Smartphones raising a mentally fragile generation
Smartphones raising a mentally fragile generation
© AFP 13 November 2018
SAN DIEGO (AFP) - San Diego State University psychology
professor Jean Twenge sees smartphones and social media as raising an unhappy,
compliant "iGen."
QUESTION: What is the iGen?
ANSWER: The iGen is the generation born in 1995 and
later, and they're the first generation to spend their entire adolescence in
the age of the smartphone. They spend a lot more time online, on social media
and playing games, and they spend less time on non-screen activities like
reading books, sleeping or seeing their friends in face-to-face interactions.
Those children are growing up more slowly. By the age of
18, they are less likely to have a driver's licence, to work in a paying job,
to go out on dates, to drink alcohol or to go out without their parents
compared to teens in previous generations.
So iGen's probably the safest generation in history and
they like that idea of feeling safe.
Yet, they also have the sense that they are missing out
on something. They realize that being on the phone all the time is probably not
the best way to live. They don't like it when they're talking to a friend and
their friend is looking at their phone.
Many of them have a recognition of the downsides of that
type of living as well.
QUESTION: You have researched the behavior and health of
millions of teenagers. What have you observed?
ANSWER: Around 2011 and 2012, I started to see more
sudden changes to teens, like big increases of teens feeling lonely or left
out, or that they could not do anything right, that their life was not useful,
which are classic symptoms of depression.
Depressive symptoms have climbed 60 percent in just five
years, with rates of self-harm like cutting (themselves) that have doubled or
even tripled in girls. Teen suicide has doubled in a few years.
Right at the time when smartphones became common, those
mental health issues started to show up. That change in how teens spend their
time is so fundamental for mental health. We know, from decades of research,
that getting enough sleep and seeing friends in person is a good recipe for
mental health and that staring at a screen for many hours a day is not.
QUESTION: What advice would you give to parents?
ANSWER: Many of the things on which happiness and mental
health depend are now under our control. We cannot change the genes we were
born with and we are not going to solve poverty overnight, but we can control
how we spend our leisure time and we can help our children do the same.
The research points toward limiting digital media use to
about two hours a day or less. That seems to be the sweet spot for mental
health and happiness.
So sure, use social media to stay in touch with friends,
help plan things, and watch a little bit of video but keep it under that
two-hour limit for 13- to 18-year-olds. Then you get all the benefits of social
media and this technology without the big downside of it.
If you feel your child needs a phone, say for getting
back and forth to school, you can get them a "dumb" phone that does
not have internet and all the temptations of a smartphone.
Jean Twenge is an author whose works include
"iGen" and "Generation Me."
© 2018 AFP
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