Screen Time and the Quest for a Healthy Digital Lifestyle

Forty-five percent of teens say they're online on a near constant basis, according to a survey by Pew Internet Research. What are they doing online? How much is too much? Is all screen time created equal? Today's episode is about the addictive power of screens and the unprecedented amount of time our kids spend in front of us.

It's not all bad news. Tech can be very beneficial when used to form deeper relationships, allow for creativity, learn, and explore identity. A lot of this comes down to Yeah. doing when they're in front of the screen. So how can we guide our kids towards a healthy digital lifestyle full of thoughtful and intentional uses of Hi, I'm Mark Roman, a tech policy expert and former White House advisor on privacy. And I'm David Reitman, an adolescent medicine physician who works with teenagers.

And we're also married, raising a teenage son of our own. And you're listening to Their Own Devices, a parenting podcast with practical advice for the twenty-first century. So historically the American Academy of Pediatrics recommended that the first time. Spend no more than two hours a day on screens. This recommendation came from data that that was mostly related.

Television. The problem is that when you kind of look at where we are in this decade compared to when these recommendations came out, say 20 years ago, what kids are doing on screens and the screens and kids' lives has dramatically changed. So in 2016, the American Academy of Pediatrics updated its recommendations and did make it somewhat more nuanced, although there are still a lot of generalities there. The first thing that they mentioned was that under eighteen months.

you really shouldn't have your kids in front of a screen, with the exception of video chatting, if you've got a parent who's out of town or other relatives, to be able to increase social connections between these toddlers and other, you know, family members' relatives. It was then thought that the Children f between the ages of eighteen to twenty four months, so a year and a half to two years. They can start looking at some

television, some screen media considered high quality programming and they really did encourage parents to be w looking at this stuff with their children to help them understand what they're seeing. So I gotta ask you a question about that, David, because I seem to remember in our own house when our son was, I don't know, three months old and I needed to do something, popping a C D into a laptop that had like Beethoven music going, and then coming back a half an hour later.

So i is the study actually saying that we shouldn't have done that? That sort of strikes me as wildly unreasonable, or at least at least not practical. And this is not a study, this is a set of recommendations.

So these recommendations actually do say that you sh we should not be doing that. Now we do also have to balance this a little bit with there's a certain practicality here. I needed to make dinner while our son was sitting, you know, was sitting there and I couldn't be carrying him around.

Yeah, I will admit I'm probably a bad parent and pediatrician in that way, and I did occasionally have my son look, you know, watch some of this stuff just because it was the only way to kind of find some balance to make this work. So the next recommendation that came from the American Academy of Pediatrics in 2016 was that kids who were preschool age.

They could do some screen time, up to an hour a day. Once again, high-quality programming with the parents around, ideally to help them understand what they're seeing. Where, you know, I find it kinda getting interesting is what do you do when the kids are now school age or they're middle school or high school kids.

And you know, and how do we kind of manage that stuff?'Cause at this point the kids actually have a little more independence from the parents to be able to do some of these things and and have

access to screens without the parents being there all the time. The lawyer in me who focuses on definitions really wants to pause and ask how does the American Academy of Pediatrics define screen time If you look at the traditional definition from twenty years ago, it was T V. It's only been in say the last say seven years or so that we've actually been having to look at this from the standpoint of all the stuff that you know constitutes screen time.

No, I I agree, but I wasn't even getting to that. I just wanted to be on the same page that when we are talking about screen time Uh it is um the full range of electronic devices that we can either toss in our kids' hand or they can sit in front of and view. So then comes the discussion that you're having which is how much

screen time is the right amount or how much is problematic. And then does that mean you're putting all of these in one category? Do we have to start breaking them down? I think that we do have to start breaking them down. This is not all equal. and to sit here and say we're going to make a blanket recommendation of two hours a day may or may not be realistic. It may not be and sometimes it may or may not be in the best interest of the kid and it may not be doable. Like I said before. You can't

say that you can that you can only be on a screen for two hours a day when homework is requires a computer. Right. And if the kids are doing four hours of homework a day.

which has its own issues right there. Um and you know, and they're on their computer for four hours doing homework, you can't say that you're only gonna be able to do your homework for two hours a day if they've got four hours a day. But when our son says he's on his computer doing homework for two hours, uh it turns out half of that was YouTube. That's it and that's a whole separate issue. Yes. Okay, so American Academy of Pediatrics.

