Latest / Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families / The Hidden Cost of Tracking Your Kids

Transcript

The Hidden Cost of Tracking Your Kids · Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families

0:06
Speaker 1: To what degree should we be monitoring our children? How
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Speaker 1: much should we be tracking them, watching where they are,
0:14
Speaker 1: keeping a close eye on them just in case they
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Speaker 1: get into trouble? Is tracking kids healthy or unhealthy surveillance?
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Speaker 1: Today on the Happy Families podcast, we unpack the degree
0:27
Speaker 1: to which we should be flying the drone over their
0:30
Speaker 1: head as they walk to school, keeping an eye on
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Speaker 1: them to keep them safe.
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Speaker 2: Stay with us goday.
0:38
Speaker 1: Welcome to the Happy Family's podcast, where you get real
0:40
Speaker 1: parenting solutions every single day. This is Australia's most.
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Speaker 2: Downloaded parenting podcast.
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Speaker 1: We adjusted and Kylie corson Parents of six Children.
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Speaker 2: I'm the writer author of what Is It?
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Speaker 1: Ten or eleven books about raising a happy family, and
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Speaker 1: we received this question from Loretta that sparked our curiosity.
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Speaker 3: Hi, I was wondering if you could have a discussion
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Speaker 3: around apps such as Life through sixty and some of
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Speaker 3: the implications around their use. I understand most parents would
1:10
Speaker 3: use these apps with great intentions, innocently and for safety,
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Speaker 3: particularly when their kids and teens start using public transport.
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Speaker 3: But I guess my concern is twofold is how that
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Speaker 3: impacts the developing autonomy and that transition from dependence to
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Speaker 3: independence where it kind of seems like the parent is
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Speaker 3: letting go and allowing that adolescence to have that freedom
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Speaker 3: and autonomy, but in reality they're not because they're actually
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Speaker 3: tracking their every move and they can use that for
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Speaker 3: punishment like why did you go and stop at this cafe?
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Speaker 3: And the other thing is is it normalizing tracking and stalking.
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Speaker 4: Both to say to kids that it's okay to track
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Speaker 4: or stalk someone and it's okay to be tracked or stalk.
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Speaker 4: What does that do for our future adults and our
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Speaker 4: future relationships, but also in families where they might already
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Speaker 4: be control and behavior and some domestic abuse and even violence.
2:15
Speaker 4: Does this reinforce that? And is it safe?
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Speaker 5: Okay? So I'm just going to put it out there. Yeah,
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Speaker 5: I don't even know what these apps are. I've never
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Speaker 5: heard of them. So I why are you laughing at me?
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Speaker 1: Because I get emails pretty regularly from people from organizations.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if I've had one from this specific
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Speaker 1: one that Loretta's referencing, but I'm often asked to be
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Speaker 1: an ambassador for a variety of these tracking apps, these
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Speaker 1: surveillance apps. These apps are out there to basically take
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Speaker 1: your money so that you can keep an eye on
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Speaker 1: your children wherever they are.
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Speaker 5: So we have a stalker in our home.
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Speaker 2: Our eldest daughter.
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Speaker 1: Seriously, she'll give us a phone call and she's like, so,
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Speaker 1: what are you doing at such and such at the moment,
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Speaker 1: And we're like, oh, my goodness, because we've we've got
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Speaker 1: the Apple connectivity thing, and she's got the fine mind.
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Speaker 1: She knows where we are. It's like, I got to
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Speaker 1: switch this off.
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Speaker 5: This is the same kid who actually got into my
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Speaker 5: phone as a sixteen year old and turned off her
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Speaker 5: location so that we did not know so we couldn't
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Speaker 5: find her.
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Speaker 1: Let's talk about Loretta's question. We're not going to spend
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Speaker 1: ages on this. It's pretty simple. There's a reason that
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Speaker 1: I say no every time I'm asked to be an
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Speaker 1: ambassador for a new app that stalks your kids, because
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Speaker 1: stalking your children is an inappropriate form of control. It's unnecessary,
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Speaker 1: it's not healthy for them, and frankly, it's not healthy
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Speaker 1: for you. We are the most stressed out, most most
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Speaker 1: anxious parents in the history of the world, well at
3:40
Speaker 1: least since we've been recording anxiety in parenting, and our
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Speaker 1: children are the most stressed out, anxious children because they
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Speaker 1: are being overparented.
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Speaker 5: So I'm going to stop you there, right because I
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Speaker 5: think that the whole wording around tracking and stalking our
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Speaker 5: children has a really really negative connotation.
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Speaker 2: I am being inflammatory, and.
