Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / The Social Media Ban: Why It’s Not the End of the World for Your Teen

Transcript

The Social Media Ban: Why It’s Not the End of the World for Your Teen · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

• 0:06
  Speaker 1: This is the Happy Families Podcast. In about a month
• 0:08
  Speaker 1: from today, there's going to be a whole lot of
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: new legislation enacted, which means that social media will not
• 0:15
  Speaker 1: be able to be accessed by children under the age
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: of sixteen. Minimum age legislation is just one month away
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  Speaker 1: and today on the podcast, we answer the questions that
• 0:24
  Speaker 1: I've been asked by media more than any other questions
• 0:27
  Speaker 1: over the last month or two. How do you help
• 0:30
  Speaker 1: your kids to prepare for the social media minimum age legislation.
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: Were the first country in the world to do it.
• 0:36
  Speaker 1: Nobody knows what's going on. How are we supposed to
• 0:38
  Speaker 1: grapple with this and get through it? That and more
• 0:42
  Speaker 1: coming up next on The Happy Family's podcast. Gooday, Welcome
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: to the Happy Families podcast, where you get real parenting
• 0:49
  Speaker 1: solutions every single day. This is Australia's most downloaded parenting podcast.
• 0:53
  Speaker 1: We are Justin and Kylie Colson. Kylie, We're in this
• 0:56
  Speaker 1: weird situation where as much as we've got a whole
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: lot of kids spread across a whole lot of years,
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: we actually only have one child affected by the social
• 1:04
  Speaker 1: media minimum age legislation.
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: I feel like one child's enough.
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  Speaker 1: It's our fifteen year old, and she is in one word,
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  Speaker 1: now this is two words, not happy. I'm so sorry, Lily,
• 1:18
  Speaker 1: but I'm really glad that the minimum age legislation is
• 1:21
  Speaker 1: coming in. Unfortunately, she turned sixteen next year, which means
• 1:23
  Speaker 1: that it's not going to be lasting long enough for her.
• 1:26
  Speaker 1: But one of my greatest parenting regrets is the decision
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  Speaker 1: that we made to allow her access to a device
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  Speaker 1: screen social media at too young in age. Thank goodness
• 1:34
  Speaker 1: the government's doing this, is all I can say, Kylie.
• 1:37
  Speaker 1: I've been asked again and again and again over the
• 1:40
  Speaker 1: last couple of months to help parents to know, in
• 1:44
  Speaker 1: various media conversations how to prep and you're not. My
• 1:48
  Speaker 1: general response has been, don't worry, don't worry. Yeah, it'll
• 1:53
  Speaker 1: be fine.
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  Speaker 2: Like once they don't have access, they don't have access.
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  Speaker 1: Not everything has to be a new story. Yeah, But
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  Speaker 1: I've been thinking about it more, especially based on some
• 2:01
  Speaker 1: conversations I've had with some young people, and I do
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: think that we do we'll all benefit from a quick
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: chat about it. So to kick off and before we
• 2:10
  Speaker 1: talk about the five things that I've outlined that we
• 2:13
  Speaker 1: could do to help this amendment, this change to life
• 2:19
  Speaker 1: occur smoothly. I just want to read something to you.