Revise the recommendations, middle school teens. What's the recommendation? The recommendations they have are basically still at the two hour mark, but they don't go into too much detail in terms of you know

How much should be school? How much should be this? How much should be that? So uh a a doctor, right? I mean I have a question. There are lots of um Best Counselor. I read everything and there are tons of headlines talking about uh internet addiction. Uh, is internet addiction a real thing? Is it just like a headline grabber? What's up with that? If you look at things from a diagnostic standpoint, the way that many of us doctors do

in terms of like is there a diagnosis that we're gonna m make, you know, and and are there criteria that fits this diagnosis? There really is not anything that specifically speaks to and says this is quote internet addiction. The better term that I think that a lot of us uh use is this term called uh problematic interactive media use.

an out of control, like an over consumption of a readily available resource, rather than an actual addiction where there's a physiological component to it. And I think that that's a really important distinction. I have spoken to many parents who have told me about kids trashing their rooms like when phones are taken away, or not coming out of their room until they get the phone back, not eating I don't know if that's withdrawal as much as what, just anger because they're getting punished?

I don't think it's withdrawal. You know, they're they are not having vomiting and diarrhea and chills and that kind of thing because of the fact that their phone was taken away. What I really do think that we're looking at is the fact that this stuff actually can affect kids from a mental health standpoint. It is not per se a physiological reaction. I think that's a big distinction here. I think that's important because I I at least from my perspective as as someone who really focuses on words.

the word dediction is really thrown around a lot and, you know, I would say that maybe it's used in ways that are not accurate or responsible, particularly if it's in the media. But y but kinda speaking to your your last question, yeah, there are some things that we that are go along with, you know, normal, you know, in quotes versus problematic internet use.

So what are the kind of things that that I tell parents to look for on a regular basis? Are these kids l you know, totally losing track of time online? You know, they go down to play their video games for

uh, you know, for five, ten minutes and three hours later they're still glued to the screen. Are they not getting homework done? Are they not getting household chores done? Are they d are they not taking care of themselves, uh, in terms of the way that they look, in terms of bathing That type of thing.

Are they becoming more isolated from family and friends? And, you know, I think another one that's really interesting, especially with what kids are doing with online gaming these days, is are they more invested in their friends who are online versus their friends that are their peers in real life?

Sometimes kids will say that the only time they feel good about themselves is when they're in front of a screen. If a kid feels good about themselves when they're engaging online or meeting friends virtually or through gaming, is that not a good thing? Well Once again, moderation. It's okay to feel good when you're online. I mean, I like being online. I like going on on and you know, surfing the web, that type of thing.

But I also feel good when I'm not online. Okay. And I and I think that it you really do have to kind of look at this from the standpoint of are these kids who in their daily, actual lives are just not happy. Things like depression, anxiety, stuff like that are actually big risk factors for developing problematic media youth.

So if the w for the kids who are using the internet and using this stuff as a way to to r become a recluse from society, from their friends, that kind of thing, that's where it's problematic. I don't know. I'm still I'm still noodling on this one. Um as as a parent You know, I have a friend and I I I'm not gonna use his name, but we were just talking about this. His son is an incredible player of Fortnite. May like maybe the best in the school. And it is like

tremendously increased his sort of social credit in seventh grade. And this dad is struggling, saying, you know, on one hand, it feels like it's way too much time when he gets to like six hours on this game. On the other hand, he gets so much of his positive Identity from it. So what do you t what would you tell that dad? I would tell this dad that he should he needs to moderate this a little bit. I I mean that that and this is my personal slash professional opinion.

six hours a day is you know, is liable to give a kid other kinds of physical concerns, symptoms, that type of thing. And you know, looking at this not in absolute, you know, it's not like he you know, either he's an internet star or he's total failure. I think that's the pro right. Because if you're gonna if six hours a day, eight hours a day is what requ is what is required to do that

then you're you're missing out on other stuff. You're missing out on other kinds of social you know, even though you're getting some social cred You're missing out on some other social directions. Right. Exactly. Which kinda speaks to another thing. The screen time, like I said, is not inherently good, not inherently bad. There are certain things in terms of physical stuff that you do have to watch out for when parents ask about like red flags and that kind of thing.

