Latest / Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor / Digital Nutrition: Navigating Tech's Impact with Jocelyn Brewer

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Digital Nutrition: Navigating Tech's Impact with Jocelyn Brewer · Hardiness with Dr Paul Taylor

• 0:10
  Speaker 1: Justin Brewer, Welcome to the podcast.
• 0:13
  Speaker 2: Thank you for having me. I haven't done podcasts for
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: a while, so this is fun cool.
• 0:17
  Speaker 1: The last time we met was at the Happiness Conference.
• 0:20
  Speaker 3: You've just reminded me where you not only introduced me
• 0:23
  Speaker 3: because you were a MC, but you spoke at it
• 0:25
  Speaker 3: as well, which you've just said you wouldn't recommend because
• 0:29
  Speaker 3: you're just juggling different balls.
• 0:32
  Speaker 1: What did you speak about? Tell our listeners what you
• 0:34
  Speaker 1: spoke about.
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: I've spoken at that a couple of times.
• 0:38
  Speaker 4: I think I actually did something quite different, which was
• 0:40
  Speaker 4: an eyes closed process.
• 0:42
  Speaker 2: So it actually gave the.
• 0:43
  Speaker 4: Presentation asking people to close their eyes and just consider
• 0:47
  Speaker 4: how their brains work and how much information we actually
• 0:50
  Speaker 4: consume in a day. So rather than lots of slides
• 0:56
  Speaker 4: and people who are desperate to you know, capture it
• 0:58
  Speaker 4: all taking photos of the slides, actually ask people to
• 1:01
  Speaker 4: close their eyes and just allow their mind to sort
• 1:04
  Speaker 4: of go back to the nineties.
• 1:05
  Speaker 1: Almost interesting.
• 1:08
  Speaker 3: How did you find when you ask people to close
• 1:11
  Speaker 3: their eyes? And I know it's it's probably hard at
• 1:15
  Speaker 3: the Happiness Conference because we're on a big stick. Could
• 1:18
  Speaker 3: you see people and could you see if they were
• 1:20
  Speaker 3: closing their eyes or.
• 1:21
  Speaker 2: Not even look to be honest.
• 1:24
  Speaker 3: And did you have your eyes closed in your presentices
• 1:26
  Speaker 3: re reading it?
• 1:28
  Speaker 4: Because it's basically a way to cheat a bit too,
• 1:32
  Speaker 4: when you want to do something different and you haven't
• 1:34
  Speaker 4: memorized your entire keen. Yeah, and because mine changed all
• 1:37
  Speaker 4: the time. I actually am terrible at memorizing things because
• 1:42
  Speaker 4: there's so many bits of information in my head about
• 1:44
  Speaker 4: all of these different topics. But I always invite people
• 1:48
  Speaker 4: to close their eyes. I know for some people that's
• 1:50
  Speaker 4: not particularly safe. But also at something like happiness and
• 1:54
  Speaker 4: its causes, which ultimately is run by you know, the
• 1:57
  Speaker 4: Vajoyana Institute, and it's full of two are probably very
• 2:01
  Speaker 4: very good at meditating and being mindful processes. Yeah, most
• 2:07
  Speaker 4: people kind of take that opportunity, and I guess I
• 2:12
  Speaker 4: also just don't give them anything to look at. So
• 2:14
  Speaker 4: whether or not you're staring at this, you know, at
• 2:17
  Speaker 4: me being a dot on the stage, or you know
• 2:20
  Speaker 4: the kind of emptiness behind me, you are not you know,
• 2:24
  Speaker 4: smashing that visual cortex full of more information. That often
• 2:28
  Speaker 4: is kind of I mean a lot of what I
• 2:30
  Speaker 4: talk about is how much information we're consuming and what
• 2:33
  Speaker 4: impact that's having on ultimately a really ancient operating system.
• 2:37
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And we will dive into the reason
• 2:40
  Speaker 3: I asked you if you could see the audience because
• 2:43
  Speaker 3: when I do corporate talks, not all of them, but
• 2:47
  Speaker 3: in some of them, I ask people to close their
• 2:49
  Speaker 3: eyes and go to and there are I would say
• 2:54
  Speaker 3: just roughly fifteen to twenty percent of people.
• 2:56
  Speaker 1: Who don't close their eyes.
• 2:58
  Speaker 3: And it's really quite interesting, right that they just don't
• 3:01
  Speaker 3: feel comfortable with their eyes shut. But anyway, we're not
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: going to dive into the psychology on this. So you
• 3:08
  Speaker 3: are a psychologist, but you interesting. What caught my eye
• 3:12
  Speaker 3: is you are interested in cyber psychology, which is something
• 3:17
  Speaker 3: that is I think interesting for all of us, and
• 3:21
  Speaker 3: particularly now with the social media ban with the under sixteens.
• 3:26
  Speaker 3: I'm just going to introduce this actually because I want
• 3:30
  Speaker 3: to read just an article that I have just been reading, right,
• 3:35
  Speaker 3: social media use trajectories and cognitive performance in adolescents. Right,
• 3:41
  Speaker 3: So they looked at six and a half thousand adolescents
• 3:46
  Speaker 3: at age nine to thirteen years. Some of them had
• 3:50
  Speaker 3: very low social media use, which was half an hour
• 3:53
  Speaker 3: day or less, and then some of them had low
• 3:59
  Speaker 3: but in increasing social media use, which sort of increased
• 4:03
  Speaker 3: from the age of nine at about half an our
• 4:05
  Speaker 3: day up to over and r at the age of thirteen.
• 4:09
  Speaker 3: And then they had the third group of high social
• 4:12
  Speaker 3: media use, which increased from about the age of nine
• 4:16
  Speaker 3: about half an our day or right up to more
• 4:18
  Speaker 3: than three hours at the age of twelve and thirteen.
• 4:23
  Speaker 3: And they looked at aspects of cognitive performance and a
• 4:27
  Speaker 3: number of different validated cognitive performance tests, and you will
• 4:32
  Speaker 3: not be surprised to hear that there were.
• 4:36
  Speaker 1: Low, even low.
• 4:38
  Speaker 3: Levels of early adolescent social media exposure were linked to
• 4:43
  Speaker 3: poorer cognitive performance. And this paper suggested this massage suggest
• 4:49
  Speaker 3: support for stricter age restrictions, right.
• 4:54
  Speaker 4: Can I point out though, that already under thirteen should
• 4:58
  Speaker 4: not be on social media?
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: Social media really, you know.
• 5:02
  Speaker 4: Like if we had have just started by banning it
• 5:04
  Speaker 4: for under thirteens, which is really what the terms of
• 5:06
  Speaker 4: service already say.
• 5:08
  Speaker 2: We know that those.
• 5:09
  Speaker 4: Little brains, you know, you're ultimately watching lots of TV
• 5:13
  Speaker 4: really really quickly. There's not a lot of creativity that
• 5:17
  Speaker 4: goes into that. It's just mindless scrolling and what I
• 5:20
  Speaker 4: would call often digital dunk food. If we haven't curated
• 5:24
  Speaker 4: to make sure that some of what we watch might
• 5:27
  Speaker 4: be actually you know, beneficial.
• 5:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, you can get into that, but.
• 5:31
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, no, no, no, we will, we will definitely
• 5:34
  Speaker 3: unpack it. But I just wanted to bring this right
• 5:37
  Speaker 3: up front. Now, you also talk about digital nutrition. You
• 5:43
  Speaker 3: know that that's your big thing. So how did that start?
• 5:47
  Speaker 3: How did you, as a psychologist go okay, this is
• 5:50
  Speaker 3: an area that I'm going to start specializing in.
• 5:52
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it all started when I was a high school teacher.
• 5:55
  Speaker 4: So I was teaching at a selective boys' school in
• 5:59
  Speaker 4: Sydney and I got into the New South Wales Department
• 6:01
  Speaker 4: of Ed's School Counselor Retraining program. And so as I
• 6:05
  Speaker 4: was becoming a psychologist and had to do my honors thesis,
• 6:09
  Speaker 4: I was like, what should I study? What can I research?
• 6:12
  Speaker 4: And the principle said to me, you should work out
• 6:14
  Speaker 4: what's going on with boys and games. It was two
• 6:17
  Speaker 4: thousand and eight, two thousand and nine, and we were
• 6:19
  Speaker 4: handing out laptops to every kid in year nine across
• 6:22
  Speaker 4: Australia when we hadn't really taught teachers how to teach
• 6:26
  Speaker 4: with technology. We were just crossing our fingers and hoping
• 6:29
  Speaker 4: that they'd be engaged, and they were because they were
• 6:32
  Speaker 4: hacking the flyward wall on those laptops to play all
• 6:36
  Speaker 4: sorts of games. So that's how I got into it
• 6:39
  Speaker 4: in yeah, two thousand and nine when I wrote that thesis.
• 6:43
  Speaker 4: Then and then I just was like a dog with
• 6:47
  Speaker 4: a bone, because I was realizing, as a thirty two
• 6:50
  Speaker 4: year old who'd gotten a smartphone, that this was having
• 6:53
  Speaker 4: a really big impact on me, that my own habits
• 6:55
  Speaker 4: and social media use were getting a bit wobbly. And
• 6:59
  Speaker 4: I had like this, you know, apparently fully developed brain.