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  Speaker 1: This is from a recently published July twenty twenty five
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  Speaker 1: published article in Pediatric Research. I'm going to sneak some
• 2:30
  Speaker 1: doctor's desk content into today. Please forgive me. But the
• 2:33
  Speaker 1: abstract basically says smartphone use among young people is framed
• 2:37
  Speaker 1: as a post pandemic concern, with increased screen time and
• 2:41
  Speaker 1: online distractions attributed to lockdown induced dependency. However, this narrative
• 2:47
  Speaker 1: overlooks the trajectory of digital policy and education, where education
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  Speaker 1: departments globally we're encouraging the integration of student owned devices
• 2:53
  Speaker 1: into classrooms before the pandemic. Really important point, right, we
• 2:58
  Speaker 1: were already headed down this road. COVID might have amplified it,
• 3:02
  Speaker 1: but we were already well and truly on this road
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  Speaker 1: thanks to Kevin Ruden's education revolution, which happened in two
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  Speaker 1: thousand and eight. For goodness sakes. Anyway, the research has
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  Speaker 1: gone to say the growing focus on links between the
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  Speaker 1: digital lives of children and adolescents and their mental well
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  Speaker 1: being are often based on correlational data, with few longitudin
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  Speaker 1: or experimental studies. There is a notable absence of studies
• 3:24
  Speaker 1: which successfully disentangle the effects of different types of smartphone
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  Speaker 1: and social media usage, separating learning and education or from
• 3:31
  Speaker 1: recreational uses. Although I will say even since July when
• 3:34
  Speaker 1: this was published, there have been a couple of other
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  Speaker 1: really smart papers that have come out that are helping
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  Speaker 1: us to see even more why this matters. Okay, back
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  Speaker 1: to the abstract last thing, and this is the key
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  Speaker 1: thing that I wanted to highlight. These researchers have said
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  Speaker 1: a growing number of governments have introduced restrictive policies to
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  Speaker 1: limit access. They're talking about us, where the first government
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  Speaker 1: in the world, Australia's federal government is the first government
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  Speaker 1: of the world to go as far as we've gone,
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  Speaker 1: And they're saying this one size fit approach may inadvertently
• 4:01
  Speaker 1: exacerbate inequalities or ignore the social realities of young people's lives.
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  Speaker 1: While regulatory effort may form part of a broader digital
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  Speaker 1: policy toolkit, bands alone are insufficient. They do little to
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  Speaker 1: address the underlying needs that drive youth engagement with smartphones,
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  Speaker 1: the human desire for social connection, access to information, and autonomy.
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  Speaker 1: A more effective response must be holistic, combining regulation with education,
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  Speaker 1: digital literacy, and the co creation of safe digital spaces
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  Speaker 1: that support both protection and participation. Now I'm sharing that
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: because they're right. As much as I support what Julian
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  Speaker 1: mcgrant and Anthony Albanezi and the government is doing here,
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  Speaker 1: the band isn't going to change the game here. It's
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  Speaker 1: not going to change the world. It's going to make
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  Speaker 1: a big difference in terms of social media usage for
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  Speaker 1: our kids. But if we're relying on the government to
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  Speaker 1: do it all for us, we're going to be sadly
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  Speaker 1: disappointed and our children are going to be sadly disadvantaged.
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  Speaker 1: And that's the real crux of what's driving my five
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  Speaker 1: points that we need to talk about today. If all
• 5:08
  Speaker 1: we do is say you can't have this thing, something
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  Speaker 1: else is going to fill that void. So if we
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  Speaker 1: don't create effective conversations around screens, another screen activity is
• 5:22
  Speaker 1: going to step in. If we don't create useful, productive, positive,
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  Speaker 1: powerful things for our kids to be doing off screens,
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  Speaker 1: then this social media minimum age legislation simply moves the
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  Speaker 1: problems to other platforms and they will show up elsewhere.
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  Speaker 2: At a surface level. For a majority of families, having
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: social media access to our children has alleviated a huge
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  Speaker 2: amount of the social navigation that would normally be mum
• 5:51
  Speaker 2: or dad's job, as in, let's organize a hang out,
• 5:55
  Speaker 2: let's organize a you know, kind of payday. Kids have
• 5:59
  Speaker 2: done that all for themselves and just told us where
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  Speaker 2: they've got to be and what time they need to
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: be dropped off or picked up. But the reality is
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  Speaker 2: that in doing that, it's also taken us as the
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  Speaker 2: parents out of the social circles as well.