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Speaker 5: Obviously there are going to be some people who are
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Speaker 5: doing that. But we share our location as a family,
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Speaker 5: so we know where each other are and it literally
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Speaker 5: is there for oh, she said she was going to
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Speaker 5: be home an hour ago. I'm just checking how close
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Speaker 5: she is to the house, and depending on where she is,
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Speaker 5: we might give her a quick phone call and just say, hey,
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Speaker 5: it looks like you're still in Cabulja. We were going
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Speaker 5: to leave. Like it's not a But this is for.
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Speaker 1: Our adult kids, right, and they've all got the opt
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Speaker 1: in option.
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Speaker 2: So one of our kids has not opted in.
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Speaker 1: She hasn't unless she has an I don't know, but.
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Speaker 2: I have bother checking.
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Speaker 1: It's really like, oh, hang on, I was expecting.
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Speaker 5: It's their big sister. She's the stalker. She's the one
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Speaker 5: who checks in.
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Speaker 1: Basically, here's the situation. We are told relentlessly, I mean
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Speaker 1: absolutely unequivocally, the danger is everywhere, and the childhood is fragile,
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Speaker 1: and that if we do not know where our children
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Speaker 1: are at all times, that we are abrogating our responsibility
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Speaker 1: as parents, that we're totally.
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Speaker 2: Getting this wrong. The world is dangerous out.
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Speaker 1: Well, if you're watching the news or if you're on
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Speaker 1: social but I don't, that's right, you don't. I've got
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Speaker 1: a colleague by the name of Claire Row. She's a
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Speaker 1: psychologist and she writes for some of the papers, and
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Speaker 1: a little while ago she wrote this. She said, when
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Speaker 1: parents outsource their anxiety management to technology, children pay the
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Speaker 1: developmental price. When we outsource our anxiety management to technology,
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Speaker 1: it's our children that pay the developmental price because when
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Speaker 1: they're constantly monitored, they learn that they're not trusted and
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Speaker 1: therefore they don't.
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Speaker 5: But they themselves they also learned to outsmart you, right,
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Speaker 5: So they if they know their privacy, if they know
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Speaker 5: that you're tracking them, then they leave their phone where
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Speaker 5: they say they're going to be and they disappear, or
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Speaker 5: do you know what I mean? Like, kids are so
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Speaker 5: switched on. If they want to find a loop in
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Speaker 5: the system, they're going to find a loophole.
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Speaker 1: So Loretta's comments cut to the very core of my
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Speaker 1: issues and the reason that I have not taken the
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Speaker 1: money from any of these companies, even though they've offered
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Speaker 1: it to me. And the reason I won't be an
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Speaker 1: ambassador for any of them, and that is because it's
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Speaker 1: developmentally appropriate that our children learn how to leave the
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Speaker 1: nest and not be monitored, and not be tracked and
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Speaker 1: not have surveillance.
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Speaker 2: We can use fun.
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Speaker 5: Worth if they're going to get in trouble, they can
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Speaker 5: call well.
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Speaker 1: I mean, I don't even think they need a phone.
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Speaker 1: It's not developmentally inappropriate to let your seven year old
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Speaker 1: go for a bike ride around the block, or to
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Speaker 1: let your nine year old go and hang out of
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Speaker 1: the park for an hour with their friend. It's not
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Speaker 1: developmentally inappropriate to let your twelve year old go to
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Speaker 1: the shops.
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Speaker 2: It's not developmentally.
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Speaker 1: Inappropriate to let your four year old go into the
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Speaker 1: next aisle and get the peanut butter that they like
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Speaker 1: and then bring it back to you in the supermarket,
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Speaker 1: or go and get an apple that they can eat
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Speaker 1: from the fruit and vegile like. These things are developmentally inappropriate.
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Speaker 1: We want our kids to be able to use public
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Speaker 1: transport and navigate the world. And we keep on saying, oh,
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Speaker 1: but I've got to keep them safe because we buy
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Speaker 1: this lie that the world is actually that unsafe. It's
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Speaker 1: not break Let's talk about the developmental realities and what
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Speaker 1: these apps are doing.
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Speaker 2: We're back.
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Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast. Should we be surveiling our kids?
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Speaker 1: Should we be tracking them? Should they know that we
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Speaker 1: know where they are at all times? I don't think so.
7:21
Speaker 1: The short version is I don't think so. We need
7:23
Speaker 1: to cut that umbilical cord. Research tells us, and has
7:27
Speaker 1: done now for several decades, that the whole idea of
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Speaker 1: helping our children grow up is that they're trying to
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Speaker 1: learn how to handle the world. They become confident and
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Speaker 1: competent when they're allowed to go and explore and stretch
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Speaker 1: their boundaries further and further. That doesn't mean that we
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Speaker 1: just say, hey, kids, go.
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Speaker 5: Explore now, that's FAFO parenting.