• 7:02
  Speaker 4: So I started looking to digital detoxing, and that actually
• 7:06
  Speaker 4: sounded to me like a real problem, like yoyo dieting
• 7:10
  Speaker 4: and all of the culture stuff that was like really
• 7:12
  Speaker 4: gross at the time, and I guess still is. And
• 7:15
  Speaker 4: then I thought, well, what if we actually flipped this
• 7:17
  Speaker 4: and started thinking about how can what we do with
• 7:20
  Speaker 4: technology nurture us so that we can be well and
• 7:22
  Speaker 4: be connected rather than this binary notion of one is
• 7:26
  Speaker 4: good and one is bad, and pofline is better and
• 7:28
  Speaker 4: outdoor is better and all of these sorts of things,
• 7:30
  Speaker 4: because technology is so embedded in our lives, and that
• 7:34
  Speaker 4: really doubled down obviously in COVID and in lockdowns where
• 7:38
  Speaker 4: quite frankly, thank goodness we had that technology, so we
• 7:42
  Speaker 4: didn't absolutely go about shit crazy, I mean to what
• 7:45
  Speaker 4: you know further because of what happened there, So we
• 7:50
  Speaker 4: obviously are then paying for that.
• 7:52
  Speaker 2: And with the young people who have.
• 7:54
  Speaker 4: Come through, who really were products of those lockdowns and
• 7:58
  Speaker 4: their technology, you's got really really ingrained again because no
• 8:02
  Speaker 4: one had stopped to teach media and digital literacy or
• 8:05
  Speaker 4: digital wellbeing or any of really the skills that we
• 8:09
  Speaker 4: need to know how to navigate this, you know, colonization
• 8:13
  Speaker 4: of digital technologies into our life.
• 8:16
  Speaker 3: And so let's talk about overall digital stuff, right, so
• 8:22
  Speaker 3: not just the social media, but.
• 8:24
  Speaker 1: The overall exposure to digital because.
• 8:28
  Speaker 3: We're nice seeing and you will see it, and I
• 8:32
  Speaker 3: see it a lot. You're writ in restaurants and there's
• 8:34
  Speaker 3: families there, and the little kid who's one year old,
• 8:39
  Speaker 3: maybe not even has got an iPad and it's the
• 8:42
  Speaker 3: a iPad B a B sitter. What are the pros
• 8:46
  Speaker 3: and cons of that? Short term and long term?
• 8:50
  Speaker 4: Yeah, And I think that's a really important kind of distinction.
• 8:54
  Speaker 4: Is the short term is we get to go and
• 8:56
  Speaker 4: have a nice dinner and our kid isn't winging and
• 8:58
  Speaker 4: wanting to run around or play or all of those things.
• 9:02
  Speaker 4: You might have noticed that young children are not actually
• 9:04
  Speaker 4: designed to be in cafes and restaurants, And the cafes
• 9:08
  Speaker 4: and restaurants are just something I didn't do when I
• 9:10
  Speaker 4: was growing up. You maybe went to the Chinese for
• 9:13
  Speaker 4: a special meal once in a while, but you're on
• 9:15
  Speaker 4: your best behavior, and I think you know again, there's
• 9:19
  Speaker 4: this sense of we want to kind of live a
• 9:21
  Speaker 4: particular life, and we expect kids to be almost seen
• 9:24
  Speaker 4: and not heard, like my grandfather would say to me,
• 9:27
  Speaker 4: rather than they're not.
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: Designed for that.
• 9:29
  Speaker 4: And I literally will only go to a restaurant that
• 9:32
  Speaker 4: my eight year old can run around that and a
• 9:34
  Speaker 4: lot of the pubs and clubs actually have worked out
• 9:36
  Speaker 4: that there's a really big.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: Market in making sure that their kid friendly, because we
• 9:42
  Speaker 2: really do.
• 9:43
  Speaker 4: I'm in the convenience even when you talk to parents
• 9:46
  Speaker 4: about I have a whole room in my house dedicated
• 9:49
  Speaker 4: to craft and it's messy.
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: It drives me crazy.
• 9:53
  Speaker 4: An iPad is really neat and tidy and containable. But
• 9:56
  Speaker 4: obviously the long term consequences, especially for little ones, is
• 10:00
  Speaker 4: language acquisition. So when you're actually sticking something in between
• 10:05
  Speaker 4: that call and response of how we learn to have
• 10:07
  Speaker 4: a conversation. We actually see some research that says kids
• 10:11
  Speaker 4: actually end up with you know, a thousand words less
• 10:13
  Speaker 4: by the time they go to preschool because we're stickingless. Yeah,
• 10:20
  Speaker 4: because they're still you know, like even if they're not
• 10:23
  Speaker 4: on the iPad, even if we are interrupting that because
• 10:27
  Speaker 4: you're so cute, go do that thing again, or do
• 10:29
  Speaker 4: it again for mummy, and we're interrupting, and we're sending
• 10:32
  Speaker 4: a really big signal that you know, the phone, not
• 10:36
  Speaker 4: my hand obviously is the phone in this case, I
• 10:38
  Speaker 4: don't have my phone with me, you know, is something
• 10:42
  Speaker 4: to be negotiated. And it's like a still face experiment
• 10:46
  Speaker 4: sometimes if you've seen that before, if you know, a
• 10:49
  Speaker 4: parent goes still face, the baby doesn't know what to
• 10:52
  Speaker 4: do because we're seeking that biofeedback and nodding.
• 10:55
  Speaker 3: And that's an interesting I remember and seeing some research
• 11:00
  Speaker 3: around and particularly toddlers in prams, and what we noticed
• 11:07
  Speaker 3: in my wife combents all the time is that you
• 11:10
  Speaker 3: will see parents are walking with their little toddlers and
• 11:15
  Speaker 3: a pram and the parents are on their pilms and
• 11:20
  Speaker 3: that's an issue because the little bob in there wants
• 11:24
  Speaker 3: to see mom or Dad's fiercial expressions, and when they're
• 11:28
  Speaker 3: just there, they can't see them. That's a problem, isn't it.
• 11:32
  Speaker 2: Absolutely Yeah.
• 11:34
  Speaker 4: Similarly, being in a front facing pram and rather than
• 11:37
  Speaker 4: looking at the world and developing, you know, especially if
• 11:40
  Speaker 4: you're outside developing that you know, your eyes literally the
• 11:46
  Speaker 4: way that the eye wires up. You've got kids with
• 11:51
  Speaker 4: content sitting there, smashing their brains full of really quick content.
• 11:55
  Speaker 4: So the cadence of the you know, what happens in
• 11:58
  Speaker 4: an episode of Poor Patrol, you know, eight minutes is
• 12:02
  Speaker 4: much more than used to happen in an episode of
• 12:04
  Speaker 4: Shera or The Smurfs or whatever we were watching. So
• 12:08
  Speaker 4: even that that, you know, the pace of what kids
• 12:10
  Speaker 4: are consuming and the like, the dramatic tension that needs
• 12:15
  Speaker 4: to be in things is really part of that problem
• 12:18
  Speaker 4: as well. So rather than you know, observing your environment
• 12:21
  Speaker 4: and spotting the bird and all of those things, kids
• 12:24
  Speaker 4: are you know, consuming, consuming, consuming.
• 12:27
  Speaker 1: Which is much more appealing to the brain.
• 12:30
  Speaker 3: All of that fast, right, and then they're not kicking
• 12:34
  Speaker 3: in the environment, which I don't think it's just just
• 12:38
  Speaker 3: around kids like, if you look at movies today, I
• 12:43
  Speaker 3: just can't watch this just there's so much noise and
• 12:47
  Speaker 3: action and it's just an assault on the senses.
• 12:51
  Speaker 1: And then you know, we've got our kids.
• 12:52
  Speaker 3: And we want to watch some all movies and ten
• 12:56
  Speaker 3: and it's in there, gone, this is boring as much.
• 12:57
  Speaker 4: Yes, yeah, my daughter just watched and she's like, when's
• 13:01
  Speaker 4: this going to start? Nothing's happening, and I said, yeah,
• 13:04
  Speaker 4: that's kind of the point though, right, And there's formulas
• 13:09
  Speaker 4: to that, like they're literally to get a show made
• 13:12
  Speaker 4: in Hollywood or for Netflix, and you know all these
• 13:14
  Speaker 4: big things you have to have like twenty eight dramatic
• 13:17
  Speaker 4: tension points in a twenty four minute episode, like a right,
• 13:21
  Speaker 4: there are there's a I can't remember exactly what the
• 13:24
  Speaker 4: formula is, but literally and you know the cliffhangers, and
• 13:27
  Speaker 4: it's more than just the cliffhangers, and you've.
• 13:29
  Speaker 2: Got many more stories that are happening within that.
• 13:33
  Speaker 4: Yeah, it's not the same as if even if you
• 13:35
  Speaker 4: go back and you watch mad Men. I really recommend
• 13:38
  Speaker 4: that for a kind of really low cadence pre phone show,
• 13:43
  Speaker 4: to watch that series, which was probably made about between
• 13:47
  Speaker 4: fifteen and twenty years ago now is a really interesting
• 13:50
  Speaker 4: one to compare to some of this you know, high action,
• 13:53
  Speaker 4: dramatic tension stuff that comes out now.
• 13:56
  Speaker 3: Yeah, I think of one of my favorite movies, The
• 13:58
  Speaker 3: Deer Hunter, which two three hours long and takes like
• 14:03
  Speaker 3: an r to build up. Like, there's just no way
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: that my kids would sit in front of the freaking
• 14:09
  Speaker 3: Deer Hunter to start to get hooked into the to
• 14:12
  Speaker 3: the story.
• 14:12
  Speaker 1: But so let's let's let's let's talk about.