One of the big things that we see all the time, I see this in my practice, is the effect of screen time on sleep. The impact on sleep can be one of where they're not going to sleep because they are staying up and you know, texting and doing stuff online. It also can be part of the fact that when you're looking at screens

And you're getting some of this blue light phenomenon uh you know, affecting your pineal gland and your melatonin uh production that it may be more difficult for kids to fall asleep when they've been on screen. So some of it may be what they can control and some of it may be stuff that they can't control. But if they were to cut back on it, they'd be able to modulate that a little bit more. It's important to remember that sleep is really, really important for teenagers and for kids.

When you don't get sleep it it affects every part of your life in terms of your school performance It affects your ability to socialize. It does correlate directly with worsening moods. depression, anxiety. As a doctor, when I have a kid coming in with an issue, you know, the kid comes in, the parent says he can't focus, he's got, you know, ADHD, the first question I s ask these parents is what's the sleep pattern like? Because a lot of times you fix that and everything gets better.

One message I have to parents is that we have to be good role models. If we are telling our own children to limit screen time, but we have two devices in our hands at all times and that when we're doing family game night or T V time or at dinner and we're checking our own tech

It's kinda hard to insist that our kids don't use devices all the time. So it's that notion of being a good role model. You know, while we're on that subject, you know, let's be honest, uh I don't think we're great at that in our own home. Uh in fact This morning. While we were, you know, thinking about our podcast, I came downstairs and our son is at the breakfast table eating breakfast.

by himself, while the parent, David, is next door in another room on his laptop during family breakfast time, typing up notes. And so that prompted a whole discussion about, yeah, there's something wrong here that we're prepping for a podcast uh on screen time and you're in here on a laptop and our son's by himself at the breakfast table.

So I think that it is easier to say be a good role model and it's sometimes hard to do, but we've gotta stop and think about what we are sort of modeling for our kids. Right, Doctor? Absolutely. And yes, I am guilty as charged with this morning. It is difficult as a parent, and I think back to when I was working seventy to eighty hours a week and I would have multiple devices wherever I went, right? D given the kind of work I was doing.

And I know, and I felt it then, that I was setting a horrible example, not only about electronics, but maybe about priorities and work time and the like. It is easy to say about being a good role model and I was busting on you this morning, but certainly in my last job, I was more guilty than anyone of being on screens all the time. We're gonna have to be on screens. It's part of our culture, it's part of our lives.

What I think that we as parents need to be doing is saying, okay, we're gonna have screen free time. Obviously, we're a very tech heavy home. We are not parents who advocate don't give your kid a device. In fact I I was stunned at the number of devices we have in our house as I was counting them, but

Our kid does have a phone and a tablet, a laptop from school, uh a personal laptop, not to mention gaming consoles. So we are grappling with it. We think it's important, but obviously we're a tech heavy home and that's why we work to strike the balance. Two years ago we put an app on his phone that w gave me the ability to it was his iPod, um, to shut down the iPod. uh at any time that I want to or limit w exactly which uh apps he could use.

uh on the iPod and within two days of it being on I was getting an email from the app server saying that he had disabled it and I said this this can't be right, he's eleven years old so I put it back on and A couple hours later, it was disabled again and I was getting notifications. And I called the app company and spoke to their customer service. And I said, This is impossible. My kid is 11 years old. There's no way he knows how to take off a VPN.

And finally after about three or four more times, I was about to cancel the the subscription to this sir to this service. I asked him, I said, Have you been disabling the the app that I that I put on? He said, No and I said, What have you been doing? He said, Well, I've been d I've been disabling this V PN thing He totally knew how to do it within hours of this being on his phone. Yeah, it turns out there are YouTube videos on how to circumvent controls. There you can Google it.

So the next step was we sat down and had a discussion. I looked him in the eye and I said to him If I ever get a message like this from the server again that it's been disabled, you are gonna lose that iPod. and it is going to go into the garbage. And I was serious and he knew I was serious. And I will say that two years later, to this day, I've never gotten that message again. And I've double checked on that iPod that those parental controls are still on and active.

I think that this is where it is a combination of using the technology as well as having this conversation, being a parent and setting up consequences and if need be following through with them. As I was reviewing the apps and parental controls that I use on our son's devices. I was thinking, you know, this is complicated enough with one kid.

