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Essential Rules For Raising Kids In a High-tech World · Raising Daughters

• 0:03
  Speaker 1: Welcome to Raising Daughters, the podcast that helps parents learn
• 0:07
  Speaker 1: the best ways to support their daughters as they navigate
• 0:09
  Speaker 1: the high levels of stress, anxiety, pressure, and uncertainties so
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: pervasive in our culture today. Doctor Tim Jordan is a
• 0:16
  Speaker 1: developmental and behavioral pediatrician who has specialized in counseling girls
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: for over thirty years and shed's light on the realities
• 0:23
  Speaker 1: of today's young women in all facets of their lives.
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  Speaker 1: This is your opportunity to learn how to better support
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  Speaker 1: your daughters, making them feel safe, secure, and truly loved
• 0:33
  Speaker 1: in the midst of life's ups and downs. Here is
• 0:35
  Speaker 1: your host, Doctor Tim.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: Hey, friends, doctor Tim Jordan back here with a brand
• 0:48
  Speaker 2: new episode of Raising Daughters. As you know, I talk
• 0:52
  Speaker 2: about all kinds of different topics that relate to girls,
• 0:55
  Speaker 2: what's going on for girls today, parenting, how to successfully
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: launch your daughters. And I have a guest today that
• 1:04
  Speaker 2: I've been reading her her books, I've been reading her
• 1:08
  Speaker 2: articles for a long time, and she's got some very
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  Speaker 2: interesting things out and she has a new book that
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  Speaker 2: just came out less than a month ago. So I
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  Speaker 2: thought I would have her come on and talk to
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  Speaker 2: you about this topic which I know is on all
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  Speaker 2: of your minds. So welcome Gene. Is it tway or twenty?
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  Speaker 3: It's pronounced twenty like twenty guitar.
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  Speaker 2: I thought so, so Gene twangy and Gene is a
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  Speaker 2: psychologist and a professor of psychology at San Diego State University.
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  Speaker 2: She's the author of I believe it's eight books now
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  Speaker 2: or nine?
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  Speaker 3: Eight or nine you count textbooks, count.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: Text I would count textbooks. The first book I read
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  Speaker 2: of hers was called I Is called Eegen came out
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: in twenty seventeen. And she has another book that came
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  Speaker 2: out called Narcissism Epidemic, and another one called Generations. And
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  Speaker 2: I've read lots and lots of her articles, including one
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  Speaker 2: just came out I think this past week about how much,
• 2:03
  Speaker 2: how much or how little FaceTime people have these days
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  Speaker 2: and talking to each other, including young people, which we
• 2:10
  Speaker 2: can we can touch on as we go along. But
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  Speaker 2: today we want to talk about her brand new book,
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  Speaker 2: which is Ten Rules for Raising Kids in a High
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  Speaker 2: Tech World. How parents can stop smartphones, social media, and
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  Speaker 2: gaming from taking over their children's lives. And that is
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  Speaker 2: a hot topic if I've ever heard one. So thank
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  Speaker 2: you so much for coming.
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  Speaker 3: On you're very welcome.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, you know, it's interesting how this may sound harsh,
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  Speaker 2: but it feels like parents have given their power away
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  Speaker 2: to kids when it comes to things like phones and
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  Speaker 2: video games and all those kinds of things and social media.
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  Speaker 2: And I wonder if if you would agree with that.
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  Speaker 3: I think so, and I think it. You know, I
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  Speaker 3: always want to acknowledge right from the beginning that you know,
• 2:53
  Speaker 3: parents are a really tough physician these days, because these
• 2:56
  Speaker 3: technologies are so pervasive. Their hits used laptops to do homework,
• 3:04
  Speaker 3: sometimes they even use their phones to do homework. That
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  Speaker 3: there's a lot of social pressure to be on social media,
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  Speaker 3: and that these technologies are so unregulated. But with all
• 3:14
  Speaker 3: of that said, I firmly believe there are things parents
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  Speaker 3: can do, and sometimes it is going to mean standing
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  Speaker 3: your ground and maybe fighting with your kids, which parents
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  Speaker 3: never liked to do, but modern parents especially hate it.
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  Speaker 3: And so I think because of that, a lot of
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  Speaker 3: times it has felt like the easier way to just
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  Speaker 3: not fight with your kids about their technology use when
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  Speaker 3: you probably should. Is what I have found out, both
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  Speaker 3: through research and through my own personal experience as the
• 3:45
  Speaker 3: mother of three daughters.
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  Speaker 2: One of the reasons why I also wanted join the show.
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  Speaker 2: I saw you had three daughters. I thought, Okay, she's
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  Speaker 2: perfect for this. Proc. You know, we've wrestled with this,
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: this whole issue about is using phones, smartphones, social media?