• 14:18
  Speaker 3: What what are some of the good things that can
• 14:21
  Speaker 3: come from digital stuff before we completely slam it, right,
• 14:25
  Speaker 3: I think lots of people are increasingly aware of the negatives,
• 14:28
  Speaker 3: But what are some of the advantage whether it's social media,
• 14:32
  Speaker 3: whether it's video games, general TV, what are some of
• 14:36
  Speaker 3: the useful things?
• 14:37
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I think the common things that the people use
• 14:40
  Speaker 4: that can be really useful is YouTube. And the inclusion
• 14:44
  Speaker 4: of YouTube in that social media band was really quite
• 14:46
  Speaker 4: controversial for a number of reasons, one of which is
• 14:50
  Speaker 4: that when you log in and you kind of can
• 14:52
  Speaker 4: train it, you can look at educational content. Right, There's
• 14:56
  Speaker 4: lots of places that have produced really great how to right,
• 15:00
  Speaker 4: and when the Prime Minister says go learn an instrument,
• 15:04
  Speaker 4: many kids would go to YouTube to learn those things,
• 15:07
  Speaker 4: you know, go learn new sport, Well, you go and
• 15:10
  Speaker 4: learn through that, unless, of course you have the resources
• 15:13
  Speaker 4: to have one hundred dollars an hour piano lesson or
• 15:16
  Speaker 4: whatever and such.
• 15:17
  Speaker 3: Just a quick quick point on not just so my
• 15:19
  Speaker 3: little gay Oscar is starting to play golf, right, I
• 15:23
  Speaker 3: took him to have one lesson, but then he's been
• 15:27
  Speaker 3: watching stuff on TikTok about improving golf, which brings up
• 15:31
  Speaker 3: another point which we will get into. Liot that he's fifteen.
• 15:35
  Speaker 3: All of his friends are fifteen. He says he does
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: not know one of them that has not.
• 15:40
  Speaker 1: Circumnavigated the social media band to this point.
• 15:43
  Speaker 3: Now that may be because they're fifteen, but just to
• 15:47
  Speaker 3: underscore the point that there are some benefits, particularly some
• 15:51
  Speaker 3: of the platforms in terms of the education.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: Absolutely right, and for many people.
• 15:55
  Speaker 4: You have your tiktoks on TikTok, but you've shared it
• 15:59
  Speaker 4: out to YouTube shorts and it's across different platforms, so
• 16:03
  Speaker 4: you know, and there's huge amounts of that, some of
• 16:05
  Speaker 4: which we know with mental health.
• 16:07
  Speaker 2: Is completely wrong.
• 16:08
  Speaker 4: And we've got a lot of people sharing data information
• 16:12
  Speaker 4: but it goes like wildfire and Again, something that I
• 16:15
  Speaker 4: was reading yesterday talked about how the TikTok algorithm actually
• 16:20
  Speaker 4: amplifies mental health content. Then they know that that will
• 16:23
  Speaker 4: go like wildfire. The other thing to say about that, though, too,
• 16:27
  Speaker 4: is that the algorithm in the West is very different
• 16:30
  Speaker 4: to in China. So in China TikTok promotes all of
• 16:33
  Speaker 4: the educational, you know, content there, and they've got moods
• 16:37
  Speaker 4: to make sure that anyone who is influencing on in
• 16:41
  Speaker 4: online spaces actually have doctorates in the topic area they're
• 16:45
  Speaker 4: speaking on wow.
• 16:47
  Speaker 2: So they're actually.
• 16:48
  Speaker 3: So interesting because and I reckon part of it is
• 16:51
  Speaker 3: the Chinese going right, we want we want to control
• 16:54
  Speaker 3: what our population sees because we want our population to
• 16:57
  Speaker 3: be smart and short. And you know what, all this
• 17:00
  Speaker 3: bad ship we can fleck over to the guys.
• 17:03
  Speaker 4: At the West because it's you know, what we would
• 17:05
  Speaker 4: call a weapon of mass distraction.
• 17:07
  Speaker 2: While we're distracted.
• 17:09
  Speaker 4: And dumbing down and confused by a lot of the
• 17:12
  Speaker 4: content there, we're not thinking critically and creatively, we're not
• 17:17
  Speaker 4: connecting with one another. We're actually, you know, Australia today
• 17:20
  Speaker 4: is at risk of super division because we're not actually
• 17:25
  Speaker 4: coming together and sitting you know, holding space with one another,
• 17:29
  Speaker 4: really looking eyed eye. We're you know, scrolling through and
• 17:33
  Speaker 4: doing you know what we'd call the digital disinhibition effect.
• 17:36
  Speaker 4: We're not actually face to face with one another and
• 17:40
  Speaker 4: our humanity a lot of the time.
• 17:42
  Speaker 3: So digital disinhibition is basically by spending time in a
• 17:46
  Speaker 3: digital device. It's the opportunity cost of that that we
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: are not having fierce to fierce interactions which are much richer.
• 17:53
  Speaker 4: And Yeah, and we say and do things that we
• 17:56
  Speaker 4: wouldn't say if we were standing face to face looking
• 17:58
  Speaker 4: at another human.
• 17:59
  Speaker 2: We forget that.
• 18:01
  Speaker 4: Well, we think we're anonymous sometimes and certainly there are
• 18:05
  Speaker 4: some platforms where anonymity is breed some of the most
• 18:10
  Speaker 4: gross stuff that happens. But also we think that we're
• 18:14
  Speaker 4: above the law when it comes to what we say
• 18:17
  Speaker 4: in those online spaces when and again in Australia, you're
• 18:20
  Speaker 4: often not because we have an Online Safety Act which
• 18:24
  Speaker 4: prevents us from being abused in online spaces.
• 18:27
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and I remember seeing stuff about about bullies online
• 18:31
  Speaker 3: bullies that when they are actually then brought fierce to
• 18:34
  Speaker 3: fierce with the victim and told of the impact that
• 18:37
  Speaker 3: it has, they're kind of like all shit, right, because
• 18:42
  Speaker 3: you don't see the real human you don't. You know,
• 18:44
  Speaker 3: if you're seeing something really nasty to someone fierce, fierce,
• 18:48
  Speaker 3: you see the impact, right Number one, you're not likely
• 18:51
  Speaker 3: less likely to do it.
• 18:52
  Speaker 1: But then it's the impact, just a little diversion because
• 18:56
  Speaker 1: we want to combust it. But I want to do
• 18:57
  Speaker 1: the version.
• 18:58
  Speaker 3: Because we talk about China, there are bad actors in
• 19:03
  Speaker 3: terms of social media, reading some really interesting stuff about
• 19:08
  Speaker 3: I don't know if you saw it about a lot
• 19:11
  Speaker 3: of the MAGA influencers in the United States were actually
• 19:15
  Speaker 3: being paid by Russian bad actors to actually produce their
• 19:22
  Speaker 3: content and essentially and when I heard, I'm like.
• 19:24
  Speaker 1: Okay, now that makes so much sense.
• 19:27
  Speaker 3: Is that that the whether it's Iran or whether it's Russia,
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: they're actually using social media to try to try to
• 19:34
  Speaker 3: destroy the social fabric and democracy and.
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: It's breaking working beautifully, isn't it.
• 19:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean it's a propaganda machine.
• 19:46
  Speaker 1: Yeah.
• 19:46
  Speaker 2: And if you have.
• 19:48
  Speaker 4: The money and the influence, surprise, surprise, within the capitalist society,
• 19:53
  Speaker 4: then you're going to have that influence.
• 19:57
  Speaker 2: And we've seen pushback. I guess.
• 19:59
  Speaker 4: I guess in very small media outlets across Australia.
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: That I'm I'm kind of aware of.
• 20:03
  Speaker 4: That breaks some incredible stories and are growing a lot
• 20:07
  Speaker 4: of traction because we often can't necessarily trust the media to.
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: Just do good journalism anymore.
• 20:16
  Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, I look like that.
• 20:17
  Speaker 3: That that's under the umbrella of psychological warfare and being
• 20:21
  Speaker 3: ex military.
• 20:22
  Speaker 1: I know that it is.
• 20:24
  Speaker 3: It's an increasingly big part of warfare and it's very,
• 20:28
  Speaker 3: very effective. But anyway, that was a little aside, So
• 20:33
  Speaker 3: let's focus on the social media bank for the under
• 20:35
  Speaker 3: sixteens of Australia, right, So first of all, so there's
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: lots of Australians who listeners, but there's lots of overseas people.
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: So talk us through from your perspective, because I'm sure
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: you probably get your finger on your pulse pulse a
• 20:49
  Speaker 3: bit more than me.
• 20:52
  Speaker 1: How is it working?
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: Do you think it was a good idea? Do you
• 20:55
  Speaker 3: think sixteen, sorry, sixteen is the right age. Do you
• 20:59
  Speaker 3: think it's a good idea? Has it been well implemented?
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: What does the future look like?
• 21:03
  Speaker 1: All of that.
• 21:04
  Speaker 2: Okay, I'll try and be as brief as possible, so.
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: You don't have to be brief, be comprehensive.
• 21:10
  Speaker 4: You know, it's quite complex and so there's many facets
• 21:14
  Speaker 4: to it. Do I believe that young people need, and
• 21:17
  Speaker 4: in fact do all of us need, protection from big
• 21:20
  Speaker 4: tech and the way that technology is influencing us, both
• 21:25
  Speaker 4: just to scroll mindlessly and be sedentary and all the
• 21:28
  Speaker 4: impacts of that, but also the toxic algorithm and the
• 21:32
  Speaker 4: fact that we don't have a lot of control over that. Absolutely,
• 21:34
  Speaker 4: I think we need to do something. What we've done, though,
• 21:38
  Speaker 4: is a.
• 21:38
  Speaker 2: Very poor.
