Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / #953 From the Dr's Desk - Screens, Schools, & Social Connection

Transcript

#953 From the Dr's Desk - Screens, Schools, & Social Connection · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:03
Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast.
0:05
Speaker 2: It's the podcast for the time poor parent who just
0:09
Speaker 2: answers Now.
0:10
Speaker 1: One of the things that we love about the Happy
0:12
Speaker 1: Families podcast is we get to talk about serious things
0:15
Speaker 1: that help us to be better parents. We don't always
0:18
Speaker 1: talk about serious things, as you discovered last week with
0:20
Speaker 1: This Week in Parenting, but we do talk about some
0:23
Speaker 1: stuff that really matters, especially the science. My background is, oh,
0:27
Speaker 1: I've got a PhD in psychology. I really care about
0:30
Speaker 1: what the latest science tells us. Once a month we
0:33
Speaker 1: dive into the latest peer reviewed, scholarly empirical evidence that's
0:38
Speaker 1: come across my desk that I think can help all
0:41
Speaker 1: of us to be better parents. Today it's no exception, Kylie.
0:44
Speaker 1: We have two studies to dive into. I'm not going
0:46
Speaker 1: to try and cramp too much in because both of
0:48
Speaker 1: these matter. What if we got lined up today.
0:51
Speaker 2: There's new research out of Western Australia about how screens
0:55
Speaker 2: are having a negative impact on our young kids. And
0:58
Speaker 2: our second story today we talk about how you feel
1:01
Speaker 2: about being at school actually affects your well being, not
1:04
Speaker 2: just while you're at school, but well into adulthood.
1:07
Speaker 1: Okay, so two big studies to discuss let's start with
1:09
Speaker 1: screen time. Over the years, I've kind of flip flopped
1:12
Speaker 1: a fair bit around whether or not screens are really
1:14
Speaker 1: bad or not for kids. I've never suggested that they're good,
1:18
Speaker 1: but I've kind of had this belief that it depends
1:21
Speaker 1: on how you use them. It's probably not the end
1:23
Speaker 1: of the world if you kids are using a screen,
1:24
Speaker 1: and we shouldn't get two worked up about it. In
1:27
Speaker 1: the last little while, I've really shifted. I've had a
1:30
Speaker 1: profound shift. Screens are the new smoking. I'm convinced of it.
1:35
Speaker 1: The more research evidence we're seeing come across our desk,
1:38
Speaker 1: the more I believe that fundamentally screens are crippling our children.
1:43
Speaker 1: We've got loads of evidence now around teens and well being.
1:46
Speaker 1: But this research, like you mentioned out of Western Australia
1:50
Speaker 1: is looking at screens and kids between one and three
1:54
Speaker 1: years of age.
1:55
Speaker 2: Why don't you walk me through the study.
1:57
Speaker 1: Okay, so this is a really well designed study, what
2:00
Speaker 1: we call a perspective study. A lot of studies are retroactive.
2:03
Speaker 1: They're focused on saying to somebody, can you try and
2:06
Speaker 1: remember what happened last week? Tell us all the times
2:08
Speaker 1: that this thing happened. We know that memory is terribly faulty.
2:11
Speaker 1: The best studies we can do what we would call
2:14
Speaker 1: a prospective study, So.
2:15
Speaker 2: It's happening in real time, you're recording as it's happening.
2:18
Speaker 1: Precisely, that's exactly right. So this is an Australian study.
2:21
Speaker 1: It's perspective and it's what we call a cohort study,
2:23
Speaker 1: so a large number of kids all from the same
2:26
Speaker 1: age group, all the same age or going through this
2:28
Speaker 1: at the same time. So we've got an Australian prospective
2:33
Speaker 1: cohort study. And the researchers have used advanced speak recognition
2:37
Speaker 1: technology to capture young children's screen time and the home
2:42
Speaker 1: language environment. On a typical sixteen hour day, kids are
2:47
Speaker 1: asleep for eight hours, well hopefully they're asleep for more
2:49
Speaker 1: than that, but basically for the sixteen hours that they're
2:51
Speaker 1: recording data, we've got two hundred and twenty families. They're
2:54
Speaker 1: being recorded live in the home at twelve months, eighteen months,
2:59
Speaker 1: twenty four months, thirty months, and thirty six months of age.