I cannot imagine having to keep track of the devices and the internet use of multiple kids. I would have loved to have seen the Brady's handle this with six kids uh if that show was on today. And so to really learn more about that and then to get somebody else's perspective.

We invited a mom of three boys to join us in the studio today and we are really thrilled to have with us Jen Reed. Hello, thank you. Thanks for having me. Tell us about your kids. Um I have three boys. Um oldest is thirteen as of yesterday. Happy birthday. Um, middle guy is eleven and the little guy is nine. You know, they're your typical boys, uh rambunctious, crazy, into everything. Oh how do they use tech? Well, they you they have tablets and they have uh video game, PlayStation and a switch.

And that's it. No no phones. What no phones. No phones. Although although something happened yesterday.

But no phones. They had nobody had any phones. Um Oh, thirteen. Thirteen. So thirteen was the magic age to get for in your family to get'em a phone? I mean, I just had that idea in my mind because it felt so far away. I kept saying Thirteen, thirteen, thirteen because for me the phone, this thing that's always with you and in your pocket and you can never get away from it and you can never shut it off.

adults have trouble regulating themselves on it and I just felt like I didn't want to burden them with that and give that to them when they were so young. I just wanted to shelter them from that So I'm envisioning your thirteen year old throwing a fit and saying something to the effect of Mom Every one of my friends has a smartphone. I am the only kid in seventh grade without a smartphone. You're killing me. I have no social life. You are destroying me, mom. I need a phone. Something like that?

Yes, but maybe not quite that it was harder last year in sixth grade because sixth grade is when Everybody well, I mean most kids had'em in fifth grade, right? But sixth grade with walking to school'cause it's a different scenario. That was hard. And he begged me regularly. I said, Well, how about a flip phone? Oh yeah, we we we went to the phone. Wait, say that again? He wouldn't use the flip phone? No, humiliated. Mom.

They'll make fun of me, you don't understand. And apparently if anybody is seen using one, they all get

laughed at and made fun of. We had that we had that in our home too. I mean uh that actually sounds very familiar. Yeah. So then I was just feeling so like Ugh, like it was backfiring on me because I didn't want him to be like the odd guy out and be ostracized but I'm the adult, I'm the parent, and I know better and I'm not trying to judge any other parents and what they decide to do, but I just I just felt like I w I wanted to make him wait and and g s save him from this for as long as I could.

That's interesting. I would say and I guess what you're saying is most parents don't. A lot don't. And he's definitely now in in seventh grade now, definitely probably one of the only ones. Or maybe out of five in the whole fifth, seventh grade. Like have you observed or like what are your primary concerns? Why'd you wait and have you observed things that had you concerned? Yes. Um social media. I just didn't feel like

that he was ready to handle that and I didn't want to again burden him with that. And once you go into that world, there's no coming out of it. And he's he's aware. I mean, I use social media. He sees my stuff. He sees his friends. But last year there was a couple incidences that Confirmed that I made the right decision. I don't know how lucky I got with this, but he tells me everything. Guess what, Mom? You're never gonna believe it.

I'm like, oh my God. I'm thinking, does this boy who who was getting these Snapchats do his parents even know? So when you see that, do do you call the parent? I mean I would want someone to call me and say, Your son just sent a photo um of him doing X, Y, or Z. It really do you guys remember when there was a student who was doing a

Live from the elementary school playground and your son was in it? No. Yes. And it freaked me out. I remember it. And I call I told you guys because I felt like I could come to you and you would understand. my concern. But I felt like in fifth grade you're s you're doing a a YouTube saying here we are at such and such elementary school and you're showing the and y and your kid's face was on there and I just That freaked me out because I if it was my kid, I would want to know so I could shut that

So I'm guessing that's when I was at the White House and a completely checked out parent. Yes, you were. Great. Great. He was on it. That's why there's two of you. Yes. Yes. Awesome. One one of us dealt with it. I'm feeling really good about myself on that. It's f i I mean you guys are a team, so as long as somebody's on it, that's all that matters. With our son, I take a fairly, I would say, uh, middle of the road approach where I want him to come to us and ask questions or

show us, you know, things that concern him. So I want him to trust us and know that we're not going to constantly go tell other people what we're hearing. On the other hand, if he does point something out that I think is particularly concerning or alarming, then I feel that I have to tell a parent and One recent example was you know, he showed me a social media account that one of his peers had, and I was shocked at

the fact that it was public facing and how many adults had posted comments on this middle school student's account. The parents did know this kid had an account. I don't think they had any idea that it was a public facing profile or the kinds of features that were on the um on the platform. Oddly enough in that case, the parents actually were not all that appreciative and it was a quick conversation and nothing changed.