• 21:41
  Speaker 4: Attempt at what could have been a lot better if
• 21:44
  Speaker 4: we had have taken more time.
• 21:46
  Speaker 2: And the genesis of.
• 21:47
  Speaker 4: This, very briefly was news corp Ran and let Them
• 21:51
  Speaker 4: Be Kids campaign, as well as a radio dude called
• 21:56
  Speaker 4: Whipper and his little crew of many men under the
• 22:01
  Speaker 4: banner of thirty six months also had a campaign that
• 22:06
  Speaker 4: wanted to raise the age of social media access to sixteen.
• 22:11
  Speaker 4: They presented lots and lots of signatures and asked the
• 22:15
  Speaker 4: Prime Minister live on air would you back this? And
• 22:17
  Speaker 4: he went okay, And then we suddenly had introduction of
• 22:22
  Speaker 4: legislation which was debated and brought into law within nine days.
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 22:27
  Speaker 4: When we stopped and we said, could we please have
• 22:31
  Speaker 4: a committee that like really looks at this, they were
• 22:34
  Speaker 4: given twenty four hours for submissions, and fifteen thousand submissions were.
• 22:38
  Speaker 1: Made chiump and Jehovah.
• 22:41
  Speaker 4: The committee was given half a day you are kidding me, no,
• 22:46
  Speaker 4: and we're expected to then that was on a Friday,
• 22:48
  Speaker 4: I think, and then we were expected to come back
• 22:50
  Speaker 4: on the Monday, and then on the twenty eighth of November.
• 22:53
  Speaker 4: Literally within nine days, this legislation came through without a
• 22:56
  Speaker 4: key component, which was the digital duty of care. Now,
• 23:01
  Speaker 4: this was the component that says, well, how I would
• 23:04
  Speaker 4: describe it actually is. This is the difference between saying
• 23:08
  Speaker 4: what we ended up with was ten social media platforms
• 23:11
  Speaker 4: not being allowed is kind of like saying to under
• 23:14
  Speaker 4: sixteen year olds, you're not allowed to drive in these
• 23:16
  Speaker 4: ten cars, right right, you can't be in those cars.
• 23:20
  Speaker 2: Those parts the dangerous, rather than.
• 23:24
  Speaker 4: These seat belts and safety features must be in every
• 23:28
  Speaker 4: platform that are available for everyone.
• 23:31
  Speaker 2: That's the digital duty of care.
• 23:33
  Speaker 4: That's saying safety by design, designing for safety in mind
• 23:37
  Speaker 4: must happen. And if you have these particular features, you
• 23:40
  Speaker 4: know that, you know you can go and look in
• 23:43
  Speaker 4: the legislation exactly what they are to do with the
• 23:45
  Speaker 4: algorithm and et cetera, et cetera. Then that shouldn't be available.
• 23:51
  Speaker 4: So we unfortunately had I believe it was the Liberal party.
• 23:55
  Speaker 2: Go no, we don't want that digital duty of care
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: in there.
• 23:58
  Speaker 4: Let's just stick with this part of the legislation, which
• 24:02
  Speaker 4: saw the ten at the moment ten social media platforms
• 24:07
  Speaker 4: being on the age restricted list. That doesn't include platforms
• 24:12
  Speaker 4: such as Discord, which is very very popular with young
• 24:15
  Speaker 4: people and operates. In my mind, it's very similar to
• 24:19
  Speaker 4: social media. It's a great platform. I use it myself,
• 24:22
  Speaker 4: and well.
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: Now I become much more popular because of this.
• 24:24
  Speaker 4: Time Yeah, and Roadblocks, which is sort of like imagine
• 24:29
  Speaker 4: a virtual time zone where you go in and there's
• 24:31
  Speaker 4: four million different gaming experiences that you can choose, which
• 24:36
  Speaker 4: is sort of well known for having predatory I've heard
• 24:40
  Speaker 4: of that they have proactively started to age as sure,
• 24:44
  Speaker 4: so if you get an account at the moment, they
• 24:48
  Speaker 4: will check your age and then put you into certain
• 24:50
  Speaker 4: parts of Roadblocks, so you're only communicating with other kids
• 24:54
  Speaker 4: your age.
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: And there are very.
• 24:55
  Speaker 4: Good parental controls on pretty much all of these, but
• 24:59
  Speaker 4: Roadblocks have good parental controls. It's just that many parents don't, unfortunately,
• 25:04
  Speaker 4: spend the time to understand.
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: What those controls are, so you know.
• 25:08
  Speaker 4: Without this legislation, my suggestion was always wait until your
• 25:12
  Speaker 4: kids are thirteen to get on social media and know
• 25:15
  Speaker 4: how to use it and what it does and how
• 25:17
  Speaker 4: to put the controls in place. That would have been, like,
• 25:20
  Speaker 4: we could have done really great work if we had
• 25:22
  Speaker 4: have focused.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: On that instead.
• 25:25
  Speaker 4: I think what is happening is parents go, it's not
• 25:28
  Speaker 4: my problem, you need to be off that, and they're
• 25:32
  Speaker 4: not because the age verification technology isn't working.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: As well as we would like it.
• 25:38
  Speaker 4: And we knew that because there were many trials that
• 25:42
  Speaker 4: came out and said, oh yeah, it kind of works
• 25:44
  Speaker 4: eighty five percent of the time. And there's all of
• 25:48
  Speaker 4: these other new platforms that are popping up that kids
• 25:50
  Speaker 4: are using. So my daughter's nine year old friend, she
• 25:54
  Speaker 4: still has access to TikTok, but she's also on one
• 25:57
  Speaker 4: of the newer platforms that have risen up in the chart,
• 26:00
  Speaker 4: and she was telling me this morning, Oh, it's okay
• 26:02
  Speaker 4: because it's much more positive.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: Right, this is.
• 26:07
  Speaker 2: A nine year old, Yeah.
• 26:09
  Speaker 4: You know safe it is for her to be on
• 26:11
  Speaker 4: this other social media platform to watch videos. So that's
• 26:17
  Speaker 4: very small sample size, but you know it will It
• 26:20
  Speaker 4: will be interesting to see what the long term effects are.
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so do you think that that maybe they've just
• 26:27
  Speaker 3: gone right blanket bamd. We want to get something done,
• 26:29
  Speaker 3: we want to be first in the world, and then
• 26:32
  Speaker 3: they're going to look at it and judge it and
• 26:35
  Speaker 3: bring that whatever that panel was that you were talking
• 26:38
  Speaker 3: about of experts to go. Okay, n how do we
• 26:42
  Speaker 3: actually refine it? Yeah, I'm sure you hope and I
• 26:46
  Speaker 3: hope that that's the case.
• 26:47
  Speaker 1: Do you think that's going to be the case?
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: I would have loved it to be the case.
• 26:51
  Speaker 4: And there is a really awesome expert advisory that has
• 26:55
  Speaker 4: been put together. However, when it came to voting to
• 26:58
  Speaker 4: make sure that any rickons made from that panel were implemented, No,
• 27:03
  Speaker 4: that was voted.
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: Out voted I by by.
• 27:08
  Speaker 4: A range of people I can't remember exactly. That was
• 27:11
  Speaker 4: relatively recent A legra spender, the Wentworth MP had pushed
• 27:16
  Speaker 4: to make sure that that advisory, those recommendations were like mandated,
• 27:21
  Speaker 4: like if we say you should do this, you should
• 27:23
  Speaker 4: do it.
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: No, that wasn't actually then part of the legislation.
• 27:27
  Speaker 3: Wouldn't it be interesting to see to just know how
• 27:32
  Speaker 3: many lobbyists are on the other side looking.
• 27:36
  Speaker 4: Yeah, I would really recommend folks check out Cam Wilson
• 27:40
  Speaker 4: from Kriik's reporting on this. Craik is an excellent independent,
• 27:45
  Speaker 4: sort of progressive publication and he has written over forty
• 27:49
  Speaker 4: four thousand words on the social media ban and has
• 27:53
  Speaker 4: exposed the folks from thirty six months as basically taking
• 27:58
  Speaker 4: sponsorship when they were to the un And you would
• 28:01
  Speaker 4: have heard about the Anaka Wells, the Communications Minister spending
• 28:05
  Speaker 4: one hundred thousand dollars on flights to New York to
• 28:08
  Speaker 4: go and scrough how good the ban is before the
• 28:10
  Speaker 4: band had started. They actually then were looking at you know,
• 28:14
  Speaker 4: you could do a sponsor, provide sponsorship for one hundred
• 28:17
  Speaker 4: and fifty grand to be a part of that.
• 28:18
  Speaker 2: So you know, some.
• 28:19
  Speaker 4: People would say, oh, well, to stop these billion dollars
• 28:21
  Speaker 4: tech companies, and that's just.
• 28:23
  Speaker 2: What you have to do.
• 28:24
  Speaker 4: I would say, that's some really interesting lobbying that's happening
• 28:28
  Speaker 4: by you know, ultimately an organization that makes TV commercials.
• 28:35
  Speaker 4: So one of the guys it works for a production
• 28:37
  Speaker 4: company who also makes ads for the gambling industry. So
• 28:42
  Speaker 4: you know, we've been waiting four years for gambling ads
• 28:45
  Speaker 4: to be banned in social media and online.
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: Spaces that we Oh, no, that takes time. You can't
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: rush things. You've got to get the legislation right.
• 28:55
  Speaker 4: But a blanket ban with really bad features nine days,
• 28:58
  Speaker 4: done and dusted, won't you think about the kids? So
• 29:01
  Speaker 4: you can probably hear that I'm really cynical, and I
• 29:03
  Speaker 4: guess the reason for that is that there's so much
• 29:06
  Speaker 4: research that said this probably isn't going to work.
