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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

#161

Post by jacquesm »

0xffff2 wrote: post #134
jacquesm wrote: post #121

Someone tell the local high school here please, they definitely won't listen to me and require that every student have a smartphone.

How? Do they issue the kids phones? Assuming not because that seems implausibly expensive, what happens if you just don't give your kid a phone?

Then they won't be able to follow the courses because all of the data required for homework/tests etc is only available in some stupid app. And no, they don't issue the phones (obviously...). Though they probably should since it is their requirement.

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

#162

Post by Shared404 »

throwaway3838g wrote: post #149
afavour wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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

I'm convinced that barring kids who are exclusively homeschooled, every kid has a way to bypass these restrictions either by themselves or with a classmates help.

Source: was a kid not that long ago.

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

#163

Post by bratbag »

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.

Do they?

You still have a little dopamine generator in every kids pocket, just waiting for another app that's not technically social media.

Conversely social media without constant access through mobiles would be far safer.

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

#164

Post by jacquesm »

moolcool wrote: post #136
jacquesm wrote: post #121

Someone tell the local high school here please, they definitely won't listen to me and require that every student have a smartphone.

Do they allow tablets instead?

That's a very good question. I will look into that. Still, all that social media junk also works on a tablet.

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

#165

Post by [deleted] »

rcme wrote: post #123
afavour wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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…

> 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…

[deleted]

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

#166

Post by adastra22 »

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…

My kids don’t have phones. They are the only ones among their peers who don’t have a phone. I told them they can get one when they write an app and get it listed on the App Store, not before.

Most people I tell this to are impressed. The only time I got crucified was the last time I mentioned it on HN. This seems to be a particular bone to pick that HN users have.

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

#167

Post by urthor »

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…

Bring back the flip phone.

Got a kid, give them Motorola.

Job done.

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

#168

Post by casey2 »

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…

The thread and article isn't about smartphones being harmful, it's about a very small study showing slight correlation between MHQ(something that approximately 2 people itt could define) (and a few categories that "don't align with DSM-5") and the age at which 18-24 year-old females got their first "smartphone or tablet" and even less correlation among 18-24 year-old males.

It can't be the million other things wrong with society it has to be the new thing, let's all extrapolate wildly from a random study and get hyped up on fear of the new thing so we can keep ignoring real problems. Through in some random easily debunked claims about every (literally every) child.

You make no sense.

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

#169

Post by hibikir »

trinix912 wrote: post #109
IceHegel wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> We don’t know what’s causing it. Speculatively, I’d say it’s social media for girls (instagram, tiktok, snapchat) and porn for boys.

As if it’s impossible for boys to have body image issues because of all those Instagram models.

Oh, boys can absolutely have image problems for looking at instagram models. In general, comparing oneself to the photoshopped version of people that are already in the top percentage in the good looks lottery is bad, regardless of gender.

However, statistically speaking, boys just don't follow male instagram models in the first place. Far fewer install instagram in the first place, and if they do, it's not to get fashion tips and lifestyle advice models. Those that do are probably going to end up very insecure too. But in practice, boys don't do that, and therefore the practical levels of harm are lower. It's just like how teenagers that have friends that binge drink end up having more alcohol related problems. It's not that the alcohol itself is more dangerous, physically speaking, the more friends that drink the teenager has. It's that if their friends are binge drinkers, chances are higher that they themselves will binge drink too.

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

#170

Post by tkaiste112344 »

alexb_ wrote: post #52
inconceivable wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Yeah, I'm not giving my daughter a smart phone or tablet. i can tell you how this goes. when it becomes socially important to get one, she's going to do everything in her power to get one behind your back, turning her into an extremely skilled liar (since her entire life will revolve around this lie), a skill which she will use whenever an opportune moment comes up.

This is totally what a healthy and non-addictive thing does to children, right? Children being socially pressured into lying to their parents and hiding what they do is something that happens with drugs. The fact that it happens with smartphones as well should tell you something.

Except drugs aren't the main means of socialization among today's children.

You can stay off the grid, and deny your kids access to it, but you can't stop the advance of technology itself. Eventually your children will be left behind, ostracized by their peers for being weird/lame. Maybe even paranoid for life as a result of your helicopter parenting. And of course, when they finally get a smartphone, they will have zero experience in managing its "addictive" capabilities, which probably won't help their adult lives either.

Source: anecdotal evidence of a friend who lives with depression and severe social anxiety as a result of similar experiences. Of course, there were other deciding factors that turned said person into what they are today. Make of this what you will.

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