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Speaker 1: Our approach has very much been if you want to
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Speaker 1: go and do this thing, let's talk about how you
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Speaker 1: can be safe. Let's talk about what you would do
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Speaker 1: if anything came up. Recently in our neighborhood, we were
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Speaker 1: approached by somebody who had appropriate knowledge that let us
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Speaker 1: know that there was somebody who had been a concern
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Speaker 1: a public safety concern in our neighborhood, and they approached
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Speaker 1: us to let us know about that because they knew
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Speaker 1: that we had a daughter who is set. He is
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Speaker 1: young and walks the dog for us a couple of
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Speaker 1: times a day and rome's the streets and they're like,
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Speaker 1: do you know what's going on up there? And we
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Speaker 1: said no, we hadn't heard. But that gave us a
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Speaker 1: perfect opportunity to sit down with our daughter and say, Hey,
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Speaker 1: there is somebody who is out there in our neighborhood
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Speaker 1: who may not always be safe. This is the person
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Speaker 1: that we're looking for, but it could be anybody because
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Speaker 1: there are other people who may also be unsafe. What
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Speaker 1: are the strategies that you need to know so that
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Speaker 1: you can be safe in case something happens?
8:42
Speaker 2: And it worked.
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Speaker 1: I love the conversation we had with Lenorskanazzi, the World's
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Speaker 1: worst mum, now in charge of Free Range Kids, who's
8:51
Speaker 1: or let grow Sorry. Her book Free Range Kids was
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Speaker 1: a New York Times bestseller. Who let her nine year
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Speaker 1: old son ride the subway a couple of stops home,
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Speaker 1: I mean New York City subway. It's not exactly the
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Speaker 1: safest place nine year old boy on his own kind
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Speaker 1: of scary.
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Speaker 2: She got absolutely.
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Speaker 1: Scared, and you were with me.
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Speaker 2: And our family.
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Speaker 5: And I won't say how old I was.
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Speaker 1: So this is a long way of saying, already, you're
9:15
Speaker 1: right to be concerned about it. I don't think that
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Speaker 1: monitoring is healthy or safe or appropriate.
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Speaker 5: Can you tell our door to that?
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Speaker 1: But if you are going to do it, if you
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Speaker 1: are going to do it, the best way to do
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Speaker 1: it is to sit down with the kids and say,
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Speaker 1: here's what we'd like to do, here's why we'd like
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Speaker 1: to do it.
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Speaker 2: How do you feel about it?
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Speaker 1: And when everyone buys into it and they know that
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Speaker 1: this is not about a crazy safety thing but it's
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Speaker 1: really just about a convenience thing, go for it.
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Speaker 5: And well, I guess the one cave that I would
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Speaker 5: share in relation to how we do it in our
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Speaker 5: home is you and I share our location as well,
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Speaker 5: so it's not it's not a one sided no, We're
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Speaker 5: all involved in And.
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Speaker 1: I'll tell you why we actually do this. We do
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Speaker 1: it because it's really annoying when I'm driving home and
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Speaker 1: I'm three minutes from home and I'm listening to a
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Speaker 1: really great podcast and I know it's only got five
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Speaker 1: minutes to go, and I'm thinking, I think I can
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Speaker 1: probably listen to the whole thing. You can get a
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Speaker 1: phone and I get a phone call.
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Speaker 2: How far away are you?
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Speaker 5: Where are you?
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Speaker 2: Look at the app?
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Speaker 1: I'm just around the corner, don't my podcast?
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Speaker 5: But not only that, because you travel a lot, for
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Speaker 5: each of us, it's actually just nice to check in
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Speaker 5: and go, oh, that's where Dad is. It just feels
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Speaker 5: like you're still part of us. So for us, it's
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Speaker 5: actually a really positive In spite of our elder daughter
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Speaker 5: who likes to check in.
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Speaker 1: I got a phone call from her the other day
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Speaker 1: and she goes, Dad, I was driving along. For those
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Speaker 1: who know the Sunshine Coast, I was driving along Kouanaway
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Speaker 1: past the home Makers Center. She goes, hey, Dad, what
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Speaker 1: are you doing driving past the Home Makers Center on Kuanaway?
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Speaker 1: And I was listening to a podcast. And I was
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Speaker 1: pretty annoyed that she'd rung me because I was right
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Speaker 1: in the middle of something that was really interesting. And
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Speaker 1: I'm like, seriously, why are you always stalking me? And
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Speaker 1: she goes, no, I'm not stalking you.
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Speaker 2: Look left.
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Speaker 1: She was out and about doing some errands and she
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Speaker 1: was literally in the car beside me, moving along the
11:00
Speaker 1: two lane road, and I was like, now I a
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Speaker 1: you an apology And I felt really special that she
11:05
Speaker 1: wanted to call me hi because she was driving beside me.
11:09
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11:15
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