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: We do that. Could we do this instead?
• 29:13
  Speaker 4: That, you know, and that's a longer slower path, that is,
• 29:18
  Speaker 4: you know, lack with any good work. Is multifactorial and complex,
• 29:24
  Speaker 4: but would actually make a longer term difference and have
• 29:26
  Speaker 4: participatory approaches because what happens now, like kids are booted
• 29:31
  Speaker 4: off and then they come back in maybe with a
• 29:33
  Speaker 4: slightly more developed prefrontal cortex, but actually with no other
• 29:37
  Speaker 4: training wheels or driving.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: Skills for these digital spaces.
• 29:41
  Speaker 3: Yeah, and you know, just because now you're sixteen and
• 29:45
  Speaker 3: you're old good and you can access anything, yeah, it
• 29:48
  Speaker 3: doesn't mean that it's going to be good. That then
• 29:51
  Speaker 3: brings me to the whole idea of the rule of
• 29:55
  Speaker 3: parents in all of this, because I know I've got
• 30:02
  Speaker 3: a nineteen year old girl and a fifteen year old boy,
• 30:06
  Speaker 3: and I know from conversations with them over the years
• 30:09
  Speaker 3: that there's a number of their friends who not only
• 30:13
  Speaker 3: is their social media completely unrestricted, their parents have no
• 30:17
  Speaker 3: idea how much time they're spending on screens, that they
• 30:21
  Speaker 3: have phones in the room at night, that they have
• 30:24
  Speaker 3: computers in their room at night. And I know that
• 30:28
  Speaker 3: that quite a lot of these kids are up late
• 30:31
  Speaker 3: on social media and boys gaming, and it's impacting on
• 30:36
  Speaker 3: their sleep, which impacts the cognitive function, which impacts.
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: A whole heap of shit and parents.
• 30:43
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, yeah, I mean that it's just the excuse me,
• 30:47
  Speaker 3: the sleep.
• 30:48
  Speaker 5: Alone, and the knock on effects of that on behavior,
• 30:54
  Speaker 5: on likelihood of exercising the next day, and through the
• 30:58
  Speaker 5: impacts on leptin, on far behaviors, through the impacts on grelling,
• 31:02
  Speaker 5: on stress, on all of this stuff.
• 31:06
  Speaker 2: No effect, right, That's where I start.
• 31:08
  Speaker 4: I start when kids come to me, or really really
• 31:11
  Speaker 4: any client comes to me, but often it's the kids
• 31:14
  Speaker 4: with the social media or the gaming addiction. We fix
• 31:16
  Speaker 4: their sleep first, protect sleep at all cost because of
• 31:20
  Speaker 4: that cascade effects. I talk about the mood, metabolism, and memory.
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: That's ah. Nice.
• 31:26
  Speaker 3: I like those three things because look, and I'm happy
• 31:29
  Speaker 3: to be hardcore on this. If you're a parent and
• 31:34
  Speaker 3: you do not know and monitor and regulate your kid's
• 31:39
  Speaker 3: phone use first and foremost, but also social media, you're
• 31:44
  Speaker 3: being a shit parent.
• 31:46
  Speaker 2: Yeah.
• 31:46
  Speaker 4: It's a tricky one, right, because we talk about kids
• 31:48
  Speaker 4: as digital natives.
• 31:50
  Speaker 2: And they you know, oh, they just grew up with
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: it and they know what to do. No, they're not.
• 31:54
  Speaker 2: They're digital orphans.
• 31:55
  Speaker 4: They're growing up without a generation of you know, older people,
• 32:00
  Speaker 4: trusted adults, parents who know some of the risks and
• 32:05
  Speaker 4: are willing to actually do the tough work around parenting,
• 32:09
  Speaker 4: which is to set limits, which is to set a
• 32:12
  Speaker 4: good example. And often you know, parents are doing their best.
• 32:17
  Speaker 4: I would like to generally say, but we're also I
• 32:20
  Speaker 4: think asleep at the wheel a lot of the time
• 32:23
  Speaker 4: because we haven't asked the right questions. Now, when I
• 32:27
  Speaker 4: used to be a teacher, I taught commerce, and the
• 32:29
  Speaker 4: first lesson in commerce is caveat emptal let the buyer beware.
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: And I think as consumers we are not aware enough
• 32:36
  Speaker 2: of what we're doing.
• 32:37
  Speaker 4: And you know, for a variety of reasons that many
• 32:41
  Speaker 4: parents are really disregulated themselves.
• 32:45
  Speaker 3: I was going to say, you're saying that that the
• 32:47
  Speaker 3: parents are doing the best. I think some parents are
• 32:49
  Speaker 3: doing the best. Some of them are as addicted to
• 32:52
  Speaker 3: the digital smack, as I would call it digital heroine,
• 32:56
  Speaker 3: and some of them are spending so much time on
• 32:59
  Speaker 3: their own digit heroin that they are either don't have
• 33:03
  Speaker 3: the time or the inclination to regulate their kids stuff.
• 33:06
  Speaker 4: Absolutely right, And I think it is a massive coping
• 33:11
  Speaker 4: strategy maladaptive for a lot of people.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: And it's sometimes.
• 33:17
  Speaker 4: Really hard then to sort that digital candy from the
• 33:21
  Speaker 4: digital kale, because it's all.
• 33:24
  Speaker 2: In one body.
• 33:27
  Speaker 4: Yeah, so you know, like your your email and even
• 33:30
  Speaker 4: being kind of addicted to email and getting that secondary
• 33:34
  Speaker 4: gain from I've got to reply to this, and I've
• 33:36
  Speaker 4: got to keep my inbox manageable or zero or whatever,
• 33:41
  Speaker 4: and that kind of constant, always on urgency principle of
• 33:45
  Speaker 4: being pulled into things, I then think sets up neural
• 33:49
  Speaker 4: pathways even if you're not mindlessly scrolling. For you know,
• 33:52
  Speaker 4: I'm getting all these ads for cellulite creams that are
• 33:55
  Speaker 4: magically gonna you know, and like how many people would
• 33:59
  Speaker 4: just buy into that and then get into that zone
• 34:02
  Speaker 4: of like seeking hoping for that kind.
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: Of thing versus the literacy to go.
• 34:08
  Speaker 4: I know that that's total bullshit that they like cellulite.
• 34:11
  Speaker 4: Doesn't nothing get rid of cellulite really even being skinny,
• 34:17
  Speaker 4: you know? Anyway, That really is those differences of like
• 34:22
  Speaker 4: I went on just to catch up with that one person,
• 34:24
  Speaker 4: then I got sucked into these ads. Then I went
• 34:26
  Speaker 4: to kind of respond to this other thing over here
• 34:28
  Speaker 4: about the netball oranges or you know, a million parent
• 34:32
  Speaker 4: WhatsApp groups, and then I found myself over there.
• 34:36
  Speaker 2: And it's really really hard.
• 34:38
  Speaker 4: To stay on task when if you haven't managed your notifications,
• 34:43
  Speaker 4: if you're not really clear on intention and purpose, if
• 34:46
  Speaker 4: you've never learned any of these executive functioning kind of
• 34:50
  Speaker 4: skills that we usually only teach to kids who have ADHD,
• 34:54
  Speaker 4: Like executive function skills I think are something that everyone
• 34:57
  Speaker 4: needs lessons in.
• 34:59
  Speaker 3: I think we are having declines in executive function because
• 35:04
  Speaker 3: of the immediacy and all the little green hits. And
• 35:08
  Speaker 3: the concerning thing, particularly from a neural development stance, is
• 35:15
  Speaker 3: that these young developing Briands are getting completely hijacked and
• 35:23
  Speaker 3: we are changing the trajectory of Brian development in kids,
• 35:28
  Speaker 3: and we're sleepwalking right into this shit.
• 35:31
  Speaker 4: Don't we including our use of educational technology as well.
• 35:36
  Speaker 4: So I think we have to really pull that out,
• 35:38
  Speaker 4: the idea that just because it's for learning doesn't mean
• 35:41
  Speaker 4: that suddenly you're sitting at your desk with your shoulders
• 35:43
  Speaker 4: back and you're making sure that you're looking at something
• 35:47
  Speaker 4: in the long distance so that you're not you know,
• 35:49
  Speaker 4: at myopia. All of our tech use really needs to
• 35:53
  Speaker 4: be examined. We need to examine whether or not those
• 35:56
  Speaker 4: teachers who back in two thousand and nine who never
• 35:58
  Speaker 4: got the lessons, actually you're getting the lessons now. Victoria
• 36:03
  Speaker 4: actually considering bringing in legislation that says that teachers can
• 36:07
  Speaker 4: only use screens for ninety minutes of the school day.
• 36:11
  Speaker 3: I I think that it would be a wonderful thing
• 36:15
  Speaker 3: because to your point, So my fifteen year old, who
• 36:18
  Speaker 3: I've got a really open relationship, he tells me that
• 36:21
  Speaker 3: lots of his meutes when the teacher is.
• 36:25
  Speaker 1: Teaching, they're on games.
• 36:26
  Speaker 3: They they know how to hack the system, and they're
• 36:30
  Speaker 3: playing games in class.
• 36:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah, constantly.
• 36:34
  Speaker 4: Even if they're not doing that, they can be in
• 36:36
  Speaker 4: Google classroom on a Google doc, messaging one another.
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: Right, Like I used to pass notes.
• 36:42
  Speaker 4: You can pass notes and you look like you're doing work.