That is their option to whether or not they're gonna appreciate that or not and what they're gonna do about it. You know, every parent's gonna be different. I'm kinda wondering so now now that you you've crossed this bridge of getting him a smartphone, okay, how do you monitor? Well the PlayStation, a lot of a lot of his buddies play the PlayStation. They're in the basement, they're off in a corner in their room. Guilty. Yep. Yep. And I

Bush and trust me, this is like a great sacrifice on my part because it's r they play right on my main TV in my living room. I'm right there. I hear everything he's saying. I'm hearing the yelling and I'm hearing the I it's annoying. Trust me. I am I would like to just not have to hear it, but I feel like it's my responsibility to hear it.

And I had a parent actually come to me whose son was getting bullied when they were playing Fortnite'cause he h he had not been allowed to play. So he was kinda new to the game. And they were making fun of him, calling him a noob, which is apparently a big insult and

making fun of him and he was like to the point of tears about it and she said, I just wanted to tell you that your son was one of the only ones who wasn't bullying him And he said, Well you know why? Because I was standing over his shoulder. Yes.

Yes. Like if I hear any inner pro I'm like, hey Nothing mom. No, that w that's not what it was, Mom. I mean Well I would suggest, right, as a tech guy that that's not necessarily a tech issue as much as Um teaching our kids you know, the right values about being inclusive and that could

That kind of behavior could just as well happen on a playground around any particular game or baseball. True, but don't you feel like and this is the other thing, this is my thing with the technology. I mean, think of your typical keyboard warrior. You You're behind a screen.

You're cut off. It it's easy to say or do things because you're disconnected. You're not looking at the kid you're you're you're teasing. Right. It's not real. That rem remember like we talked about kids feel like this is not real. And adults too. Adults too. Yeah. And and it's not gonna have real consequences if it's on a screen. What about um how do you control like when they do it? Like we were talking earlier about bedtime and that kind of thing. That's um

I am a little you know, I grew up playing video games. I remember the Christmas of nineteen eighty nine when I got the my Nintendo. It was the greatest Christmas of my life and I get why it's fun to play and defeating the levels and I feel like I have a understanding of that. So I don't really regulate it by, well, you've hit your hours, whatever today. Like for me, I use it as a form of currency. So if you're

doing good in school, if I'm not getting emails from the teachers that you're misbehaving, if your grades are good and if you're listening to me I'm pretty liberal. You can go ahead and play for you know, I mean not until midnight. You have to go to bed at a normal time. Right. But you know, but if I'm getting notes like my little guy's got some behaviour issues like

Sorry, I got an email from your teacher. Your tablet's gone for the next three days and he's on the ground, you know, in hysterics and is so mad at me, but That's interesting. So when you take away the device, what's the reaction? Oh, they're dev it's devastation. They're very upset. I mean that's that's'cause that's nothing else works. That's all I got. There's nothing they don't care. Nothing else works. There's nothing else that I can take away.

that packs the punch of taking away. So let's let's actually dig into that. So what you're saying is, um, it's almost like the most important thing to them now is this device. Yeah. Which way does that cut or is that um I don't know. That's that's almost concerning to say that the only effective punishment we can find as parents is to say you're gonna lose a device. Yeah. I mean I guess is that a sign of the times? Or Yeah, maybe it is. Yep. But I guess I'm not sure.

I would kinda ask it's interesting how you phrased this before, because you said that it's a currency, kinda like they have they have to earn it. Okay. So are you taking the device away from your youngest one or are you saying you didn't earn it, so you're not getting it? Well, because like here's our set of rules. You can have it if you do this, this and this. If you don't do this, this and this, you can't have it. Okay. And I'm gonna decide

How many days? So it's not a p so it's not a punishment as much as it is a you didn't earn it. Yeah, it's a it's a privilege. So and I'm happy to let you have it. And if you're doing good and you're I'm not having to go have meetings and get all these emails from your teachers. and you're listening to me, I'm pretty lax about it. I'm gonna let you You know, but you gotta do your homework first.

and will not take away the phone or device because the parent thinks it's too important to the kid. It's hard to do. I mean, it's right it's hard to discipline our kids, right? It's not easy to do. What about Yeah we kind of talked about with your oldest.

now and the fact that you know everybody has one and a lot of kids are communicating on it, you know, and they're texting, Snapchatting, that kind of thing. So the the argument that we that we've had to struggle with and I've had a lot of parents, you know, you know, patients struggle with is that It is actually a very important part of their social.

