A majority, 83% of parents think U.S. kids’ mental health is getting worse, according to the National Poll on Children’s Health by the C.S. Mott Children’s Hospital at the University of Michigan.
And many blame screens: three-quarters of respondents identify both social media and general device use as major problems for U.S. youth, while 66% specifically point to internet safety.
Health and science journalist Catherine Price, who has a 10-year-old daughter herself, agrees with her fellow parents. Every minute kids are spending on screens is a minute they’re not “developing real world skills or real world relationships or having real world experiences,” she says.
Price recently teamed up with “The Anxious Generation” author Jonathan Haidt to write a book about screens and social media use for tweens. It’s called “The Amazing Generation: Your Guide to Fun and Freedom in a Screen-Filled World.” And she has a few suggestions for parents who want to quell their kids’ device use.
Here’s what she recommends.
3 ways parents can lower kids’ screen time
1. Model the kind of habits you want your kids to exhibit
“It’ll be easier to limit your kids’ screentime if they see you trying to work on your own habits, too,” price says.
Experts agree modeling the behavior you want your kids to exhibit is key in helping to mold them.
“Think about the person you want your child to become,” writer and educator Theo Wolf wrote in a recent article for CNBC Make It. “Ask yourself: Am I demonstrating those traits in front of them? Is there anything I’m doing that opposes the values I want to pass on?”
You can even ask your kids to hold you accountable for looking at your phone or computer too much. Â
2. Invest in some shared family phones
Instead of giving your kids their own phone, have a few shared family phones.
Price suggests using a landline to help children develop conversational skills, encouraging them to use the phone to check in with grandparents or chat with friends.
You can also have a family flip phone for after school activities or if they’re going to a friend’s house. “They take it, they use it, they give it back,” she says.
3. Have them pay for their own smartphone
Price is a proponent of putting off getting your kids a smartphone until they’re at least 16, a guideline psychologist Jean Twenge recommends, too.
If you’re hoping to put it off even longer, though, you can tell them they have to pay for their smartphone themselves. If they know they’re financially responsible for it, “they probably won’t get one until they’re 25,” she says.
Plus, it could help “teach a lot of important lessons about working hard toward a goal,” she says.
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