3:03
Speaker 1: And this happens from twenty eighteen right through to the end
3:05
Speaker 1: of COVID and the researchers looked at a couple of things.
3:08
Speaker 1: They looked at technology usage and then focused on these
3:11
Speaker 1: three things. Number one, how many adult words are being spoken?
3:17
Speaker 1: Number two, how many child vocalizations are being made because
3:21
Speaker 1: they're young kids, so they're not always talking. And number three,
3:24
Speaker 1: how many conversational turns occurred. The short version of this
3:29
Speaker 1: is we're going to go into the house, we'll see
3:30
Speaker 1: what technology is being used, and we're going to see
3:32
Speaker 1: how much parents and children are interacting in terms of
3:35
Speaker 1: the words that they're speaking, the vocalizations that are coming up,
3:38
Speaker 1: and the conversational aspects of the interactions.
3:41
Speaker 2: So what did they actually find.
3:42
Speaker 1: The reason that we're talking about this on the doctor's
3:44
Speaker 1: desk is because these findings I think are super important. Basically,
3:48
Speaker 1: as screen time goes up, there is a whole lot
3:51
Speaker 1: less of parent child talk. Largest decreases were seen as
3:55
Speaker 1: the kids were older, at thirty six months, which I
3:58
Speaker 1: mean this is such an integral time for kids to
4:01
Speaker 1: be talking to their parents and engaging with them. What
4:03
Speaker 1: the research has found was this, let me read this,
4:06
Speaker 1: an additional minute of screen time. So for every minute
4:09
Speaker 1: of screen time, it was associated with a reduction of
4:13
Speaker 1: six point six adult words per minute reduction of four
4:17
Speaker 1: point nine child vocalizations per minute and one point one
4:21
Speaker 1: conversational turns per minute. Let's extrapolate that across a day.
4:26
Speaker 1: We're looking at the average three year old in a
4:29
Speaker 1: screen saturated home. When that screen is on, they're missing
4:33
Speaker 1: out on more than eleven hundred adult words. They're missing
4:36
Speaker 1: out on the opportunity to make at least eight hundred
4:39
Speaker 1: and forty noises of vocalizations, and they're missing out on
4:43
Speaker 1: one hundred and ninety four conversational turns per day. Stretched
4:49
Speaker 1: across a month, thirty three thousand words, twenty five thousand vocalizations,
4:53
Speaker 1: almost six thousand conversational turns over a year. Can you
4:56
Speaker 1: imagine what those numbers are? Absolutely staggering.
5:00
Speaker 2: So we've talked about screen time and the damage that
5:02
Speaker 2: it plays in our kids' lives for lots of different reasons,
5:06
Speaker 2: but this specifically dealing with their language development. What does
5:11
Speaker 2: it all mean?
5:11
Speaker 1: Okay, So there's another study that we talked about last
5:14
Speaker 1: year that I think is really important and kind of
5:17
Speaker 1: dovetails nicely with what we're talking about here. In that study,
5:20
Speaker 1: researchers looked at kids who are read to by their
5:22
Speaker 1: parents versus kids who are not read to by their parents,
5:25
Speaker 1: And at the end of the year, if parents will
5:27
Speaker 1: just read to their kids every day, the kids who
5:30
Speaker 1: aren't being read to are missing out on literally a million,
5:34
Speaker 1: maybe two million words of adult to child interaction per year,
5:39
Speaker 1: and the researchers were able to essentially peg that to
5:41
Speaker 1: developmental delays or, if not delays, academic outcome reductions. In
5:48
Speaker 1: other words, no matter what we're looking at in terms
5:49
Speaker 1: of our children's development, hearing more language, having more interaction,
5:54
Speaker 1: conversing more, it makes a difference for our children's development
5:58
Speaker 1: and well being. The central thing here is that when
6:02
Speaker 1: we've got screens on in the home, our kids aren't
6:06
Speaker 1: talking with us, they're not engaging with us, and they're
6:08
Speaker 1: missing out on those woods. So there's the social aspect,
6:11
Speaker 1: there's the cognitive aspect, there's the language aspect, there's the
6:14
Speaker 1: developed metal aspect. There's so much going on here, and
6:17
Speaker 1: the study didn't even measure parental mobile phone usage. So
6:20
Speaker 1: it's likely that this is an underestimate technoference is real
6:26
Speaker 1: and it's hammering our kids development.