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  Speaker 2: Is it causing a lot of these mental health problems
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  Speaker 2: and girls today? Is it just associated? But we've come
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  Speaker 2: a long way with the research, So tell us where
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  Speaker 2: we're at today with that question.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, So where we are today is that the totality
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  Speaker 3: of the evidence and you take it all together, really
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  Speaker 3: does point toward causation. So social media in particular, but
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  Speaker 3: you know online time, smartphones overall as well being linked
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  Speaker 3: to mental health issues. So you know, I don't know
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  Speaker 3: how in depth you want to get on the research,
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  Speaker 3: but I usually look at the huge increases in teen
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  Speaker 3: depression over time, the associations between spending a lot of
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  Speaker 3: time on social media and mental health. So the more
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  Speaker 3: hours a day team spends on social media, the more
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  Speaker 3: likely it is that she'll be depressed. Longitudinal studies point
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  Speaker 3: in that direction too, and we have more and more
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  Speaker 3: experimental studies too that randomly assign people to give up
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  Speaker 3: or cut back on social media and find that they're
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  Speaker 3: less anxious and less depressed after especially three or four weeks.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, you mentioned it must have been in the book,
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  Speaker 2: so that when girls are on social media, they end
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  Speaker 2: up comparing themselves a lot, and the end of experiencing
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  Speaker 2: what you call a grief cycle.
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  Speaker 3: That that's actually what Meta calls it. Oh, that was
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  Speaker 3: Meta's own internal research on Instagram. That was the conclusion
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  Speaker 3: that their researchers came to themselves, which is even more
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  Speaker 3: stunning when you think about it. Yeah, that's what they found.
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  Speaker 3: They did a bunch of focus groups and survey research
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  Speaker 3: with teen girls and young women, and they said, yes,
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  Speaker 3: there's that social comparison, especially to the perfect bodies on Instagram,
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  Speaker 3: and then there's the lower self esteem and the just
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  Speaker 3: the idea you can't you can't compare and could you
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  Speaker 3: ever look like that? And then with the realization of no,
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  Speaker 3: then there's debt. That's what they called the grief spiral.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, when parents with these retreats this past weekend, I
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  Speaker 2: was telling you briefly about I was with some a
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  Speaker 2: total of fifty four dads and their sons and daughters
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  Speaker 2: who are all about age seven to ten, and so
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  Speaker 2: they're all asking about phones and social media and what
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: age and all those kinds of things. And so my
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: wife a while back came up with a list of
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: readiness signs to look for. We can talk about an age,
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  Speaker 2: because you talk about that age in your book, but
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: we tell parents that there's a lot of things that
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: need to be in place. Your kids need to have
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  Speaker 2: a certain level of maturity, certain level of emotional security,
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  Speaker 2: social security, all those kinds of things. And I guess
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  Speaker 2: our feeling after working with girls in our cams, retreats,
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  Speaker 2: my counselor all those things for years, is that they're
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  Speaker 2: just not ready. Most girls are just not ready to
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  Speaker 2: be able to handle like those images you're talking about
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  Speaker 2: that met and meta described as the grief cycles. Is
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  Speaker 2: it not ready for us that that it's a bad
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  Speaker 2: or good things? Are they ready to really be able
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  Speaker 2: to handle it?
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  Speaker 3: Right? And not just that, but the competition for likes
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  Speaker 3: and followers, the huge time saying where the algorithms are?
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  Speaker 3: You know, they pour billions into these algorithms to make
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  Speaker 3: sure people are spending as much time as possible on
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  Speaker 3: the app and coming back as often as possible. I mean,
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  Speaker 3: there's so many challenges and we've just kind of talked
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  Speaker 3: about the tip of the iceberg there. And I love
• 7:19
  Speaker 3: the idea of the readiness list. I think it should
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  Speaker 3: be that you know, plus something with age. So in
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  Speaker 3: ten rules, what I recommend is that boys and girls
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  Speaker 3: should not be on social media before they're at least
• 7:33
  Speaker 3: sixteen years old, and maybe even put it off until later.
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  Speaker 3: You can make a pretty solid argument for eighteen being
• 7:39
  Speaker 3: the minimum them as well.
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  Speaker 2: So I'm imagining people who are walking around listening to
• 7:44
  Speaker 2: this podcast gasping right now because they gave their daughter
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  Speaker 2: a smartphone when she was eight or ten or twelve,
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  Speaker 2: and they've been on social media. And what a lot
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: of parents will say is, well, it's hard to put
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  Speaker 2: the genie back in the ball, right.
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  Speaker 3: I hear that all the time.
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  Speaker 2: I heard that once, like you like a million times.
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  Speaker 2: So how do you respond to the genie genie question?
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  Speaker 3: Of course you could. You can. You can put the
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  Speaker 3: genie back in the bottle. You're the parent. Yeah, I mean,
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  Speaker 3: it's really I think I think it's really that simple.