Like they communicate through this stuff. If you take this away, it's going t you know, it if they or if they don't earn it, it's gonna mean that they are socially being left out of stuff, that type of thing. What do you think about that? I don't know. Um I don't I that's never really come up with my oldest. Like he's never really I just

Go outside, go knock on somebody's door. I mean, or the his friends will text me. That that's reasonable. That that though is a reasonable solution in some ways. Right.

Um now as for my middle guy who's kind of introverted, quiet guy, um, I've seen a whole new side of him when he's playing Fortnite and hi he's talking and just like he's like alive and I'm like, Wow, I didn't know you had had it in you He's like cracking jokes and and it's n I I feel like it's doing a lot for him socially to talk to his friends.

That that to me like, oh w how lucky are they? We didn't have that option with our Nintendo controller. That's a really interesting point. And we were discussing that earlier as well. Uh what a great benefit uh technology can be for a lot of kids.

can he bring that experience, that new confidence into what I'll call the uh real world or the offline world, or does he have a persona that he can express himself that way through when gaming, but then in a real world circumstance, does he revert back or is he grown?

I mean that's a good question and it's hard for me to give a real answer'cause I'm not with him at school, right? But I mean, I can go by teachers meetings and things that I'm hearing and he's definitely w way come out of his show than two or three years ago. Now, is that because of the games? Is it because he's just growing up? I I don't know. Right. But

I'm definitely seeing a sign of him that I like and I'm happy for him that it's he's able to come out a little bit of a shell. What about as a as a dad, I'm really concerned about bedtime and sleep. How do you handle those issues? Um, it's tough. They hate to go to bed, right? They hate to go to bed, they hate to wake up. Um, but I with having the three I kinda stagger it. So the youngest goes first, then a half an hour later the next guy, and then a half an hour later the next guy.

shut down at some point? Do you know what do you see them sneaking in at later to go back or no, I've never my sister in law had that happen. That's never happened to me. Um what happened to her? They've th they it was going on for months. Her son was sneaking out of his room like at three and four o'clock in the morning and gaming until it was time to wake up. And she thought that he was just waking up.

In the morning when it was time to wake. Wow. And then they finally figured it out. Now to me I'm like, What how did you not know? Weren't you checking and looking at things? I'm always checking and looking, looking at their browser history on their tablets. I'm like a little

Snoop looking at the chat boxes. Oh you are d yeah, yes. Years ago, as a matter of fact, when Clash of Clans first came out and he would play it on my phone, he played it on my phone, but with A lot of our guys friends this was like geeze like fourth grade or something and in the chat box one of the friends he was like using cuss words and I'm like

What is going on here? And I d I did tell his parents and they didn't know and and then my was like, Yo mom, everyone's mad at me I said, I'm sorry but And a lot of the parents didn't even know that there was a chat feature on the channel.

parents don't know. They don't know. And it's it's it's complicated because a lot of these games and apps and social media platforms evolve. And so maybe you gave permission a year ago when a certain platform only allowed texting and now it has added ten new features. Uh or your kid asked about being on a game and you had no idea that it has a chat function and a public-facing profile.

It still surprises me, but I think that's why we're doing the podcast is that Parents don't actually know or understand what their kids are doing. So you mentioned that you do check um your kids' devices and you do wanna see what they're doing. Do you use like uh any like apps or services to do that? Or you literally physically or like periodically grab the phone? Or they didn't have they didn't have no phone, so we're talking tablets. Yeah. I just to take'em and look.

Look at the browser history. So they they browsed are are they on YouTube? That's ba yeah, that's it really. YouTube. That's their thing. Yeah. What are they looking for? People playing video games or like Henry's. I just checked his this morning and he was watching um tackling football, how to tackle, you know, with the pads and Well his is mostly sports, top ten greatest sports moments.

