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Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

jonathanhaidt.substack.com

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Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#141

Post by sb057 »

afavour wrote: post #100
alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

> Smartphones give children the ability to bully eachother at a scale unlike any other. No, social media does. I think it's important to be specific about that because a smartphone is just a tool, same as a laptop or a desktop computer is (when I was a kid there was plenty of bullying that went on via AIM!) Having access to e.g. Wikipedia is of enormous benefit to young people. Having the means to easily call your pa…

>>Smartphones give children the ability to bully eachother at a scale unlike any other.

>No, social media does.

Social media (and other mindless media consumption) is perhaps the defining role for smartphones, especially for children.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#142

Post by asynchronous »

naravara wrote: post #87
IceHegel wrote: post #40

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was a period of time from about 2011-2013 where it felt like many parents would complain about everyone being on their phone. Then they started using them too and stopped complaining.

If anything parents are as bad or worse than the kids now. I'm about 40 and am constantly having to remind my own parents to put the phone away and be more present with their grandkids when they come to visit.

This to the power of ten. Saddest realization of my life was seeing my mother who always scolded me about screen usage becoming more addicted to her phone than me.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#143

Post by nilespotter »

nh23423fefe wrote: post #78
tgv wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Writing off all of this ..., makes no sense. It does make sense when you think of it as an addiction. Many people fear giving up their phone. They think it's essential. They feel it. They live it.

Imagining you understand the motivations of diverse non-coordinating groups of people by labeling them addicts isn't persuasive or clarifying.

But it is still true

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#144

Post by ChatGTP »

balder1991 wrote: post #80
alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

But these things aren’t smartphones’ fault per se, if you remove toxic social media from the equation most of these problems go away.

Toxic social media and similar forums like YouTube are what’s feeding the “AI” at the moment, it’s not going to happen for a while. Tech is becoming the new tobacco.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#145

Post by aidenn0 »

afavour wrote: post #122
jacquesm wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Smartphone = pushy social media in your pocket 24x7. In practice I suspect that amongst highschoolers the ratio of time spent between wikipedia and social media (and gaming as well) heavily favors the latter.

Like I said: > It's possible to set up a child's smartphone in such a way that their access to social media is limited if not totally removed. The problem is parents who don't care enough to get actively involved in their child's lives to this extent.

It's very hard though; particularly if you do want to give e.g wikipedia access.

I am reasonably tech savvy and gave up figuring it out with the controls that Apple and Google provide, and paid for an MDM application.

Also, it means banning most popular apps, as they are all building in social media features.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#146

Post by civeng »

OP here. Parent of 3, ages 12, 15 and 18 navigating this issue irl. Although I believe good parents aren't super rigid on any issue, I feel pretty strongly on this one. It's the parents responsibility and it's hard since it requires your good example. No phone, age 0 to 10-12, to the Lightphone (absolutely love this product) age 13 to 16-18, to a smart phone. I believe the progression is pushed off as long as possible and allows for a manageable transition to responsible use of a necessary evil. To restrictive and your kid goes off the rails at 18 or earlier. Too permissive...pretty obvious what happens.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#147

Post by adamwong246 »

afavour wrote: post #100
alexb_ wrote: post #45

There is so much instant dismissal of this entire idea that smartphones are harmful in this thread, most of which is just "correlation is not causation". Yes, correlation does not equal causation. But when it makes logical sense why there would be correlation, there is no way to actually measure causation (we can't exactly give kids placebo phones), we keep seeing the same correlation over and over again, why is it b…

> Smartphones give children the ability to bully eachother at a scale unlike any other. No, social media does. I think it's important to be specific about that because a smartphone is just a tool, same as a laptop or a desktop computer is (when I was a kid there was plenty of bullying that went on via AIM!) Having access to e.g. Wikipedia is of enormous benefit to young people. Having the means to easily call your pa…

An important point: It's not the "smartphones"- Its the APPS, specifically the social media apps, but really this applies the vast majority of apps. Rather than selling value, most are attention-parasites which inevitably harm the user. They become skinner boxes designed to keep us engaged, by any means necessary. To me, it highlights a key point of FOSS, which is that we should not harm our users.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#148

Post by watwut »

pavlov wrote: post #93

After moving back to Finland from the US, I noticed that seemingly everybody gives their kid a SIM-equipped phone at age 7. That's the age when school starts (a year later than in most other countries), and a lot of children become fairly independent quickly, e.g. walking or biking to school on their own. It's just too convenient to be able to call and track the child by the phone. In America, the smartphone seems to…

I think that freedom at age of 7 might be difference on itself. It means that kids so actually can socialize on their own terms. Whereas if you drive kids to school and home, their only freedom is on the phone.

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#149

Post by throwaway3838g »

afavour wrote: post #130
rcme wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No, social media does. This is like the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument. Sure, smartphones are just a tool. But they're a tool used to access social media. Also, I'd argue it's not just social media causing this issue. AI filters that make you look more "beautiful" are commonplace now. Children see themselves through these filter and it may impact their self-esteem, e.g. "why do I look beautif…

> This is like the "guns don't kill people, people kill people" argument. C'mon. Guns are dumb. Smartphones are smart. It's entirely possible to set up a smartphone in a way that blocks access to certain apps, limits how many hours you can use an app in a day, etc etc. The only way your parallel works is if guns had the ability to selectively target bad guys.

I’m not convinced that an enterprising kid couldn’t easily bypass these restrictions

Re: Kids who get smartphones earlier become adults with worse mental health

#150

Post by mschuster91 »

How much of that is correlation vs causation?

I don't see anything in that article mentioning obvious causes for worse mental health:

- employment perspectives - even my generation that graduated right in the financial crisis knew we were in for rough, low-pay and crap job years, kids graduating these days have even worse perspectives

- the looming climate crisis - everyone paying attention in a school that teaches fact-based education knows humanity is in for a rough ride with climate change threatening to make wide swaths of the world basically unable to support human life during their expected life time

- politics actually regressing worldwide - with open marches of actual Nazis raising their arm to the well-known salute, dictators and authoritarians worldwide getting and staying in power, politicians hell-bent on erasing all social progress of the last decades, and no one doing anything about that, it paints a pretty depressing view.

The earlier kids get smartphones, the earlier they see that the promise of "work hard, have a good life", "everyone can start a dishwasher and die a millionaire" and "your future will be better than your parents'" is bullshit. Facts don't lie, facts are not political, and children and adolescents are not dumb. They know they are being lied to, and they see that lies have absolutely zero consequences.

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