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  Speaker 3: And look, if we're talking about a fifteen and a
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  Speaker 3: half year old who spends an hour a day on
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  Speaker 3: various social media apps and they don't seem to be
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  Speaker 3: having negati effects. That's a different conversation if we're talking
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  Speaker 3: about a twelve year old. No, they should not be
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  Speaker 3: on social media at all, period. Take it away.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, we're talking with Gene Twangy. She's the author of
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: a new book called Ten Rules for Raising Kids in
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  Speaker 2: a High Tech World. How parents can stop smartphones, social media,
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: and gaming from taking over their children's lives. Yeah. One
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  Speaker 2: of the things that I've noticed is that when when
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: parents are in my especially in my counseling practice, and
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  Speaker 2: they're asking about phones and social media, one of the
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  Speaker 2: things that they worry about, even oftentimes more than their
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  Speaker 2: daughter sometimes is, well, is my daughter going to lose
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  Speaker 2: all of her friends and she can to be socially
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  Speaker 2: she's not going to have any friends If she hasn't
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  Speaker 2: everybody else has one. And how do you answer that concern?
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  Speaker 2: Because I think that's probably a pretty common one.
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  Speaker 3: It is a common one, but it's a complete myth
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  Speaker 3: that teens have to have social media to communicate with
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  Speaker 3: each other. Of course they don't. They can text each other,
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  Speaker 3: they can call each other on the phone or you FaceTime,
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  Speaker 3: they can see each other in person. So my eighteen
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  Speaker 3: year old daughter said something recently I thought was really
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  Speaker 3: really fessent on her part. She said, anyone who won't
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  Speaker 3: communicate with you just because you're not on a certain
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  Speaker 3: platform or app is not really your friend. And I
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  Speaker 3: think that's just so, it's so true. So yeah, if
• 9:42
  Speaker 3: you know, think about if you have if your daughters,
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  Speaker 3: say thirteen fourteen, you do not want her on Snapchat
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  Speaker 3: and a lot of her friends are on Snapchat. And
• 9:51
  Speaker 3: she comes to you and says, hey, you know everybody
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  Speaker 3: else is on Snapchat and being left out. So what
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  Speaker 3: you say is I get that, but I don't want
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  Speaker 3: you on Snapchat. Why don't you talk to you and
• 10:00
  Speaker 3: start with your best friend, talk about how we can
• 10:03
  Speaker 3: maybe move that conversation to another place. And I've had
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  Speaker 3: this very same conversation with my now fifteen year old,
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  Speaker 3: and I'll say, look, you can blame me, throw me
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  Speaker 3: under the bus. I don't care. Say my mom is
• 10:17
  Speaker 3: mean me and mom's the best. By the way, my
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  Speaker 3: mom is mean and will not let me on Snapchat?
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  Speaker 3: Can we have a group text instead?
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  Speaker 2: Yeah?
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  Speaker 3: You know.
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  Speaker 2: I interviewed three young women. Oh, I guess it was
• 10:32
  Speaker 2: in May or June. They just faced their first year
• 10:35
  Speaker 2: of college and they're they're some of my camp counselors.
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  Speaker 2: I've known them for years, and they're really mature, emotionally
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  Speaker 2: mature young young people. But one of the things that
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: they described was how hard it was to meet people
• 10:51
  Speaker 2: at college because they said people are walking around with
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: the phone in their face constantly. They walk around campus
• 10:59
  Speaker 2: with the phone their face. They give going to class,
• 11:01
  Speaker 2: everybody's sitting at their looking at their phone. Classes over,
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  Speaker 2: they get up, they put the phone back in their face,
• 11:06
  Speaker 2: and even described to me that a lot of their
• 11:08
  Speaker 2: friends find their dating partners on apps. I said, look,
• 11:13
  Speaker 2: there's twenty five thousand people that you're stating.
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  Speaker 3: University, most of whom were close to your age, right.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, But they said because people and they also say
• 11:22
  Speaker 2: they say people my age are so socially awkward. I
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  Speaker 2: wonder if you found that also with your research.
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  Speaker 3: I hear that everywhere I go, and look, there's clearly
• 11:35
  Speaker 3: exceptions to that, but that seems like a pretty noticeable average.
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  Speaker 3: Shift managers tell me this all the time about their
• 11:44
  Speaker 3: young employees, so even even when they're you know, they're
• 11:46
  Speaker 3: graduating from from from college saying they'll say, I'm surprised
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  Speaker 3: at how many will not look me in the eye,
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  Speaker 3: and they don't have the social skills we need them
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  Speaker 3: to have. And this is not at all surprising because
• 11:57
  Speaker 3: it's not just the phone and the district action of
• 12:00
  Speaker 3: the phone. It's the teens and young adults spend a
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  Speaker 3: lot less time with each other face to face socializing
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  Speaker 3: than they used to. And we've got, you know, really
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  Speaker 3: solid hard data on this. It's not just an observation,
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  Speaker 3: it really is true. It's been cut basically in half
• 12:18
  Speaker 3: the amount of time that they're they're spending with other
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  Speaker 3: people face to face. So thus it's really not surprising
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  Speaker 3: that social skills are suffering.
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  Speaker 2: Yeah, right, I just read an article, was it last week?
• 12:31
  Speaker 2: And you get an article and I think it was
• 12:32
  Speaker 2: in substack. Maybe it came out about your data over time.
• 12:36
  Speaker 2: I love your article. Is there's so much really good data.
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  Speaker 2: This one didn't just show young people, it showed adults,
• 12:42
  Speaker 2: people of all ages, and the lines how they all
• 12:45
  Speaker 2: kind of came down in the last twenty thirty or
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  Speaker 2: so years.
