain age, and you have to have taken classes, and there's a definition for ready. And I think we have to do the same with technology.
- [29:23]
Henry Blodgett
The other thing that startled me when I read that about the driver's license is often what you hear is one of the most dangerous things you can allow as a parent is driving. And the horror stories about teen driving, especially when drinking is involved and so forth. So 2 hear you say, effectively, you know, get your driver's license first is remarkable. I mean, it does seem to be a very big commitment to this idea that, hey, real world's okay. It's the online world that's the problem.
- [29:53]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah. And look, this. This has to be in the context of them being a safe driver. And, yes, you will absolutely have to have a conversation about not using that phone or while you're driving. You have to have. I think you have to have that conversation with any. Any new driver. So I think that's kind of baked in. But the basic idea stands that in a lot of neighborhoods, including mine, that driver's license is the key to independence and freedom and seeing their friends in person without it having to be online. So it's an important. It's a really, really important turning point and milestone. And when kids do that, then they. They grow up a lot. They grow up a lot, and it really helps them prepare for, for example, going off to college. Because it's really common now for. For kids, like, not even to get their driver's license until right before they go to college, not even learn how to do laundry or cook. And then it's a really hard adjustment. And that's often happening when they're away from home for the first time. That can be really tough.
- [31:07]
Henry Blodgett
Another thing you say about real life that really struck me because it brought up one of my Own just parental decisions. That was really difficult. Was effectively, when they're scared, that can be an opportunity to nudge them into it. And you call it exposure therapy. And you push through it or they push through it and suddenly they have much more confidence and they can do it next time I'll give you the example that I think about a lot is we were going on a family hike and there was another family that had gone on many more hikes that had set it all up and done the research. I hadn't done any research. And we got on the trail. Suddenly it was a very exposed trail where if one wasn't paying attention, one could slip and fall and presumably die. And my family members were not happy about that. I had done a lot of climbing. Even I was a little wigged out, but I felt okay.
- [31:58]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Was it Angel's Landing in Zion, one.
- [32:01]
Henry Blodgett
Of those like that? Yes. So there was a, there was a moment of discussion and the family turned around and I remember the other father who had arranged everything, giving me the little pep talk, which is, you gotta push em through it. They'll get through it, they'll get to the thing and they'll be so proud of themselves. And very tough moment for me. And I gave in to my family, which is I just decided, you know what, like, fear is not a good thing. And it was not like a little bit of jitters, like you really scared. And I said, that's fine, so let's not do it. And I certainly don't want to be the dad who pushed the family into the hike and then somebody falls off. So what's the lesson for me there? And where do you draw the line, like how much fear is. Should you be pushed through?
- [32:45]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah. So you, you. I agree that you have to choose your battles and you have to judge the amount of fear. I think it's also. Then this is just my view with kids. It's. It's also is this relevant to something that they're going to experience later in life? So if the fear is. I don't want to go to that party because I'm going to have to talk to people I don't know. Well, kid, you're going the hike. That's. See, I see that as a little bit different. First because it's somewhat maybe because the danger is physical and also because you know, if, when you're 25, you also don't want to go on a hike where you might fall off a cliff, that's not a big deal. But if you don't know how to talk to people you don't know when you're 25, that's a pretty big deal.
- [33:36]
Henry Blodgett
Millions of players, one world, no lag. How's it done? AWS is how epic games turn to AWS to scale to more than 100 million Fortnite players worldwide so they can stay locked in with battle tested reliability. AWS is how leading businesses power next level innovation. A few years ago this researcher was trying to get people to relax by sitting in a silent room for 15 minutes. But they hated it. People would rather listen to sounds of.
- [34:14]
Dr. Jean Twenge
People vomiting, nails on a chalkboard, et.
- [34:16]
Henry Blodgett
Cetera, rather than simply sit in silence. I got obsessed with this experiment, so I decided to make a whole series for Unexplainable about the way our brain processes sound. Like tinnitus.
- [34:29]
Dr. Jean Twenge
It's like you're just trapped. There's nothing else to do.
- [34:33]
Henry Blodgett
Like no way to escape it. Or what audio illusions show us about how hearing works.
- [34:39]
Dr. Jean Twenge
It just seemed that the world had just turned upside down.