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  Speaker 1: We no longer parents are disconnected.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're totally disconnected from our kids and their friends
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  Speaker 2: and their friends' parents because we're not the ones organizing
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: the catch ups anymore. And I think that it's really
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  Speaker 2: going to challenge lots of us as we go back
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  Speaker 2: essentially to the playground, because that's what we're doing.
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  Speaker 1: Well, that's what we need to do. That's one of
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  Speaker 1: my five things. Otherwise the kids will just start playing
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  Speaker 1: games more. Right, Well, they'll be off social media, but
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  Speaker 1: they'll just be gaming. So one more time, from what
• 6:45
  Speaker 1: McCoy and Marcus Quinn said in Pediatric Research in their
• 6:48
  Speaker 1: article about navigating youth Smartphones and policy, I just want
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  Speaker 1: to read this line one more time. Regulatory efforts may
• 6:55
  Speaker 1: form part of a broader Digital Policy Toolkit for bands
• 6:58
  Speaker 1: alone are insufficient. They own address the underlying needs that
• 7:01
  Speaker 1: drive youth engagement with smartphones, social connection, access to information,
• 7:07
  Speaker 1: and autonomy. So that's what our five tips to prepare
• 7:12
  Speaker 1: for the December tenth legislation are about. I'll run through
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  Speaker 1: those next. Stay with us. Welcome back to the Happy
• 7:26
  Speaker 1: Families podcast. If you like what you're hearing on the podcast,
• 7:28
  Speaker 1: please give us a follow and share the podcast with
• 7:30
  Speaker 1: your friends, your neighbors, you loved ones, because it will
• 7:33
  Speaker 1: help make their families happier as well. Kylie, let's kick
• 7:36
  Speaker 1: it off and walk through these five pointers and see
• 7:41
  Speaker 1: if we can be useful as we prepare our kids
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  Speaker 1: for the December ten minimum Social Media minimum age legislation.
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  Speaker 2: So if you haven't done it already, you really need
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: to start having conversations about what this is going to
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  Speaker 2: look like for you.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah. Of course, every time we've tried to have a
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  Speaker 1: conversation with our teenager about it, we've just had sad
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  Speaker 1: face stuff up, Like she's just sad about it, full stop.
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  Speaker 1: End of story. I don't like it, I'm sad, I
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  Speaker 1: don't really want to talk about it. But beginning of
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  Speaker 1: the conversation softly, maybe with treats is going to be helpful. Hey,
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  Speaker 1: how you're feeling about it? Is there anything we can
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  Speaker 1: to support you? Literally, just engaging with your kids around it,
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  Speaker 1: starting the conversation right now, helping them to understand why
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  Speaker 1: the band is occurring, asking them how they feel about
• 8:23
  Speaker 1: that when they agree or disagree, even if it's not
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  Speaker 1: about them. What have they seen with their friends and
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  Speaker 1: they're peers at school? That kind of conversation is going
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  Speaker 1: to be useful. But it's also useful to say, well,
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  Speaker 1: we probably shouldn't develop a plan together on how we
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  Speaker 1: can approach number one reducing screen time, but also helping
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  Speaker 1: you to have an active and full and whole life
• 8:43
  Speaker 1: off the screen, open dialogue, rationals. It's going to help
• 8:48
  Speaker 1: them to feel informed and supported.
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  Speaker 2: Recently, our eleven year old asked if she could make
• 8:54
  Speaker 2: a phone call to her friend who'd gone on holidays.
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: She homeschools, so friend was overseas and I let them
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: have a phone call, and a few minutes later I
• 9:03
  Speaker 2: realized that there was no noise coming from her bedroom.
• 9:06
  Speaker 2: I couldn't hear any conversations. And I walked in and
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  Speaker 2: I said, what are you doing? She said? We're texting.
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  Speaker 2: And I said, no, that's not what you asked to do.