6:29
Speaker 2: So what does this actually mean in practice for parents?
6:31
Speaker 1: All right? So, actually, before we talk about what it means,
6:33
Speaker 1: in practice. I want to give one more concrete example
6:35
Speaker 1: of why this matters. There was a Japanese study that
6:37
Speaker 1: came out right at the very end of last year
6:39
Speaker 1: showed something similar In this one, another cohort study fifty
6:44
Speaker 1: nine hundred and eighty kids looking at how television and
6:47
Speaker 1: DVD screen time affected developmental scores, and what they found
6:51
Speaker 1: was that as one goes up, the other one goes down.
6:53
Speaker 1: It's like a seesaw. If you want your little want
6:55
Speaker 1: to be a chatterbox instead of a screen surfer, we
6:58
Speaker 1: need to lay down the ground work really early to
7:00
Speaker 1: do the trick. Basically, they found that screen time at
7:03
Speaker 1: age one and two in Japan was associated with lower
7:06
Speaker 1: developmental scores at ages two and three. This is not good. Like,
7:11
Speaker 1: this is really not good. What does it mean in practice?
7:13
Speaker 1: To answer a question number one, At the risk of
7:15
Speaker 1: being really blunt and offending people, parents have got to
7:18
Speaker 1: stop seeing the screen as a pacifier a babysitter. It's
7:20
Speaker 1: just not good for the kids. Period. Back in them
7:23
Speaker 1: bad old days, back before we had iPads and screens
7:25
Speaker 1: and that sort of thing, if Mum had to have
7:27
Speaker 1: a shower, she didn't say, oh, here's an iPad, Mum
7:29
Speaker 1: just had a shower, and the child maybe pulled all
7:31
Speaker 1: the tupple out of the cupboard or maybe did something
7:34
Speaker 1: that they weren't suposed to, but most of the time
7:35
Speaker 1: they didn't. Most of the time they were just kids
7:36
Speaker 1: being kids, and they were Okay. We've kind of, well
7:39
Speaker 1: not kind of. We've got to get back to that
7:42
Speaker 1: so that the kids can learn how to navigate life
7:45
Speaker 1: for three minutes while their parents go to the bathroom
7:47
Speaker 1: and they'll be okay. So the first thing is we've
7:50
Speaker 1: just got to get screens out of our kids' hands. Secondly,
7:53
Speaker 1: I think we've got to work extra hard to offset
7:55
Speaker 1: the impact of screens by finding more opportunities to speak
8:00
Speaker 1: with and engage with our kids. Pick up that baby,
8:04
Speaker 1: carry them around. I did this with our little grand
8:06
Speaker 1: daughter just the other day. I held her and I thought,
8:08
Speaker 1: I said to it, we haven't given you the tour yet.
8:10
Speaker 1: You've been to our house a few times, but you
8:12
Speaker 1: haven't had the tour. And so I gave her a
8:15
Speaker 1: great big caddle and I carried her from room to room,
8:17
Speaker 1: and I pointed out the mirror and the door handle,
8:19
Speaker 1: and I showed it how it all worked, and pointed
8:21
Speaker 1: at the light switch and showed her how a light
8:22
Speaker 1: switch works, and kind of just walked her through the house.
8:24
Speaker 1: Now she's not even six months old yet, but that's
8:27
Speaker 1: beside the point. It's about the conversation. It's about the engagement.
8:31
Speaker 1: What I noticed, even at six months old, every time
8:33
Speaker 1: I pointed her eyes followed my finger like she was
8:36
Speaker 1: engaging with me. She loved it, and she would look
8:38
Speaker 1: at me and smile when I would describe something to her.
8:40
Speaker 1: Our kids need us to take opportunities to talk at
8:44
Speaker 1: every every chance we get. We've got to offset the
8:47
Speaker 1: impact of screens. And there's a third thing that I'm
8:50
Speaker 1: going to mention, and that is it's on us. We've
8:52
Speaker 1: got to put our phones down. These unhappiness machines are
8:55
Speaker 1: killing our connections.