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  Speaker 3: Yeah, and well before the pandemic, So it wasn't just
• 12:53
  Speaker 3: you know, everything was fine and then the pandemic hit
• 12:55
  Speaker 3: and then it wasn't those things have been declining since
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  Speaker 3: about twenty twelve, which is a turning point, you know,
• 13:01
  Speaker 3: in a lot of the data sets. And yeah, that
• 13:03
  Speaker 3: particular one was interesting to me on a bunch of levels.
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  Speaker 3: So one was that the decline is by far the
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  Speaker 3: largest among teens and young adults. You do see a
• 13:11
  Speaker 3: decline and in person socializing among older people too, so you know,
• 13:15
  Speaker 3: prime aged adults as well as older adults, but it's
• 13:18
  Speaker 3: not even close to the size that it is for
• 13:21
  Speaker 3: young people. You know, it really shows the age of
• 13:23
  Speaker 3: the smartphone had an effect on all of us, but
• 13:25
  Speaker 3: I had by far the biggest effect on teens and
• 13:27
  Speaker 3: young adults.
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  Speaker 2: So gen Z, we're talking with Gene Twangy. She's the
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: author of a brand new book that just came out
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: a few weeks ago called Ten Rules for Raising Kids
• 13:37
  Speaker 2: in a High Tech World. How parents can stop smartphone,
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: social media and gaming from taking over their children's lives.
• 13:43
  Speaker 2: And one of the things that I often think about
• 13:45
  Speaker 2: is it's not just the time that they're spending on
• 13:50
  Speaker 2: gaming and social media those things. It's also I think
• 13:54
  Speaker 2: maybe a more important question is what are they not
• 13:56
  Speaker 2: doing because they're spending four to five or six to
• 13:59
  Speaker 2: seven eight hours on devices.
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  Speaker 3: Yep. So we just talked about one of the things
• 14:06
  Speaker 3: that they're not doing as much, just they're not socializing
• 14:08
  Speaker 3: with friends in person as much. And the other thing
• 14:11
  Speaker 3: they're not doing as much is not sleeping as much. Yeah,
• 14:14
  Speaker 3: so technology also interferes with sleep. So I say in
• 14:19
  Speaker 3: the book, if you can follow only one of the rules,
• 14:22
  Speaker 3: have it be no devices in the bedroom overnight. And
• 14:27
  Speaker 3: what I love about that rules it's not just for kids,
• 14:29
  Speaker 3: it's also for parents. Tons of research shows that people
• 14:34
  Speaker 3: do not sleep as well or as long if the
• 14:37
  Speaker 3: phone is in the bedroom, even if it's off, even
• 14:39
  Speaker 3: if it's on, do not disturb. And the pushback I
• 14:42
  Speaker 3: usually get is, well, I have to have my phone
• 14:44
  Speaker 3: in my bedroom overnight because it's my alarm clock, to
• 14:48
  Speaker 3: which I say, I have some advice for you. Buy
• 14:50
  Speaker 3: an alarm clock. You can buy it on Amazon on
• 14:53
  Speaker 3: your phone, and then put your phone away and get
• 14:55
  Speaker 3: a good night sleep.
• 14:57
  Speaker 2: There's a positive use of their phone right ordering things
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: on Amazon, which is another addiction. I think that we
• 15:04
  Speaker 2: could talk about another day, perhaps, you know. I think
• 15:07
  Speaker 2: the other thing I also I read your book was
• 15:12
  Speaker 2: that I think we talked a lot about social media
• 15:14
  Speaker 2: and we don't give enough energy. Are talking about other
• 15:19
  Speaker 2: forms of distraction, like gaming, it's more so a boy
• 15:24
  Speaker 2: thing than girl thing, but there's all kinds of things
• 15:27
  Speaker 2: online that distracts our kids.
• 15:30
  Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, and yeah it is. It is true boys
• 15:34
  Speaker 3: spend more time gaming than girls. But there's a lot
• 15:38
  Speaker 3: of games that have become popular with girls too. Minecraft
• 15:42
  Speaker 3: and Roldblocks come to mind. Also phone games, so like
• 15:46
  Speaker 3: the classic one is Candy Crush, but now it's Block
• 15:49
  Speaker 3: Blast and Find the Cat, you know, and there's all
• 15:52
  Speaker 3: of these things on phones, and again, you know, those
• 15:56
  Speaker 3: are designed to be as engaging as possible. So the
• 16:01
  Speaker 3: thing about a lot of the games like Winecraft and
• 16:04
  Speaker 3: Roadblocks is that kids will play them together in real time,
• 16:08
  Speaker 3: so they are hanging out with their friends virtually in
• 16:11
  Speaker 3: those games, right, So they're a little bit harder, you know,
• 16:14
  Speaker 3: to say an absolute no to you than a lot
• 16:17
  Speaker 3: of social media, which is just obviously more toxic, is
• 16:20
  Speaker 3: usually not in real time, tends to be more performative.