- [34:42]
Henry Blodgett
Or how astronomers are making new discoveries by listening to space.
- [34:47]
Dr. Jean Twenge
I thought those sounds were bothersome and at that moment everything transformed into beauty.
- [34:55]
Henry Blodgett
The sound barrier from Unexplainable, a four part series about the limits of hearing and the ways we can break through. Follow Unexplainable for new episodes every Monday and Wednesday.
- [35:09]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Asted Herndon, you're finally here. Finally.
- [35:12]
Henry Blodgett
I'm excited to be here.
- [35:13]
Dr. Jean Twenge
You are joining Today Explained for the next five months to fill in for my co host Sean while he's taking care of a baby. And you are also starting a brand new podcast at FOB's. Exactly.
- [35:23]
Henry Blodgett
I'm excited to continue our reporting and help make politics more accessible to people.
- [35:27]
Dr. Jean Twenge
What's the thing that you're most excited to cover?
- [35:30]
Henry Blodgett
I'm most excited to help people make sense of all the noise that's happening right now and try to figure out what really matters. And most importantly, help people make sense of the chaos that's going on right now.
- [35:41]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Today Explained Weekdays, wherever you get your podcasts.
- [35:47]
Henry Blodgett
And then another thing that came through in the book is you seem to be not only very committed to this, but never tired, never busy with your own things. Never. Are you kidding me? Of course, never desperate to get to your own phone. Which is certainly an experience that I've.
- [36:04]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Had as a dad that I do okay with. I'm extremely busy and often tired. But. But I do. I mean I. Look, everybody, everybody has issues these days with some piece of technology or another. Mine is I spend too much time reading news. But I also do pretty well trying to keep that phone out of certain situations. Like it's usually upstairs for the whole evening. I try very hard not to let it take over my life.
- [36:35]
Henry Blodgett
And yet you also describe very vividly how incredibly clever children can be at circumventing whatever rules are in place. Not just rules, but safeguards that are in place. You please tell us the anecdote about the phone disappearing from the lockbox. And the fact of the lockbox is amazing.
- [36:55]
Dr. Jean Twenge
But yeah, it wasn't a lockbox actually. It stayed. It was just the kitchen counter. But yeah, so, so I put the rule in place. So my 13 year old had just gotten a phone and she was 12, I think, at the time that this took place. And so we had that rule, they have to go on the kitchen counter overnight. And the phone was there and she went to bed. And then I went downstairs for some reason and the phone wasn't there. Wait, what's going on? And she wasn't asleep yet, so I peeked in. I was like, where's your phone? She's like, I don't know. Like, really? Okay, well, let's try to find it because it needs to be downstairs. And kept looking for the phone so on. And then her older sister was like, hey, what are you doing? Like, we're looking for Julia's phone. And she goes, it's in her bed. So she ratted out her sister. And it was, I'm happy to say, though, that was the last time that, that, that that happened. And she's, she's really good. She. And she doesn't, at least she's 13 now and she really doesn't push back. She's really good about putting that phone downstairs now because I took it away for three days after that happened. And you know, kids are going to push back again. You know, that's one of their jobs at those ages. It was surprising because she just, she, she's not the. I don't know. All three of my kids have lied to my face. Just, that's just being a parent. But she does, she's done that a little bit less. So I was a little surprised by it, but. But then it wasn't a problem again, thankfully.
- [38:27]
Henry Blodgett
And did you take it personally when.
- [38:29]
Dr. Jean Twenge
She lied to you in that case? I did, yeah. Yeah. Just because it was so unusual for her and it was completely to my face. Yeah.
- [38:39]
Henry Blodgett
But it worked out in the end. Sounds a little better.
- [38:42]
Dr. Jean Twenge
More or less. Yeah, it did.
- [38:43]
Henry Blodgett
More or less. Okay.
- [38:45]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah.
- [38:46]
Henry Blodgett
All right, so just a couple more things. And then I Want to come back to what to me was the. Just the clear rule that made sense not only for kids, but adults. But you talked a little bit about school laptops. This seems like a big potential problem. I remember one school, actually, the school that I went to when I was a kid was following some of the debates in alumni circles and there was great frustration that the school was still using paper books and when are we going to get iPads for all the kids and enter the modern age and so forth. And you say that actually very persuasively, that this one laptop per kid is a disaster or can be a disaster.