8:56
Speaker 2: What I find interesting about this study is the decreases
9:00
Speaker 2: the children got older. Right when I think about the
9:04
Speaker 2: developmental milestones of our children. Three year olds are so
9:09
Speaker 2: much fun to talk too. They're starting to work out
9:12
Speaker 2: their vocabulary. They've got the capacity to share their feelings
9:15
Speaker 2: and thoughts and ask questions. There are curious learners. And
9:19
Speaker 2: yet the study is really showing that as parents, we're
9:23
Speaker 2: disengaging more and more because they're actually I am going
9:26
Speaker 2: to assume becoming more and more engaged in screen usage.
9:30
Speaker 1: I think that's probably what it is. We don't have
9:33
Speaker 1: anything definitive but great work from Dr Mary Brush, and
9:36
Speaker 1: I just think we need to make more noise about this.
9:38
Speaker 1: Get rid of the screens.
9:43
Speaker 2: Our second study all about how we feel about school
9:47
Speaker 2: and how it affects us throughout our early adulthood.
9:50
Speaker 1: There's a researcher that I've been following for a long time.
9:52
Speaker 1: I engage with her from time to time. She's even
9:54
Speaker 1: been on the podcast once or twice. Her name is
9:55
Speaker 1: doctor Kelly Ann Allen. She's at Monash also quite a
9:59
Speaker 1: senior research in a University of Melbourne as well, and
10:03
Speaker 1: she's been looking at this thing called school belonging. She's
10:05
Speaker 1: been on the podcast to talk about school belonging several times,
10:08
Speaker 1: also known as school connectedness. It's like being part of
10:10
Speaker 1: a club where you feel good about school, you like
10:12
Speaker 1: your teachers, and you know that you're matter socially. And
10:15
Speaker 1: previous research shows that it's a mental health booster right
10:19
Speaker 1: off the bat.
10:21
Speaker 2: So what does the research share in relation to how
10:24
Speaker 2: we feel about school and I guess a boost to
10:27
Speaker 2: our mental well being.
10:28
Speaker 1: Okay, So the more we feel a sense of connection
10:30
Speaker 1: to school, like a feeling like we belong there, it's
10:34
Speaker 1: tied to some really serious perks. Kids who feel the
10:37
Speaker 1: school love tend to crush it academically, they have healthier minds,
10:41
Speaker 1: they feel more connected socially during their teen years. And
10:45
Speaker 1: how's this? So there's brand new data literally as of
10:48
Speaker 1: now the PISA schools. You've heard of the Big PISA
10:52
Speaker 1: test where we compare people from country to country and
10:54
Speaker 1: see which school's doing the best and who's crushing it
10:56
Speaker 1: who's not. It seems like the latest piaser round OFT
11:00
Speaker 1: is pointing to school belonging as being an absolute game changer.
11:05
Speaker 1: The OECD has started waving the flag and saying this matters.
11:08
Speaker 1: It's tackling loneliness, it's tackling mental health woes. And here's
11:12
Speaker 1: the kicker, the true power of school belonging extends beyond graduation.
11:17
Speaker 1: So doctor Kelly Ann Allen has done this research that
11:20
Speaker 1: shows basically, school belonging, the more your kids feel engaged
11:23
Speaker 1: and protected and in at school, it's like a mental
11:27
Speaker 1: health vaccine that protects them through the next decade or more.
11:31
Speaker 2: Well, you would assume that if they feel connected at school,
11:34
Speaker 2: there's a sense of community, and that community doesn't just
11:38
Speaker 2: drop because they stop going to school. They finish school, right.
11:42
Speaker 1: It does a couple of things when you feel like
11:44
Speaker 1: you belong at school. Not only does it satisfy and
11:46
Speaker 1: support that relationship relatedness need, it helps you feel competent.
11:50
Speaker 1: You feel competent academically, you feel like you can problem solve,
11:53
Speaker 1: get through things, figure stuff out. You also feel competent socially,
11:57
Speaker 1: and because it feels nice to be there. It feels
11:59
Speaker 1: like you're in control of your life, somewhat like you're
12:02
Speaker 1: choosing to go to school. You're not there because you
12:04
Speaker 1: have to, You're there because because you want to be there.
12:07
Speaker 2: And I guess that when you feel competent and you
12:12
Speaker 2: feel connected, you're also able to show up more authentically
12:16
Speaker 2: as a person and therefore just feel better about yourself
12:22
Speaker 2: in general.