• 16:23
  Speaker 3: But I think gaming still has to have time limits.
• 16:26
  Speaker 3: So the idea of oh, they're with their friends, it's fine,
• 16:29
  Speaker 3: Well not if they're doing that for hours and hours
• 16:31
  Speaker 3: and hours a day. And it's crowding on time for
• 16:33
  Speaker 3: sleep and getting together with friends in person and so on.
• 16:36
  Speaker 3: So sure, if they want to interact with their friends
• 16:39
  Speaker 3: that way, okay, but put a time limit on it.
• 16:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you might tell pairs. Sometimes. I feel in some
• 16:46
  Speaker 2: ways I feel sorry for this generation because I'm older
• 16:50
  Speaker 2: than you. But in my generation, we were really out
• 16:53
  Speaker 2: and about. And we say that, but I think it
• 16:55
  Speaker 2: was true. You know, you talk to people who are
• 16:57
  Speaker 2: parents are grandparents. Both in our day and age, we
• 17:01
  Speaker 2: were out and about. We hung out down the street,
• 17:04
  Speaker 2: hung out in the woods, you hung out at skating rinks,
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: you hung out at all kinds of places. And we
• 17:08
  Speaker 2: were allowed to and our parents we left, and our
• 17:10
  Speaker 2: parents didn't know where we were, and so we had
• 17:12
  Speaker 2: a lot of geographic freedom, if you will. And I
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: think in the last since the mid eighties, when the
• 17:17
  Speaker 2: stranger danger started being talked about, we've shrunken kids geographic freedom.
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: We've also kept them uber busy, so that kids would say,
• 17:25
  Speaker 2: if I go outside on the weekends on my street,
• 17:28
  Speaker 2: there's nobody there because their parents are worried if they
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: go outside they'll get kidnapped, or even more so, they're
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: in a tournament, they're out of town, they're at practice,
• 17:36
  Speaker 2: they're at a game. So I think in some ways
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: we've sort of forced them to hang out on their devices.
• 17:43
  Speaker 3: Right, So that's another big problem. That's another big generational
• 17:47
  Speaker 3: chef that I documented. And then in this book, one
• 17:50
  Speaker 3: of the rules talks about giving your kids real world freedom.
• 17:53
  Speaker 3: We really up to shift to social norm on that.
• 17:57
  Speaker 3: And yes, it is safe. It is safe to have
• 18:00
  Speaker 3: your kid play in your front yard. It is safe
• 18:02
  Speaker 3: for your kid to go into the grocery store by themselves,
• 18:05
  Speaker 3: or you know, when they're younger, when you're with them,
• 18:08
  Speaker 3: have them go in aisle or two down. This extreme
• 18:13
  Speaker 3: fear of kidnapping is really really out of step with
• 18:16
  Speaker 3: just how thankfully, extremely vanishingly where that actually is.
• 18:22
  Speaker 2: Yeah, again, we're talking to Gene Twangy. She wrote a
• 18:26
  Speaker 2: book that came out about three weeks ago, I think,
• 18:28
  Speaker 2: called Ten Rules for Raising Kids in a High Tech World.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: How parents can stop smartphone, social media and gaming from
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: taking over their children's lives. You know, one of the
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: things that gives me hope is that when kids come
• 18:40
  Speaker 2: to my weekend retreats, when they come to my week
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: long summer camps, there's no electronics, there's no phones, there's
• 18:45
  Speaker 2: no watch things, there's none of that stuff, which is
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: probably true for a lot of camps, I think. And
• 18:50
  Speaker 2: at first, kind of like you said before, at the
• 18:53
  Speaker 2: check in table, we say where's your you know, where's
• 18:55
  Speaker 2: your phone? And they're like, I I needed for my
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: alarm clock, I needed for music to follow. They have
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: all these things like there's a counsel in your cabin,
• 19:03
  Speaker 2: she'll wake you up, all this, but the truth is
• 19:08
  Speaker 2: that within hours the first day, they don't care anymore
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: because they're playing yeah fun, They're talking there, that's right exactly.
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: And after dinner actually having conversations. We walked down to
• 19:20
  Speaker 2: the lake and we're talking. We're not like we have
• 19:22
  Speaker 2: a phone in our face. And at the other week,
• 19:24
  Speaker 2: when I ask girls, even high school girls, did you
• 19:26
  Speaker 2: miss your phone, they all say emphatically, it was awesome.
• 19:30
  Speaker 2: It was a great.
• 19:31
  Speaker 3: It was nice to have a break, and I didn't
• 19:33
  Speaker 3: miss my phone. I hear that story everywhere I go
• 19:36
  Speaker 3: for people go to camp or you know, other experiences
• 19:39
  Speaker 3: where kids have to give up their phones. I hear
• 19:40
  Speaker 3: it all the time.
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: Yeah, you talk, You have ten rules for raising kids
• 19:48
  Speaker 2: in a high tech, digital kind of world, and one
• 19:51
  Speaker 2: of them is no social media until sixteen, at least sixteen,
• 19:55
  Speaker 2: And you're very clear you have a not allow list.