• 36:47
  Speaker 4: A client who's written a forty three thousand word outline
• 36:50
  Speaker 4: that's just the outline for her fan fiction projects while
• 36:55
  Speaker 4: looking like she was doing work at school.
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: So you know, where there's a there's a way.
• 37:00
  Speaker 4: And what I like to examine is not screen time
• 37:04
  Speaker 4: like we're counting digital calories, but what's actually in the
• 37:06
  Speaker 4: digital diet, because is there enough protein and play?
• 37:10
  Speaker 2: Is there enough creativity? Is there enough you know?
• 37:14
  Speaker 4: And again even ninety minutes for teachers to be using
• 37:18
  Speaker 4: that I want to work praise whether or not you're
• 37:21
  Speaker 4: using educational technology that's actually not gamified and designed with
• 37:25
  Speaker 4: all of those hijacked principles in mind, just because we're
• 37:29
  Speaker 4: so desperate for engagement and we're competing with short form
• 37:32
  Speaker 4: media and influencers who are masters of summing up information
• 37:39
  Speaker 4: in quick, easy bites, and that's, you know, I think
• 37:44
  Speaker 4: something that we need to keep our eye on. The
• 37:46
  Speaker 4: prize around ed tech as well, and that move, you know,
• 37:49
  Speaker 4: we all had to bring our own device and now
• 37:51
  Speaker 4: we're moving back away from that. So yeah, there's so
• 37:56
  Speaker 4: much to consider here that again we sort of get
• 37:59
  Speaker 4: allured by the the promise of technology, but for many
• 38:03
  Speaker 4: of us, it just makes the world more complicated, yeah.
• 38:07
  Speaker 1: And besier.
• 38:08
  Speaker 3: So let's start about some advice for individuals who are
• 38:13
  Speaker 3: just listening tests for themselves, but also for parents for kids.
• 38:18
  Speaker 1: So what are they? What are the building blocks of
• 38:22
  Speaker 1: good digital nutrition? What does that look like?
• 38:25
  Speaker 4: So I'm just in the process of finalizing my updated
• 38:29
  Speaker 4: version of a technology use agreement. It sounds really boring
• 38:32
  Speaker 4: and it's really hard to come up with the jazzy
• 38:35
  Speaker 4: name for it. It just does what it says in
• 38:36
  Speaker 4: the box. It's a way to co design your family's
• 38:39
  Speaker 4: tech use agreement. I think we need to have explicit
• 38:42
  Speaker 4: conversations about the role that technology plays in our life
• 38:46
  Speaker 4: when it is welcomed and when it is shut down.
• 38:49
  Speaker 4: And this is not something I guess you know that
• 38:54
  Speaker 4: is very sexy or very cool, and parents often want
• 38:59
  Speaker 4: to be the cool parents, Like you actually need to
• 39:01
  Speaker 4: sit down and have hard conversations and you know, be
• 39:04
  Speaker 4: the parents, so to speak.
• 39:06
  Speaker 1: Yeah, not their friend, their friend parent.
• 39:09
  Speaker 4: There's time to be friends, and you can be friendly,
• 39:11
  Speaker 4: but you know, you have to hold firm on the
• 39:15
  Speaker 4: things that are most important. I find too, so in
• 39:18
  Speaker 4: my course, Basically what I do is I help parents
• 39:21
  Speaker 4: understand all the things that we've never learned, because where
• 39:24
  Speaker 4: are the lessons for all of this? Ye public, No, no
• 39:28
  Speaker 4: one does, and there's no one size fits all because
• 39:31
  Speaker 4: we're all so different and our kind of digital diets
• 39:35
  Speaker 4: need to be different too when they change, just like
• 39:37
  Speaker 4: your nutrition as a toddler is really different to a
• 39:40
  Speaker 4: fifteen year old or if you're an athlete. So we
• 39:43
  Speaker 4: really need to examine, like what are our predilections, what
• 39:46
  Speaker 4: are some of the things that we're allergic to. I'm
• 39:48
  Speaker 4: allergic to TikTok my brain and TikTok do not go well.
• 39:51
  Speaker 4: It sets my brain on fire and I get really dysregulated.
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: So I know not to go there, right, But that's
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: you know, you.
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: Know, I've never seen to It's.
• 40:02
  Speaker 4: Just really quick videos and a lot of a lot
• 40:05
  Speaker 4: of slop, right, a lot of junk, and you go
• 40:08
  Speaker 4: looking for the good stuff and it's really hard to find.
• 40:10
  Speaker 4: It's like you know, panning for goals. You get a
• 40:14
  Speaker 4: little bit and you think I've got to keep going
• 40:15
  Speaker 4: to you know, end on a high or whatever. So
• 40:19
  Speaker 4: knowing knowing yourself and knowing how things work and knowing
• 40:22
  Speaker 4: some of the risks, So parents really need to invest
• 40:25
  Speaker 4: a little bit of that time to.
• 40:26
  Speaker 2: Educate themselves, sometimes side by side. The expert in.
• 40:30
  Speaker 4: Technology in your family is your teenager probably, but you're
• 40:33
  Speaker 4: the expert in your family, and you're the expert in
• 40:36
  Speaker 4: you know, brain development hopefully and switching on some of
• 40:39
  Speaker 4: those boundaries to protect their brain development.
• 40:43
  Speaker 2: We also know that.
• 40:44
  Speaker 4: Explaining to kids how the neurobiology works helps them make
• 40:48
  Speaker 4: better decisions. So when I've worked with kids, and I
• 40:51
  Speaker 4: did a project recently with the Telstra Foundation where we
• 40:54
  Speaker 4: explain to kids the neurobiology of sleep and why it
• 40:56
  Speaker 4: was important. Using that you know in your mood, your memory,
• 41:01
  Speaker 4: and your metabolism, they automatically prioritize sleep because they understood
• 41:07
  Speaker 4: why it was so important, how it could benefit.
• 41:09
  Speaker 1: Them, right, Yeah, So you comment so.
• 41:14
  Speaker 4: Similarly when they understand, I say, so, how much do
• 41:17
  Speaker 4: you does TikTok pay you for your attention? You're paying
• 41:20
  Speaker 4: attention to TikTok? What's that worth an hour? And they're like, oh, nothing,
• 41:23
  Speaker 4: I do it for free. And I'm like, if you
• 41:25
  Speaker 4: went to the mall and got a job in one
• 41:28
  Speaker 4: of their fast food outlets, would you work for free?
• 41:30
  Speaker 4: Because you, you know, would you give them that time?
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: Would you give no?
• 41:35
  Speaker 4: And I'm like, well, that's kind of what you're doing.
• 41:38
  Speaker 4: And suddenly they value their attention and their time differently.
• 41:43
  Speaker 4: So there's some things like that just to it's not lecturing,
• 41:46
  Speaker 4: it's not telling them what to do, it's saying, here's
• 41:48
  Speaker 4: some information. When you now that you have that information,
• 41:51
  Speaker 4: do you think you want to do things?
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: Differently?
• 41:54
  Speaker 4: And depending on the age of the kids, so again
• 41:56
  Speaker 4: like on the primary schoolers we're going to work with
• 41:58
  Speaker 4: really really differently. So the kids who maybe have already
• 42:01
  Speaker 4: had the technology, who have already circumvented the ban to say, hey,
• 42:06
  Speaker 4: here's some information, how would you.
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: Like to use that to shape your future?
• 42:10
  Speaker 4: And getting kids connected to their future and understanding that
• 42:14
  Speaker 4: self control you need to actually put off what's right
• 42:17
  Speaker 4: now in order to get that thing in the future
• 42:20
  Speaker 4: and get that goal is really really helpful. My master's
• 42:23
  Speaker 4: thesis in cyber psychology was all about the role of
• 42:26
  Speaker 4: self control. If we haven't taught self control and we
• 42:29
  Speaker 4: haven't given kids something in the future to look forward to,
• 42:33
  Speaker 4: like having a planet that's not on fire or being
• 42:35
  Speaker 4: destroyed by war, then what you know, what are they
• 42:39
  Speaker 4: giving up that, you know, their community, their regulation, their coping,
• 42:45
  Speaker 4: their escapism.
• 42:46
  Speaker 3: For so, I think that's a huge important I'll give
• 42:50
  Speaker 3: you a little personal anecdot, but firstally self control. The
• 42:56
  Speaker 3: Dunedin Study on self control showed that and this has
• 43:00
  Speaker 3: been following a huge amount of people in the Dunedin
• 43:03
  Speaker 3: in southern South Island of the South Island, New Zealand, and.
• 43:09
  Speaker 1: They've been following them from birth.
• 43:11
  Speaker 3: They've got genetic stuff on them and they do these
• 43:14
  Speaker 3: huge assessments every couple of years on them, and the
• 43:18
  Speaker 3: people are now in their forties right. It's one of
• 43:21
  Speaker 3: the biggest longitudinal studies and so much really cool shit
• 43:25
  Speaker 3: comes out of it.
• 43:26
  Speaker 1: But they have.
• 43:27
  Speaker 3: Concluded self control is the single biggest predictor of success
• 43:32
  Speaker 3: in life, way above intelligence, above education about social your
• 43:38
  Speaker 3: social status or your economic status. Self control is the
• 43:44
  Speaker 3: most important predictor of success in life because it is
• 43:47
  Speaker 3: to your point earlier, it's self control that when I'm
• 43:50
  Speaker 3: a kid says well, I need to study because I
• 43:53
  Speaker 3: want to do well in my exams, and it's self control.