12:23
Speaker 1: Yeah, So, what the research has found is that not
12:25
Speaker 1: only does that happen in the adolescent years, but right
12:27
Speaker 1: up until the age of twenty eight. The more teens
12:29
Speaker 1: felt like they belonged in their school environment, the fewer
12:33
Speaker 1: mental health issues they had later on outside of school.
12:38
Speaker 1: Like I said before, it's like this, It's like a
12:40
Speaker 1: vaccine for depression and anxiety and stress straight from the
12:44
Speaker 1: halls of high school, which is so hard to believe
12:47
Speaker 1: when when you think about what school feels like for
12:49
Speaker 1: so many of us. I know for me that wasn't
12:51
Speaker 1: the case at all.
12:52
Speaker 2: And I spent a lot of time with youth, and
12:55
Speaker 2: it's not what they're experiencing either, exactly.
12:57
Speaker 1: In fact, just the other day, I was with a
12:59
Speaker 1: group of young men. They're all in grade eight and
13:01
Speaker 1: grade nine. They were at a high school where I
13:03
Speaker 1: was doing some work, and I had the opportunity to
13:05
Speaker 1: spend maybe fifteen minutes in conversation with them. Because I'm
13:08
Speaker 1: writing a book right now about bringing up boys, I
13:10
Speaker 1: thought i'd ask them a couple of questions that are
13:12
Speaker 1: front and center for me. But I wanted to ask
13:14
Speaker 1: a nice, easy question at the start so they felt safe.
13:17
Speaker 1: We were building beautiful report. It was going really well,
13:19
Speaker 1: and I said, so, guys, I got a quick question
13:20
Speaker 1: for you, what's the best thing about being a teenage boy? Now?
13:23
Speaker 1: When I asked teenage girls this question, and I do
13:26
Speaker 1: it regularly when I'm running my presentations, and I also
13:28
Speaker 1: did it when I wrote my book about teenage girls.
13:31
Speaker 1: They start talking and don't stop. There is so much
13:35
Speaker 1: that teenage girls love about being teenage girls. They're so
13:37
Speaker 1: excited about life. And they told me in their surveys
13:40
Speaker 1: and in the focus groups and in the interviews and
13:42
Speaker 1: in the workshops that I run. I've got these eight
13:44
Speaker 1: boys in front of me, and I say, so, what's
13:45
Speaker 1: the best thing about being a teenage boy? And they
13:48
Speaker 1: stare at me, shrug their shoulders and say, I don't know.
13:52
Speaker 1: And then they start talking about how when they're eighteen
13:54
Speaker 1: and they've left school, that's when their life begins. That's
13:56
Speaker 1: what they're looking forward to. So we talked about that
13:58
Speaker 1: a bit and then I said, so, what are you
14:00
Speaker 1: and is the worst thing about being a teenage boy?
14:02
Speaker 1: Almost in Unison, Kylie, Almost in Unison. These eight boys
14:06
Speaker 1: looked at me, and with genuine sadness and despair in
14:09
Speaker 1: their eyes, they said, school. School's the worst thing about
14:12
Speaker 1: being a teenage boy, at least for these eight kids.
14:15
Speaker 1: And I see this consistently. I mean, I'm in and
14:17
Speaker 1: out of schools all the time and talking with kids
14:19
Speaker 1: about what's working and what's not. This is a consistent response. Now,
14:23
Speaker 1: a lot of girls also feel disengaged, and in fact,
14:25
Speaker 1: Kelly and Allen's research on school belonging shows that there
14:29
Speaker 1: aren't really any gender differences in terms of the amount
14:31
Speaker 1: of girls and boys who feel connected to their school,
14:34
Speaker 1: but certainly on the ground, my experience has been that
14:37
Speaker 1: the boys are struggling with it so so very much.
14:40
Speaker 1: It's such a big deal.
14:41
Speaker 2: So my next question is twofold, what does schools do
14:45
Speaker 2: to help create the sense of belonging in connectedness? And
14:48
Speaker 2: then how do we as parents support our kids in
14:53
Speaker 2: this process.