• 19:58
  Speaker 2: On that list of not allow is Instagram, TikTok, snapchat,
• 20:03
  Speaker 2: and discord and even the YouTube videos, which which are
• 20:05
  Speaker 2: very addicting. So you're very clear about all those things.
• 20:11
  Speaker 3: Are. YouTube is on the maybe list. To be fair,
• 20:14
  Speaker 3: which one YouTube is on the maybe list?
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: Maybe? Oh, sorry, on the maybe list. Okay, So but
• 20:21
  Speaker 2: you're very clear about that. I think it's good, I
• 20:24
  Speaker 2: think for clarity because I think there's a lot of misinformation.
• 20:27
  Speaker 2: There's a lot of stuff that comes out. It's okay,
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: it's not okay, it's an association all these kinds of things.
• 20:31
  Speaker 2: So it's very clear to have some some boundaries and
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: some guidelines to say this is.
• 20:36
  Speaker 3: Why, yeah, and that you know. That really was my
• 20:40
  Speaker 3: my biggest goal in this book was to make it
• 20:42
  Speaker 3: easier for parents, because parents have a really tough job
• 20:44
  Speaker 3: on the overall. But I think especially these days in
• 20:47
  Speaker 3: managing technology use and just as a parent myself, I
• 20:53
  Speaker 3: got really frustrated with rules that seem kind of squishy
• 20:57
  Speaker 3: or guidelines that were like it depends yeah, and it's easier.
• 21:01
  Speaker 3: It's actually easier to have really concrete guidance, really concrete rules.
• 21:06
  Speaker 3: It's easier to enforce, it's easier to keep it straight
• 21:09
  Speaker 3: in your head, just especially you have multiple kids and
• 21:12
  Speaker 3: you have one rule that's it and it's not. Oh
• 21:15
  Speaker 3: but my sister had it. Oh well, she was more mature,
• 21:17
  Speaker 3: Like you really want to have that argument with your
• 21:19
  Speaker 3: team you don't, so have the rule in place, and
• 21:23
  Speaker 3: it being age based just makes the most sense. We
• 21:26
  Speaker 3: age gate lots of things in our society. You know,
• 21:30
  Speaker 3: gets in most states drive at sixteen, and the drinking
• 21:34
  Speaker 3: age in the US is twenty one, and you vote
• 21:37
  Speaker 3: and have legal adulthood at eighteen. You know, we picked
• 21:40
  Speaker 3: at age and we stuck with it, and we should
• 21:42
  Speaker 3: do the same thing with technology.
• 21:45
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I had a woman on well maybe a year ago.
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: She's another substackt writer. Her name is Gabriella Wynn. I'm
• 21:52
  Speaker 2: not sure if you've ever writ her things. She's I
• 21:55
  Speaker 2: think she's a grad student at Harvard or something. She'd
• 21:57
  Speaker 2: create an app program called Abstinence, which which kind of
• 22:02
  Speaker 2: gives parents young people some ideas about how to sort
• 22:06
  Speaker 2: of wean yourself off if you've if you've become addicted,
• 22:09
  Speaker 2: and what you can do instead to kind of keep
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: up your social life. You don't end up being some
• 22:14
  Speaker 2: lonely loser somewhere. M sure if you're familiar with her.
• 22:17
  Speaker 3: For her work, Yeah, I've read a couple of her articles,
• 22:20
  Speaker 3: and I think that's great. I mean, so it's great
• 22:22
  Speaker 3: for a number of reasons. First, just there are so
• 22:27
  Speaker 3: many young adults who are advocating for this now and
• 22:31
  Speaker 3: they grew up with these technologies. It's that's what we need.
• 22:35
  Speaker 3: We need more gen z. You know, young adults talking
• 22:38
  Speaker 3: about their experiences is talking about ways to cut back.
• 22:42
  Speaker 3: So I think that's great, you know, cut back on
• 22:44
  Speaker 3: social media. And then there's other authors who've written about
• 22:48
  Speaker 3: this too. So there is a book called How to
• 22:51
  Speaker 3: Break Up with Your Phone by Catherine Price that I'll
• 22:54
  Speaker 3: always recommend to you that it's written for adults. But
• 22:59
  Speaker 3: the you know, the basic idea is, hey, you know,
• 23:02
  Speaker 3: there are uses for these technologies, but we're letting it
• 23:06
  Speaker 3: overwhelm our lives. And that's especially true for kids.
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: Yeah. Yeah, you two quick things if you have, if
• 23:14
  Speaker 2: you have just a moment. One of them is there's
• 23:17
  Speaker 2: been a big movement Jonathan Height's book, maybe, but one
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: of the impetus is for this, but also people like
• 23:23
  Speaker 2: you who have been writing about this for a long time,
• 23:25
  Speaker 2: the effects of social media and smartphones and everything advocating
• 23:29
  Speaker 2: for no phones at school. I think I hear more
• 23:33
  Speaker 2: and more kids saying that their schools are going along
• 23:35
  Speaker 2: with them. Just wondering where you where you stand. I'm assuming,
• 23:38
  Speaker 2: actually it's one of your things in your book.