• 43:57
  Speaker 3: It says, you know, I want to get to university now,
• 44:00
  Speaker 3: so I have to study and not have the night side,
• 44:02
  Speaker 3: and then when you're university it self, controller goes, I
• 44:04
  Speaker 3: want to actually get a good degree so as I
• 44:07
  Speaker 3: can get a job, So I'm not going to go
• 44:09
  Speaker 3: on the pist seven nights a.
• 44:10
  Speaker 1: Week, and then when you're in a job, blah blah
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: blah blah blah. But so, so the point of this
• 44:15
  Speaker 1: about the conversation.
• 44:18
  Speaker 3: We are constantly talking to our two kids around the education.
• 44:23
  Speaker 3: You know, I've got a background in neuroscience and psychology,
• 44:26
  Speaker 3: and it's really interesting. Nineteen year old girl, fifteen year
• 44:30
  Speaker 3: old boy, our nineteen.
• 44:32
  Speaker 1: Year old girl.
• 44:33
  Speaker 3: She is currently in Nicaragua a right, traveling backpacking around.
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: Give us a little bit of the app.
• 44:41
  Speaker 3: But it's like, this is this is the life experiences
• 44:43
  Speaker 3: that you need. But I got a notification on my
• 44:47
  Speaker 3: phone saying Kira wants fifteen more minutes on TikTok. She's
• 44:51
  Speaker 3: nineteen years old. When she went to university. We're like, Kira,
• 44:54
  Speaker 3: you're an adult and I we don't need parental controls,
• 44:57
  Speaker 3: and she said I want them. So Kira in year ten,
• 45:01
  Speaker 3: because she was very very motivated, driven by doing well,
• 45:06
  Speaker 3: having that conversation around social media, frontal lobe development, all
• 45:12
  Speaker 3: of those things.
• 45:12
  Speaker 1: She was like bomb straight away.
• 45:14
  Speaker 3: Since she's been in year ten, she's got ten minutes
• 45:16
  Speaker 3: on TikTok, she's got twelve minutes on Instagram, and like
• 45:21
  Speaker 3: seven minutes on Snapchat.
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: And she actually came to us in year twelve and.
• 45:24
  Speaker 3: Asked to get them cut back because she understands the
• 45:29
  Speaker 3: impact on her and she sees it in other people.
• 45:32
  Speaker 3: She sees the impact on their mood, on their anxiety
• 45:36
  Speaker 3: and all of these things. So that is just underscoring
• 45:38
  Speaker 3: from a personal perspective how important it is to have
• 45:42
  Speaker 3: those conversations.
• 45:43
  Speaker 1: But fifteen years.
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: Really want that, right, Yeah, actually really.
• 45:48
  Speaker 4: Want more rules, and people like, no, they don't, and
• 45:50
  Speaker 4: I'm like, what are they getting games?
• 45:52
  Speaker 2: They get really clear rules.
• 45:54
  Speaker 4: Yes, so they actually are crying out for us to
• 45:58
  Speaker 4: say here's what to do so rather than below open slater.
• 46:02
  Speaker 4: And often that's because we then know that we can't
• 46:05
  Speaker 4: be hypocrites.
• 46:07
  Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, absolutely, And the whole thing about sleep and
• 46:11
  Speaker 3: the education on sleep, and so.
• 46:13
  Speaker 1: You know, our kids, nobody has cut phones in their bedroom.
• 46:16
  Speaker 3: But it's interesting the fifteen year old boy, it's much
• 46:20
  Speaker 3: more of a fight, right, both in terms of getting
• 46:25
  Speaker 3: social media at that age, and then the time limits,
• 46:30
  Speaker 3: which we had to do, you know, a pretty negotiation
• 46:33
  Speaker 3: around those time limits and stuff like that. But he's
• 46:37
  Speaker 3: driven by different things, right, He's not as as driven
• 46:41
  Speaker 3: by awards at school and all of those sorts of things.
• 46:45
  Speaker 3: So I think the conversation needs to be different, right.
• 46:48
  Speaker 3: You got to understand who you're talking to and what
• 46:51
  Speaker 3: pushes their buttons and try to push the right buttons
• 46:54
  Speaker 3: for them, I think.
• 46:55
  Speaker 1: And that's that's the hard work as apparent, isn't it, And.
• 46:58
  Speaker 3: That sometimes you know, if they're not motivated by these things, you've.
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: Just got to go, well, they're the roots, that's right.
• 47:04
  Speaker 1: And you've got to be unpopular.
• 47:05
  Speaker 2: That's right, don't.
• 47:06
  Speaker 4: You don't have to want to you know, great things,
• 47:09
  Speaker 4: but you do have not negotiables and they again that
• 47:14
  Speaker 4: that can be a range of different things. Because like
• 47:17
  Speaker 4: my daughter does have a phone in her room because
• 47:19
  Speaker 4: she listens to something as she's falling asleep. That phone
• 47:22
  Speaker 4: is locked down, but technically there is a phone in
• 47:25
  Speaker 4: a bedroom, so we want to really interrogate.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: Can't she can't access the.
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: Social media any of that?
• 47:32
  Speaker 4: No, No, it's just like a crappy old phone that
• 47:35
  Speaker 4: she uses literally with two apps, one to listen to
• 47:37
  Speaker 4: books and one to you know, listen to music or whatever.
• 47:40
  Speaker 4: So again, we just want to interrogate that and look
• 47:44
  Speaker 4: at the differences in our kids. So when I teach
• 47:46
  Speaker 4: that tech use agreement, there's an umbrella agreement for the family.
• 47:49
  Speaker 4: So that might be something like we bookending the day
• 47:53
  Speaker 4: is a really good one. We don't use tech right
• 47:56
  Speaker 4: up before bed, and we don't use it first thing
• 47:57
  Speaker 4: in the morning. But then individual emas for different people
• 48:01
  Speaker 4: based on, you know, what their interest in online spaces are.
• 48:05
  Speaker 4: Some people really like your daughter might have. Really I
• 48:08
  Speaker 4: want to just have a little taste. I want to
• 48:10
  Speaker 4: see my friends, I want to kind of know what's
• 48:12
  Speaker 4: going on, but I'm not.
• 48:14
  Speaker 2: Interested in being there.
• 48:15
  Speaker 4: Other kids are deep into games, they're running communities, they're
• 48:20
  Speaker 4: admitting servers. They've got real, you know, responsibilities within the
• 48:24
  Speaker 4: communities they've built, and they need different time. What I
• 48:28
  Speaker 4: suggest there, though, is that we kind of use the
• 48:30
  Speaker 4: big rocks kind of analogy from corporate Everyone probably knows this.
• 48:35
  Speaker 4: You know, if you've got a jar, you've got to
• 48:37
  Speaker 4: put the big rocks in first, then the pebbles, and
• 48:39
  Speaker 4: then the sand, because if you put the sand or
• 48:42
  Speaker 4: the screen use in First, you're not going to fit.
• 48:45
  Speaker 4: It's going to displace the sleep and school and those things.
• 48:49
  Speaker 4: So again that's built into that course is actually examining
• 48:53
  Speaker 4: the idea that screens are the sand, and we have
• 48:56
  Speaker 4: to do the big rocks first. We have to protect
• 48:58
  Speaker 4: getting enough sleep and making sure we're going to school,
• 49:01
  Speaker 4: putting some sport in there or some movement. Some people
• 49:04
  Speaker 4: don't like the word sport if you're not a sporty person,
• 49:06
  Speaker 4: but moving your body.
• 49:08
  Speaker 2: And not being sedentary.
• 49:09
  Speaker 4: And then the pebbles are, you know, your extracurriculars, family engagements,
• 49:14
  Speaker 4: your chores, all of those other.
• 49:16
  Speaker 2: Things, and then the sand goes in.
• 49:18
  Speaker 4: So when we do it the wrong way, wrong way round,
• 49:21
  Speaker 4: we're displacing those really important things and that's where the
• 49:24
  Speaker 4: wheels come off and we see big problems. But we
• 49:27
  Speaker 4: still need to be focused on the content as well,
• 49:30
  Speaker 4: because obviously any minutes of exposure to some really horrible
• 49:35
  Speaker 4: material is too many minutes.
• 49:37
  Speaker 1: And what can parents do about that?
• 49:42
  Speaker 4: So there's a range of kind of I guess net
• 49:44
  Speaker 4: nannies we used to call them back in the day,
• 49:47
  Speaker 4: and on every platform you can filter certain words so
• 49:51
  Speaker 4: that those words won't show up.
• 49:54
  Speaker 2: Places like Instagram.
• 49:56
  Speaker 4: It's not particularly well known or well advertised. Before the
• 50:01
  Speaker 4: social media bank was even discussed, Instagram launched teen accounts,
• 50:06
  Speaker 4: so if you were between thirteen and seventeen, you will
• 50:09
  Speaker 4: automatically put into kind of a sand pit version of
• 50:13
  Speaker 4: Instagram where you needed parental controls to or a parent's
• 50:17
  Speaker 4: permission to actually change some of these settings. So all
• 50:20
  Speaker 4: of the content if you're between thirteen or now sixteen
• 50:23
  Speaker 4: and seventeen.
• 50:24
  Speaker 2: Is PG rated plus night mode.
• 50:28
  Speaker 4: It has the ability to reset your algorithm. In fact,
• 50:31
  Speaker 4: everybody on Instagram can reset their algorithm and change their
• 50:34
  Speaker 4: content preferences. So there are features within many of the
• 50:39
  Speaker 4: platforms that I recommend people go to the e Safetyoffice
• 50:43
  Speaker 4: e safety dot dot au, whether you're inside of Australia
• 50:47
  Speaker 4: or not. You can use a lot of the resources
• 50:48
  Speaker 4: that are there to tame technology and to work out
• 50:52
  Speaker 4: how you can use some of the parental controls and limits,
• 50:55
  Speaker 4: both from a platform perspective, a device perspective, and even
• 50:59
  Speaker 4: an ISP or a modem perspective as well. The trick
• 51:03
  Speaker 4: to that is to always make sure you're talking to
• 51:05
  Speaker 4: your kids about what you're doing, because if you don't
• 51:07
  Speaker 4: know what you're doing.