14:54
Speaker 1: So this is what I'm grappling with is I'm writing
14:55
Speaker 1: the book, I'm putting the chapter together around this right now,
14:59
Speaker 1: in the interest of time, I'm just going to share
15:01
Speaker 1: a couple of really quick things, and everyone who's struggling
15:04
Speaker 1: with this is going to want more. I acknowledge that
15:05
Speaker 1: at the outset, this unfortunately isn't the podcast where we
15:08
Speaker 1: can dive into all the detail. But number one, kids
15:12
Speaker 1: are more likely to thrive when they feel like they
15:14
Speaker 1: have a strong connection with their teacher or a teacher,
15:17
Speaker 1: or a head of school or ahead of year or
15:18
Speaker 1: a head of house or ahead of something, or well
15:20
Speaker 1: being that they just need to have an adult there
15:23
Speaker 1: who they feel safe with, and this boys and girl,
15:25
Speaker 1: someone who knows their name and who cares about them.
15:29
Speaker 1: We have got to make sure that we partner world
15:32
Speaker 1: with schools as parents, so that the schools know that
15:35
Speaker 1: we're on their team and that they're on our team,
15:36
Speaker 1: and that we're working for the good of the kids.
15:38
Speaker 1: We can't have antagonistic relationships, and we've got to find
15:41
Speaker 1: that one person in the school who will be our
15:43
Speaker 1: child's champion and he'll be there for them. That's fundamental
15:47
Speaker 1: to a sense of school belonging. Number two, kids are
15:50
Speaker 1: more likely to thrive when they feel that they're able
15:52
Speaker 1: to be with a friend in class. It's so vitally
15:55
Speaker 1: important that they feel like they've got a relationship worth
15:58
Speaker 1: showing up to school. Four. How can you be long
16:00
Speaker 1: when you don't feel like you matter? And number three,
16:03
Speaker 1: the kids who are most likely to thrive are the
16:06
Speaker 1: ones who feel like they have a reason for being
16:08
Speaker 1: at school, like they can see their future there, or
16:10
Speaker 1: if not their future at school, but their future through school.
16:15
Speaker 1: That is, they see it as something necessary, something useful,
16:18
Speaker 1: something valuable. This is the great challenge that parents and
16:21
Speaker 1: teachers haven't supporting kids to feel good about being at school.
16:23
Speaker 1: But Kylie, across the Doctor's Desk, we see well being
16:26
Speaker 1: and academic benefits and social benefits and cognitive benefits, you
16:30
Speaker 1: name them. The benefits are all there when kids feel
16:32
Speaker 1: a strong sense of belonging at school, and that remains
16:35
Speaker 1: with them for at least the next decade after school.
16:38
Speaker 1: Based on this great new research.
16:40
Speaker 2: I didn't particularly like high school at all. It was
16:42
Speaker 2: a really, really tricky space to be. But I had
16:46
Speaker 2: a couple of teachers who I just adored, and I
16:49
Speaker 2: knew that they had my best interests at heart. They
16:53
Speaker 2: would always check in with me. They'd give me a
16:55
Speaker 2: smile or a wave if they saw me in the playground,
16:58
Speaker 2: and I just felt like I madded And that was
17:01
Speaker 2: really such a huge help in getting through those more
17:04
Speaker 2: challenging years with our friends.
17:06
Speaker 1: You know. The funny thing about that is I had
17:08
Speaker 1: teachers who tried, but I had in school so much
17:11
Speaker 1: I wouldn't allow it to let them in. Yeah, so
17:13
Speaker 1: I disengaged from them even though they were trying. It's
17:15
Speaker 1: so hard raising kids. So the wrap up of today's
17:18
Speaker 1: Doctor's Desk Number one.
17:19
Speaker 2: Keep those kids off screen.
17:22
Speaker 1: No, it sounds like I'm banging the same drum, but
17:23
Speaker 1: they need to do a number two and number two.
17:26
Speaker 2: The way our kids feel about school has the ability
17:30
Speaker 2: to impact them throughout their early adulthood.
17:33
Speaker 1: Well being boosts from feeling like you belong the doctor's desk.
17:37
Speaker 1: On The Happy Family's podcast, which is produced by Justin
17:39
Speaker 1: Rowland from Bridge Media, Craig Bruce is our executive producer.
17:42
Speaker 1: For more information about making your family happier, please visit
17:45
Speaker 1: us at Happy families dot com, dot a u