• 23:40
  Speaker 3: I think it is. It's Real ten.
• 23:41
  Speaker 2: Yeah, so totally why it's an important rule for you.
• 23:45
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so the Real ten is advocating for no phones
• 23:49
  Speaker 3: during the school day bell to bell. Of course that's
• 23:50
  Speaker 3: not directly under most parents control. But the more more
• 23:54
  Speaker 3: parents you speak out about this, the more the norm changes,
• 23:57
  Speaker 3: and it has started to shift. So it's common in
• 24:01
  Speaker 3: a lot of schools to have rules that again they're
• 24:04
  Speaker 3: squishy rules, so they're harder to enforce their piecemeal but
• 24:08
  Speaker 3: no phones during the school day bell to bell, like
• 24:11
  Speaker 3: a lot of the other rules, a lot easier to enforce.
• 24:13
  Speaker 3: It's clear, and then it's not just classroom by classrooms classrooms,
• 24:18
  Speaker 3: So the cool teacher lets you use your phone, and
• 24:20
  Speaker 3: then the mean teacher doesn't. I mean, seriously, this is
• 24:22
  Speaker 3: what teachers are dealing with these days. It's horrible. And
• 24:25
  Speaker 3: then okay, maybe you can get it out during lunch.
• 24:28
  Speaker 3: Well this didn't. We still have problems because then again
• 24:31
  Speaker 3: they're not developing the social skills. They're not talking to
• 24:33
  Speaker 3: each other at lunch because they're on their phones. And
• 24:35
  Speaker 3: it also opens up the possibility, which I know from
• 24:38
  Speaker 3: my own kids happens is the kids like I got
• 24:41
  Speaker 3: to go to the bathroom, and then they go the bathroom,
• 24:42
  Speaker 3: they're on their phone for half an hour or more.
• 24:45
  Speaker 3: So you know, the no phones bell de bell really
• 24:48
  Speaker 3: does make the most sense. It's actually the easiest to
• 24:51
  Speaker 3: enforce during that whole time that phone is physically in
• 24:55
  Speaker 3: another location ideally or maybe in a locked pouch.
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: Kind of data that shows for kids and adults that
• 25:03
  Speaker 2: just having a phone, you know, around dumbs people down.
• 25:07
  Speaker 2: Even having a phone in your pocket dumbs down the
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: conversation it.
• 25:10
  Speaker 3: Is, especially it's been buzzing, you know, and then you're like,
• 25:13
  Speaker 3: what wait, what is that? What is that? Yeah?
• 25:16
  Speaker 2: People end up multitasking and then there are everything you
• 25:19
  Speaker 2: can't do.
• 25:20
  Speaker 3: The human brain cannot actually multitask, right.
• 25:23
  Speaker 2: I'm curious as we as we end this conversation with
• 25:26
  Speaker 2: with Geene Twangy, who is the author of a new
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: book called Ten Rules for Raising Kids in a High
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: Tech World, How parents can stop smartphone, social media and
• 25:35
  Speaker 2: gaining from taking over the children's lives. I'm wondering because
• 25:38
  Speaker 2: you have I think I've read somewhere on your site
• 25:40
  Speaker 2: you have a database of like forty three million people
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: or something of that sort. Am I Did I read
• 25:45
  Speaker 2: that correctly?
• 25:47
  Speaker 3: Yeah, So that's just that's based on the large data
• 25:50
  Speaker 3: sets that I analyze, almost all of which are publicly available.
• 25:55
  Speaker 3: So it's just lots and lots of survey data and
• 25:59
  Speaker 3: you can, in most cases, you know, download the statistical
• 26:02
  Speaker 3: file and analyze it, which is what I've spent my
• 26:04
  Speaker 3: career doing.
• 26:06
  Speaker 2: And so you've been inundated with all the negative effects
• 26:09
  Speaker 2: of all these things, and the slippery slopes the kids
• 26:11
  Speaker 2: are are on with all this. So I'm wondering with
• 26:14
  Speaker 2: all of that, what gives you hope?
• 26:17
  Speaker 3: A number of things. So, first that there has been
• 26:20
  Speaker 3: that progress with no phones during the school day, bell
• 26:23
  Speaker 3: to bell, and I hope to continue to see that
• 26:26
  Speaker 3: young adults speaking out about their experiences and advocating for
• 26:30
  Speaker 3: cutting back on technology and more regulation in this area.
• 26:34
  Speaker 3: Australia passing the law that sixteen is going to be
• 26:39
  Speaker 3: the minimum age for social media and they're actually going
• 26:41
  Speaker 3: to verify age. So that's fantastic. And also just every
• 26:47
  Speaker 3: time I speak to parents of that, we're all we're
• 26:53
  Speaker 3: realizing now that we're in this together and that even
• 26:56
  Speaker 3: though it's hard, there are things that we can do
• 26:59
  Speaker 3: and that it is possible and to help our kids. Yes,
• 27:04
  Speaker 3: eventually use technology, but not too soon and not too much.
• 27:08
  Speaker 2: Yeah, and when they're ready, and.
