An Important New Study on Phones and Kids | Hacker News Reader

An Important New Study on Phones and Kids

calnewport.com

Psychology as a research discipline, has failed.

We must remember this not only when it produces papers we disagree with, but - perhaps more importantly - when it flatters our preconceptions. Agreement is not immunity from bias.

The field remains trapped in a reproducibility crisis. This result, like those before it, stands to be unreproducible, if scrutiny even comes. Until then, the weight we should assign it should be zero.

Down votes = confirmation bias

As someone with a psychology degree, I completely agree. It's as much of a hard science as nutrition. Most of the research is done through surveys and data aggregation out of necessity because conducting a real research is hard (and sometimes ethically impossible).

That said, it's not devoid of value. The issue comes when we treat it like a hard science. If instead we approached it more like sociology and anthropology, things would make a bit more sense.

We will be having our first child soon so these are the type of things that interest me. I want to limit phones and screens. I assume it’s easy at first but as they grow older there will be more friction as they interact more with other kids and the outside world. I know at some point they will need to know how to use them but when is the right time? Curious if anyone has any tips?

Unless you have a zero screen policy with your kids - which I can definitely recommend - the trick is to give them incredibly small doses and being consistent with it. My son is 6 and he is perfectly happy with 30 minutes once a week when his younger brother is taking his nap.

We tell him it’s not good for him, which is why we limit it. He occasionally complaints, but most of the time he is looking forward to the 30 mins, and will close the iPad on his own when the timer ends. Consistency is key.

Second advice is to not give them authority over what to watch. No YouTube. Spend some time curating what will be acceptable. In the first few years (we started allowing it when he was 3) they will watch anything. Just stay of the dopamine stuff!

It helps that we never have the tv on when they are awake. Break your own bad habits first - but that’s general parenting advice…

Good luck to us all!

Thank you for sharing your experience and thoughts. I had a chat with a friend with a 2 year old and he also underscores the importance of consistency. We already stay off the tv most of the time so hopefully that helps. Any recommendations for what to watch in the early years if not on YouTube? Thanks again.

Happy to share!

We have (in Denmark) a lot of shows on our public broadcasting network DR, and similar for NRK (the Norwegian counterpart) that are meant for toddlers, many of which share these traits:

- Slow, meaning long scenes without cuts. - Calm speaker narrating something happening in simple words and with repetition. - Babies like to watch other babies, and toddlers other toddlers.

Go for older shows (90s, 2000s). Once they watch newer stuff which has a faster pace, it’s hard to get them to watch the oldies.

Once they get older (5+), I would recommend Stillwater on Apple TV.

The “need to know” part is overblown. I first used the internet around age twenty five and had zero difficulty picking it up. Also toddlers can drive tablets these days, that’s not difficult anymore either.

Screen time is your friend. Also I started teaching how computers, later internet work at age 7-10. Then teach safety and how to use tools like firefox and ublock etc.

Hold off on smartphone as long as possible, it will be a constant fight. We didn’t have any help from the school, only undermining, but looks to be changing.

Thanks for sharing your experience and thoughts. Internet safety is something I need to remember to instill as we progress through all the tech that they will be interacting with.

I don't have kids but my close friend does. One thing I noticed is his kids, 10 and 8, barely touch phones or play video games. I asked him about it and if they instated any kind of ban or limitation and he said no.

The key takeaway is they sped a lot of time with their kids, discipline them, give them chores on a schedule and they are allowed to explore hobbies. My friends are social people and invite neighbors to parties they host which brings the neighborhood kids together. They spend time with family, who also have kids, and go on small trips like a car ride upstate or amusement park for a day. This constant interaction keeps them occupied with real world activities and socialization which builds their self worth and place in life.

Idle kids are bored kids and that boredom is a vacuum easily filled by screens.

Thanks! My wife and I have been discussing the deliberate effort needed to raise our child. I think your comment highlights the things we do want to do.

We just learned that several couples on our block will be having kids around the same time, so we are trying to initiate an annual block party during National Night Out to hopefully kick start the habit of building relationships with others in our neighborhood.

My "common sense" (IMHO) suggestions from the perspective of a parent of a 5yo (i.e. not in the "socializing with friends online" stage yet):

- "Screen time" is not a natural category. You can watch TV, listen to music, read, socialize, make things, educate yourself, and play games using many kinds of screens and non-screens. Use your common sense to think about how much time is reasonable to do any specific activity. Decide what you think and then enforce it.

- Everything in moderation. Rarely was someone worse off because they did something they enjoyed for half an hour a day.

- Your kid is going to want to imitate you. If you personally aren't happy with how you spend your time, then fix it, and your fixing will do double duty.

- The fundamental question is how you want to balance giving your kid time to do the stuff they enjoy, versus doing stuff that you think educates them, expands their horizons, or otherwise builds character somehow.

We’re transitioning into the acknowledgement stage, where people are starting to realize tech can be as bad as crack. With initiatives such as smartphone free schools, I think the social pressure will start reducing.

I find it way easier to keep screens away from toddlers/kids if you have a strong community/family with kids their age. Way more spontaneous physical play and creativity (more fighting over the same toys). When I travel with my young kids, it gets tough. They get a lot more bored and long international flights can be tough.

This "study" still looks fishy to me. It's not a study but a kind survey about what "experts" think about other existing studies.

There might be a huge political bias in the experts opinion that might be motivated to push an agenda.

Also it might be tempting for them to shout for the wolf as it will make them appear like "savior" of kids and "acting to change the world" instead of just saying "nothing to see there".

My personal opinion is that all their results are circumstantial and might easily be a huge case of cause and correlation being mixed up.

For example, in many countries educated people are reluctant to make kids. Is it due to depression due to smartphone/social network or that the world currently is fucked up and going worse day after day?

Sure, in 1984 kind of countries like north Korea or China where information is tightly controlled to only be positive, people might look to be less depressed, but then it is the story of "Brave new world"...

I played video games for two hours a day since I was 8, watched TV for about an hour a day, did well at school, had lots of friends, played all kinds of sports, went out a lot, and never had any mental health issues. Same with my brothers and friends.

The problem isn't screens, it's social media. Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and TikTok. Twitter, for example, has basically become the biggest porn site on the internet, a desperate move to get teenagers to use it. Twitter, TikTok, and Facebook operate like the far west. They allow harassment, bullying, racism, etc, and ignore user reports, amplify lies, conspiracy theories, and anything controversial enough to grab attention. Facebook splits up families and friends. Instagram distorts reality. TikTok is a brainwashing machine.

Most of the people I meet at events who work at these companies have strict no screen policies for their own kids because they know exactly how damaging these apps are.

The founders of these companies and their investors (mostly big banks) are sociopaths. They use algorithms to manipulate people and lack empathy and remorse. And the programmers building those algorithms are like digital drug dealers. They know what they're doing is harmful, they know parents are angry, but as long as they don't have to face the people affected and the money keeps coming in, they look the other way.

So my advice: delete these apps, and let them watch Netflix, YouTube Kids and play games. That stuff's fine. It's Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, TikTok and all that junk you need to keep them away from.

I’ve commented on this topic recently, and go figure Haidt is brought up: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44402475

I’m of the opinion there’s very little (not nothing) wrong with social media, and a whole lot wrong with people. Kids are just seeing how fucked up humans are earlier than we did and they realize early on they’re trapped in this shitbox with us.

But yes, let’s blame class warfare and rampant corruption on social media. That’ll fix it, lads.

(Side note: fuck cal newport)

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