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: You asked to have a phone call. She said, yeah,
• 9:15
  Speaker 2: but we want to text. And I said, well, that's
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: not what we're doing here. You're either having a conversation
• 9:20
  Speaker 2: or you can give me my phone back, and she went, oh, okay,
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  Speaker 2: And anyway, about three minutes later, they're chattering away and
• 9:28
  Speaker 2: they didn't stop for about fifty minutes. And it just
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  Speaker 2: was curious to me that because of what they've watched
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  Speaker 2: with big sisters, that they thought it was cooler to
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  Speaker 2: actually text each other without realizing that they were missing
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  Speaker 2: out on the real connection. Because once they got talking,
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  Speaker 2: you couldn't you couldn't get.
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  Speaker 1: So much better. Our kids have got to learn how
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  Speaker 1: to do this. The second thing that I want to
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  Speaker 1: highlight is getting phone numbers, getting phone numbers and downloading
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  Speaker 1: stuff that the kids have put onto socials because once
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  Speaker 1: they lose their accounts, they'll potentially lose all that content.
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  Speaker 1: So it's worth saying let's start to ask the question,
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  Speaker 1: who's got phone numbers? Because we are going to be texting,
• 10:09
  Speaker 1: we are going to be making phone calls, and get
• 10:11
  Speaker 1: hold of that content. The other thing that some people
• 10:13
  Speaker 1: have been doing is installing landlines, putting the phone on
• 10:17
  Speaker 1: the wall, get a landline, Yeah you can.
• 10:19
  Speaker 2: Yeah, oh we need to do that.
• 10:20
  Speaker 1: Yeah, landlines are back. They're back, baby, Yes, yeah, Like,
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  Speaker 1: this is the thing our kids.
• 10:25
  Speaker 2: Are missing out on so much by having their own phone.
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  Speaker 1: Land lines are training when we had.
• 10:30
  Speaker 2: To just share with the whole family.
• 10:32
  Speaker 1: If we put landline in. I think we should put
• 10:34
  Speaker 1: one in the kitchen on the wall, and I think
• 10:36
  Speaker 1: we should put one in our bedroom so that when
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  Speaker 1: the kids are talking on the landline, we can pick
• 10:41
  Speaker 1: it up and we can listen to it. All right.
• 10:44
  Speaker 1: The third thing, the third thing is that we need
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  Speaker 1: to fade this out gradually. Now I've put this into
• 10:50
  Speaker 1: my comments and I've shared this a few times on
• 10:53
  Speaker 1: media interviews that I've done. But Kylie, honestly, I don't
• 10:57
  Speaker 1: think that whether you're fading out or going cold tour,
• 11:00
  Speaker 1: it's going to make any difference. There are some experts
• 11:01
  Speaker 1: who are saying, oh, your social media can be addictive.
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  Speaker 1: You need to gradually reduce your children's time on social
• 11:06
  Speaker 1: media because otherwise they're going to feel really frustrated when
• 11:09
  Speaker 1: they have that sudden stop at the end I just
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  Speaker 1: don't think it matters. I really don't think it matters.
• 11:15
  Speaker 1: But I do want to add that it might be
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: a useful tool in some families toolkits, and it's at
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: least worthy of the conversation.
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: Well, even if it's not a fade out. I think
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: that every now and again, having a fast where you know,
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: as a whole family, you make a decision that you're
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: going to stay off screens for Saturday or Sunday or
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: you know, kind of a whole weekend type thing. And
• 11:34
  Speaker 2: I think you could very well do that as long
• 11:37
  Speaker 2: as you're all on Boardward.
• 11:38
  Speaker 1: When I listening to a song, fade out's annoy me,
• 11:41
  Speaker 1: I just want to songs over. Yeah, but you're cold cut, finished, done.
• 11:46
  Speaker 1: We're not all like that, okay. The fourth thing that
• 11:49
  Speaker 1: I want to highlight is the importance of building community.
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: This is something that Jonathan Hate talked about a lot
• 11:52
  Speaker 1: in his book The Anxious Generation. It's one of his
• 11:54
  Speaker 1: key pillars of how we're supposed to help our kids
• 11:56
  Speaker 1: to have a play based rather than a screen based childhood.