• 27:10
  Speaker 3: Which is when they're ready, which is.
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: Nebulous, but it's not if you have some if you
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: have an age and you have criteria. I think I
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: think the kids need to earn it. It's not like
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: you get it because you exist to because we're afraid
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: you won't make friends. It's because you've shown us over
• 27:24
  Speaker 2: a long period of time that you're ready for it.
• 27:26
  Speaker 2: Just like you don't get let every kid drive a
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: car at sixteen. Every kid's not ready to go off
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: to college at eighteen. You have to kind of show
• 27:32
  Speaker 2: us over time that you're you're ready for it. That's right, Well,
• 27:36
  Speaker 2: how can people find you? What's the best way and
• 27:38
  Speaker 2: your new book.
• 27:40
  Speaker 3: Yeah, so the book is available as far as I
• 27:42
  Speaker 3: know everywhere books are sold. And if you want to
• 27:45
  Speaker 3: find out more about about me and my speaking engagements
• 27:48
  Speaker 3: and books, my website is Gene Twangy dot com so
• 27:52
  Speaker 3: j E A n T W E n g E
• 27:56
  Speaker 3: dot com. And I know people don't want to memorize that,
• 27:59
  Speaker 3: so you you'll give a link, I hope.
• 28:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah. As always, Yeah, I'll have links to for Gene
• 28:05
  Speaker 2: Twangi's the book and also for her website in my
• 28:08
  Speaker 2: show notes. So make sure those you who are driving
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: around are walking around don't get an accident trying to
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: trying to write down there and do not want that. Yeah.
• 28:16
  Speaker 2: Any final thought to offer to parents about rules for
• 28:21
  Speaker 2: raising kids in this tech world.
• 28:24
  Speaker 3: So an aphorism that I really like that I repeat
• 28:26
  Speaker 3: a couple of times in the book is don't let
• 28:28
  Speaker 3: the perfect be the enemy of the good. You're not
• 28:31
  Speaker 3: gonna be able to do it perfectly all the time.
• 28:33
  Speaker 3: No parent, no kid is perfect. But do as much
• 28:36
  Speaker 3: as you can to put off technology and limit it
• 28:39
  Speaker 3: and you'll see benefits.
• 28:41
  Speaker 2: Thank you so much for being on raising daughters. I
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: really appreciate your work that you've been doing for a
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: long time. Especially. It's a great book, easy to read,
• 28:49
  Speaker 2: it's very clear cut. It will give you lots of
• 28:52
  Speaker 2: good ideas about phones and how to manage those and
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: in your homes with your children. So thanks so much
• 28:58
  Speaker 2: for offering all that today.
• 29:00
  Speaker 3: You're very welcome. Thanks for having me on.
• 29:06
  Speaker 2: Well, that was interesting. I would definitely recommend that book,
• 29:09
  Speaker 2: Ten Rules for Raising Kids in the High Tech World.
• 29:13
  Speaker 2: I'll put that link in the podcast in my show notes. Also,
• 29:16
  Speaker 2: I'll put the link for a couple of podcasts I've
• 29:20
  Speaker 2: done in the last year or so interviewing people who
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: have written books about this issue, about smartphones and social
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: media and readiness and all that kind of thing, just
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: so you have that as well for some of you
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: who haven't heard those before. As always, i'll be back
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: here in a week with a brand new podcast again.
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: The book was is Ten Rules for Raising Kids in
• 29:41
  Speaker 2: a High Tech World. How parents can stop smartphones, social
• 29:45
  Speaker 2: media and gaming from taking over their children's lives, by
• 29:49
  Speaker 2: Gene Twainy twe N G E. Hope you enjoy it,
• 29:53
  Speaker 2: pass it on to your friends. If you ever have questions,
• 29:58
  Speaker 2: email me through my wife's email and a N N E.
• 30:02
  Speaker 2: At d r Tim Jordan dot com or if you
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: have ideas for a future podcasts. I'm always open to
• 30:10
  Speaker 2: what's what's interesting you, what's interesting to you all out there,
• 30:13
  Speaker 2: and the kinds of things that you have questions about.
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: Please email and and I'll use those topics for future podcasts.
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: I'll be back here in a week with a brand
• 30:23
  Speaker 2: new podcast. Thanks so much for stopping by.
• 30:33
  Speaker 1: Thank you for tuning in to this episode of Raising Daughters.
• 30:36
  Speaker 1: Hopefully you've learned something useful about girls and young women
• 30:40
  Speaker 1: and how to help them navigate the pressures, challenges, and
• 30:42
  Speaker 1: opportunities of modern life. If you want to become a
• 30:45
  Speaker 1: more effective parent, keep listening to the show at doctor
• 30:49
  Speaker 1: Tim Jordan dot com and let the conversations shape you.
• 30:52
  Speaker 1: Build that one of a kind connection with your daughters
• 30:55
  Speaker 1: in the most profound and meaningful ways possible, shaping them
• 30:58
  Speaker 1: into strong, confident women of the future. That's all for now,
• 31:02
  Speaker 1: see you next week for another episode of Raising Daughters.