- [39:21]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, I mean, test scores are. Started declining right around the time we got all that tech in the classroom. It just doesn't seem to be working out all that well. So, yeah, the school laptop is the bane of my existence. You cannot put parental controls on it, and it has YouTube on it.
- [39:44]
Henry Blodgett
And how do you. How does that fit into your overall electronics rule scheme? Because I will say that one of the things that was very effective for me was the argument that, you know, they need a computer. That's how we do our work now. And that's how we do our.
- [40:01]
Dr. Jean Twenge
They do. I mean, that's just. That's the way it is. They're going to be turning. They're going to be writing things, especially about middle school, especially high school. They're going to be writing things and turning them in online. There may be. They may even have to watch a YouTube video as an assignment. It's just, why can't it be integrated into Canvas instead of on YouTube where then they're going to watch a bunch of other videos when they say that they're doing their homework. So that rule, Rule 9 is the first word in it is beware. Because I couldn't rule it. I couldn't make the rule of like, you know, don't allow the school laptop because that's not feasible. It's just. It's an endless source of frustration.
- [40:36]
Henry Blodgett
And you mentioned that it's easier to explain to kids why a rule exists when there is a law against it. So somebody wants to have a drink at age 11. Well, it's not legal.
- [40:49]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah.
- [40:49]
Henry Blodgett
And you want to take the car, you need a driver's license. One of the things I was very interested in, in preparing for this is seems like there were the same arguments about the need for a driver's license and the need for a drinking age back in the 1930s and 1920s as there are now about technology. And you talked about this being A great experiment, natural experiment. Over the past 15 years, it sounds like we are collectively learning that there are, are many things about it that we may want to regulate. Do you think there will be actual government regulations at some point?
- [41:26]
Dr. Jean Twenge
I don't know. Australia's already done that. They raised the minimum age for social media to 16 and they're going to verify age. Whether that'll happen in the US is more of an open question. But I think it might happen for pornography websites because Texas passed that law and then it was upheld by the Supreme Court, so that I have more optimism there.
- [41:47]
Henry Blodgett
And then, last question, this goes to the rule that really jumped out at me, which I think you said is if you're going to follow one, have it be this, which is no electronics in the bedroom. And that's something that overnight. And that I look back and that would have been a simple one and seemingly fairly reasonable. It would have helped me as well. Do you get pushback on that too? Or does that, that. Can we just sort of adopt that as a nice health skill these days?
- [42:16]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Yeah, I think we should. And it's, it's for adults too, not just kids. That ton of research on, on this that you'll sleep better if that phone is physically outside of the bedroom after lights out. And also don't scroll on it right before bed. That's also really, really bad for sleep for both kids and adults. So, yeah, if you're gonna follow just one rule, that phone not being in the bedroom overnight should be it.
- [42:40]
Henry Blodgett
And do you think you'll do that when your kids are older, when they're adults and they're out in the world? Because that's another thing that I feel like now I gotta have the phone because you know, what if somebody needs to get ahold of me in the.
- [42:51]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Middle of the night? Right? And it's, you know, and it's. I think it's more in building good habits that then when they leave your house, then they will not be in the habit of checking their phone at 2 o' clock in the morning because they won't be used to having it there. So it's like with anything else, you have to raise them until they fly the nest and hope that you have given them the skills and the values to be a successful adult. And I think this falls into that category.
- [43:16]
Henry Blodgett
Gene, thank you so much for your time and your work. It's great to have you and wish you all the best of luck.
- [43:22]
Dr. Jean Twenge
Thanks very much.
- [43:24]
Henry Blodgett
Solutions is produced by Meghan Cunane. Jim Mackle is our video editor. Our theme music is by Trackademics. Nishat Kurwa is Vox Media's Executive producer of podcasts. Thanks for listening to Solutions from the Vox Media Podcast Network. I'm your host Henry Blodgett. We'll see you soon. Millions of players, one world, no lag. How's it done? AWS is how epic games turn to awesome AWS to scale to more than 100 million Fortnite players worldwide so they can stay locked in with battle tested reliability. AWS is how leading businesses power next level innovation.