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: This goes back to what you were saying, Kylie, Mum, Dad,
• 12:02
  Speaker 1: time to start taking some responsibility, getting some phone numbers,
• 12:05
  Speaker 1: organizing some stuff for the kids to do, because they
• 12:08
  Speaker 1: are probably going to need a little bit more support
• 12:10
  Speaker 1: from you so that they can engage effectively in building
• 12:14
  Speaker 1: their offline community, getting together with their friends.
• 12:17
  Speaker 2: You think about those earlier days. It was playdates, right,
• 12:20
  Speaker 2: and you would organize for a family to come over
• 12:23
  Speaker 2: and hang out with you. We don't do that anymore.
• 12:27
  Speaker 2: We literally kind of drop the kids off at the
• 12:29
  Speaker 2: shopping center or you know, they go hang out at
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: the park or whatever. They don't have our involvement, and
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: we miss out as adults as well. So that's probably
• 12:40
  Speaker 2: the part that I'm looking forward to the most, is
• 12:43
  Speaker 2: just being able to reconnect with relationships that lift and elevate.
• 12:48
  Speaker 1: Let's do the last one. The last one that I
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: wanted to make a really big hooha about is model Yeah,
• 12:55
  Speaker 1: as parents, Let's show them if this stuff is so
• 12:58
  Speaker 1: damaging and it is, I would argue more damaging for
• 13:01
  Speaker 1: an adolescence developing brain that it is for a fully
• 13:04
  Speaker 1: I was going to say fully functional, let's just go
• 13:06
  Speaker 1: with neurologically mature adult brain, because well, I'm not going
• 13:11
  Speaker 1: to finish that sentence. Modeling it, modeling it, modeling it
• 13:14
  Speaker 1: if it's bad for the kids. The reality is it's
• 13:16
  Speaker 1: not doing us any favors. We don't need it in
• 13:19
  Speaker 1: our lives. And maybe it would even be something that
• 13:22
  Speaker 1: you can do in solidarity with the kids. You know what, kiddo,
• 13:25
  Speaker 1: you're off social media now, in support of you and
• 13:27
  Speaker 1: in solidarity with you. I'm not going to use social
• 13:30
  Speaker 1: media either, or at least not when you're watching, not
• 13:32
  Speaker 1: when you can see me. Maybe I might use it
• 13:34
  Speaker 1: for ten or fifteen minutes in the morning or ten
• 13:36
  Speaker 1: to fifteen minutes at night, but that'll be it. Find
• 13:38
  Speaker 1: a way that you can tag team, you can model
• 13:42
  Speaker 1: healthy living and healthy tech boundaries for your kids, and
• 13:46
  Speaker 1: that's it. They're my big five ways to help your
• 13:49
  Speaker 1: kids get ready for the one month away social media
• 13:53
  Speaker 1: minimum age legislation that's about to kick off here in oz. Hope.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: That's helpful. If you know somebody who's struggling, maybe you
• 14:00
  Speaker 1: can share this episode with them and it might shed
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: some light on a slightly tough talk that they could
• 14:06
  Speaker 1: be having in their home. The Happy Families podcast is
• 14:09
  Speaker 1: produced by Justin Ruhland from Bridge Media. Men Habits provides research,
• 14:13
  Speaker 1: admin and a whole lot of other support as well.
• 14:15
  Speaker 1: Really appreciate the team behind the pod. If you would
• 14:17
  Speaker 1: like more information and resources to make your family happier
• 14:20
  Speaker 1: and specifically on this topic, check out my book The
• 14:24
  Speaker 1: Parenting Revolution. It will literally revolutionize what's going on in
• 14:28
  Speaker 1: your home. You can find that and a whole lot
• 14:30
  Speaker 1: of other resources at happyfamilies dot com dot au