• 51:08
  Speaker 2: They are probably the ones that you will.
• 51:10
  Speaker 4: Go to to say, oh, can you help me with
• 51:13
  Speaker 4: these controls or the hack their way through them. And
• 51:17
  Speaker 4: I've seen lots of people say, oh, my gosh, my
• 51:19
  Speaker 4: kids hacked through in certain name of you know software.
• 51:23
  Speaker 4: Can somebody help me? You know, they've locked down my
• 51:26
  Speaker 4: laptop and I can't finish the annual report or whatever importance.
• 51:30
  Speaker 4: So I think honesty is usually the best policy and
• 51:34
  Speaker 4: transparency and using change management processes to get kids along
• 51:38
  Speaker 4: for the ride to say, hey, things are not working,
• 51:41
  Speaker 4: we need to change them.
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: How do you want to be part of the solution.
• 51:45
  Speaker 3: But yeah, and I think and I'm doing this because
• 51:49
  Speaker 3: I love you and I care for you, and I
• 51:51
  Speaker 3: want you to have good mental health, you know, I
• 51:54
  Speaker 3: want you to grow up to be a good responsible
• 51:57
  Speaker 3: at that think.
• 51:58
  Speaker 1: I think that intention.
• 51:59
  Speaker 2: I say kids all the time. Yeah, I said to
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: kids all the time.
• 52:03
  Speaker 4: You know when your mum's nagging in you know that
• 52:05
  Speaker 4: nagging voice, and you can just feel it, nagnagnag. You
• 52:08
  Speaker 4: know what she's saying, right, And you know, we go
• 52:10
  Speaker 4: through this process and like what's going on there?
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: And they're like they will finally go oh.
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: Because she loves me.
• 52:17
  Speaker 4: Yeah, and it's like yeah, And when we're asking you
• 52:20
  Speaker 4: and we're anxious and maybe we're not, you know, giving
• 52:23
  Speaker 4: you options, it's because it's our job to protect you,
• 52:27
  Speaker 4: and we love you enough to protect you and to
• 52:30
  Speaker 4: do that, and you don't need to like us, and
• 52:32
  Speaker 4: that's totally okay. There are times where I don't like
• 52:36
  Speaker 4: my daughter. I love her, but I do not like
• 52:38
  Speaker 4: the behavior. Yeah, you know, so I think kind of
• 52:43
  Speaker 4: digging into some of those things can be really helpful.
• 52:46
  Speaker 4: And being really curious too about our kids. Being curious
• 52:50
  Speaker 4: not furious is like this thing. I should get paid
• 52:52
  Speaker 4: every time I say that. I don't know you originally
• 52:54
  Speaker 4: said it.
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: If it was, it's pretty cool.
• 52:57
  Speaker 2: Yeah, when we.
• 52:58
  Speaker 4: Choose connection over correction, we get a lot further with
• 53:03
  Speaker 4: young people, and because it is our job and we
• 53:06
  Speaker 4: go into protective you know, mama bear puppa their kind
• 53:09
  Speaker 4: of mode, but being able to be like I would
• 53:13
  Speaker 4: really like to understand how you made that choice or
• 53:16
  Speaker 4: what you're thinking when you're doing that, so that I
• 53:18
  Speaker 4: can then help you meet those needs. I think if
• 53:21
  Speaker 4: you've ever learned anything about self determination theory, yes, psychological
• 53:28
  Speaker 4: nutrients that I call the three c's, competence, connection, and control.
• 53:33
  Speaker 4: Understanding how they play into screen behavior is really really
• 53:37
  Speaker 4: important too. I've got a whole quick lesson that people
• 53:42
  Speaker 4: can get if they want to understand screens and psychological nutrients,
• 53:45
  Speaker 4: because that will then help you understand why it's so
• 53:48
  Speaker 4: alluring and how we can then build those psychological needs
• 53:52
  Speaker 4: outside of screens so that we can try and have
• 53:56
  Speaker 4: them met without all the dopamine hits and the toxic
• 53:59
  Speaker 4: algorithm and the anisphere.
• 54:00
  Speaker 3: And yeah, and I you know what, I need to
• 54:04
  Speaker 3: fess up on this because my wife said something similar
• 54:08
  Speaker 3: about be curious, not furious. It wasn't exactly that terminology,
• 54:12
  Speaker 3: but it was like, you know, I was coming in.
• 54:15
  Speaker 3: I was, I was, I.
• 54:16
  Speaker 1: Was like, you're spending too much time on this, blah
• 54:18
  Speaker 1: blah blah.
• 54:19
  Speaker 3: And she's like, why don't you sit down with Oscar
• 54:21
  Speaker 3: and just ask him why he likes these platforms and
• 54:25
  Speaker 3: try and understand what he does and then we can
• 54:28
  Speaker 3: work with them on that. And I did, and you know,
• 54:30
  Speaker 3: and as soon as she said, and I'm like, yeah, okay,
• 54:32
  Speaker 3: you need some autonomy in this and we need to
• 54:34
  Speaker 3: have that relatedness and.
• 54:36
  Speaker 1: And and it was really really helpful.
• 54:38
  Speaker 3: So I fully endorse being curious not furious, as a
• 54:43
  Speaker 3: reformed furious reactor to social media.
• 54:47
  Speaker 1: Right, and look, just this has been awesome.
• 54:52
  Speaker 3: And I got to say, I love the idea of
• 54:55
  Speaker 3: digital nutrition and how you've broken that down.
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: It's very very clever. Have you got a book on this?
• 55:02
  Speaker 1: I should you do that? You need to have a book.
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I need to have a book. I know.
• 55:08
  Speaker 4: I yeah, maybe one day I had the range of courses.
• 55:13
  Speaker 4: And look, I just feel like everything changes so quickly.
• 55:16
  Speaker 4: If I had written that book last year, it would
• 55:18
  Speaker 4: have been out of date. Almost a good point because
• 55:21
  Speaker 4: we're talking about AI chatbots and loneliness and yeah, kids
• 55:25
  Speaker 4: who are using that to develop deep friendships and never
• 55:28
  Speaker 4: have the friction of somebody you know, all the friendship problems. Yes,
• 55:33
  Speaker 4: if you have an AI chatbot friend who's just sick,
• 55:35
  Speaker 4: aphantic and agrees with everything, it really makes real life
• 55:39
  Speaker 4: friends who sometimes your friends and sometimes aren't. All the
• 55:44
  Speaker 4: friendship dramas go away.
• 55:45
  Speaker 3: So I tell you what, that is a really scary world,
• 55:51
  Speaker 3: these these chatbots, not only friendships, but relationship Since that,
• 55:56
  Speaker 3: I mean, wow, we're going into a dangerous vortex right there,
• 56:00
  Speaker 3: But that's probably a whole nother podcast.
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: Another podcast.
• 56:04
  Speaker 4: But parents should just be really really aware of that
• 56:06
  Speaker 4: because it is so common. It's something like half of
• 56:10
  Speaker 4: kids are using have used a chat what she took
• 56:13
  Speaker 4: to them about companionship and friendship stuff.
• 56:16
  Speaker 2: Wow, it's not.
• 56:17
  Speaker 4: Even like just chat to BT like can you do
• 56:19
  Speaker 4: my assignment for me? But this happened today? What should
• 56:23
  Speaker 4: I do? YEA, yeah, so that's my next big project.
• 56:28
  Speaker 4: But I do have lots of course, there's lots of
• 56:29
  Speaker 4: freebies on my website so people can dive in and
• 56:32
  Speaker 4: take a little bite.
• 56:33
  Speaker 3: And your website is Joscelyn Buwer sorry bro dot dot com,
• 56:40
  Speaker 3: which I will put the link into that and would
• 56:44
  Speaker 3: encourage every parent and you don't, I guess you don't
• 56:47
  Speaker 3: have to be a parent.
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: It's going in there and understanding.
• 56:51
  Speaker 2: Yourself, that's right. Like my market is literally anyone who picks.
• 56:54
  Speaker 4: Up a digital device and goes, what is this doing
• 56:57
  Speaker 4: to my brain?
• 56:59
  Speaker 1: That's my market and that's a pretty big market.
• 57:01
  Speaker 4: My business coach says, you should probably niche down, and
• 57:04
  Speaker 4: you know, my my niche under that is parents, but
• 57:08
  Speaker 4: really it's for any anyone who's curious about how their
• 57:11
  Speaker 4: their brain is being impacted by digital technologies, how our
• 57:14
  Speaker 4: society is right, it's waybey on the individual.
• 57:18
  Speaker 3: It is very important work and it's it's certainly certainly
• 57:22
  Speaker 3: a growth area that you're in. You're not going to
• 57:25
  Speaker 3: be out of a job with AI, that's for sure.
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: You're going to be the last.
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: Future proof.
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: Yeah. Absolutely, Just to thank for your time, This has
• 57:35
  Speaker 1: been awesome.
• 57:35
  Speaker 3: Yeah, we'll put all we'll put all the links in
• 57:37
  Speaker 3: there and your parents go and get on it.
• 57:41
  Speaker 1: Be parents, not friends.
• 57:43
  Speaker 2: Much appreciated. Thank you, bye for now,