So you talked about you don't necessarily have a limit on time and it's about if you're doing the right things, but what about like making sure your kids have like athletic activity or get outside? Yeah. Um well I've I've invented this term. I call it toxic tablet syndrome, and I can tell when it's been too much. something happens to them. They like get like Yes, I know exactly what you're talking about. Go ahead. I th I think every parent who listens to this is gonna say

Toxic tablet syndrome. Okay. I mean I you could probably put it to the phone or to whatever. Um they just get like just crabby, irritable Mad just they you know, I have like I haven't seen your face. I haven't talked to you. You know what? Sometimes I will do a random tech tablet free day. We're not. Let's get out of board game. We're not doing it tonight. You've all been nasty, you've been mean, you've been

That's not on the rules sheet. That's just at my discretion'cause I'm the parent. And I can tell when somebody's having that syndrome, there's like a look in their eye, they're like dazed, they're I just I'm like, it's enough. You're it's the poison is too much. You're but your kids are outside a lot, right? They play sports, so you're you're not worried that they're not getting physical activity. No.

They're very I mean, that's our thing, you have to do at least one activity. So, you know, they all do baseball. Well Jen, this has been awesome. And it's been really great having you here and thank you so much for taking some time to give your perspective, like we said before,

We've got one, you've got three, it's a whole different deal and um and every parent does this differently, you know, and I don't and it's just it's just fascinating, you know, hearing y some of your stories and some of your insights on some of this stuff. And I hope that you will maybe come back. in three months and tell us how life with a smartphone went for the thirteen year old and uh and share some stories. And if you need to call me, call me and I'll

you how to put an app and monitor the device. I will. Thank you. Thanks for having me. And yeah, you're right. Every parent does it differently. I'm not trying to say I'm an expert, but this is what works for my family. Awesome. Awesome. We've talked about the importance of communicating with your child and sharing your values and explaining to them what you believe is the appropriate way for them to engage with technology and use their devices. And that remains critical.

But the good news is there are also technical solutions out there that will help parents guide or monitor their children's use of the internet and technology. And there's really been a lot of um great developments just in the past few months.

Now I'm not here to evaluate products or endorse anything in particular, but I do today want to highlight two new developments that I think are really positive in this area that I really believe all parents should know about. And so If you're, you know, an iPhone family, then in the past few months, uh Apple's had a great new development with their recent iOS 12 update. and they have a new feature called screen time, which by the way is great for adults too.

But you can set it on your child's iPhone and you can control their device and allow you to set limits on the amount of time that the device is used or a particular app is used. It can help you set a bedtime for the app and have things shut down at a particular time and give you an understanding of what your kid is doing with what apps and when.

And so it's a free, uh, easy to use and easy to navigate tool that is new. Uh, and I would really encourage parents to take a look at it, both for your own use, uh,'cause I like to look at it. It tells me how I use my phone. And as well as to get an understanding in what your kids are doing and control what your kids are doing. On the uh Android side, uh Google also has a new product and that's called Family Link, and you can download this for free. So what's great about

Family Link is that it will let you set daily screen time permissions for your child's Android device. So it's a great opportunity to discuss what is a reasonable amount of time and to set limits. It also allows you to set a quote bedtime, which will minimize distractions for your child as they get ready to go to sleep and really takes that decision point away from your child.

You can also remotely lock your child's device so that if it's homework time or it's time when you don't want them on the device from your own device, you can lock it and shut it down. Importantly, if you want to talk to your child about internet consumption, you really need to know what they're doing and what they're consuming, and Family Link will actually give you activity reports. And it will show you what are the apps and the games that they use most, how are they engaging?

And actually produce reports. that will allow you to have those conversations. And so for all of those reasons, uh I'm really pleased by this new development. Uh and it's a great way to use this free app, download it and have those conversations and engage with your child about that healthy relationship with technology.

Thanks for listening to their own devices. We hope you find this show valuable and entertaining. This show is a conversation, and we'd love to hear from you. What are your thoughts about screen time and screen addiction? How do you set limits in your house? And what conversations are you having with your kids about their habits? Email us at hello at their own devicespodcast dot com.

Their Own Devices is hosted by Mark Roman and David Reitman. Our producer is Matt Silverman and our editor is Chris Poniello. This show is part of the podglomerate network and is recorded at Clean Cut Studios in Washington DC. Be sure to subscribe to the show in your favorite podcast app. And if you're listening on Apple Podcasts, please leave us a review. It will help other parents find the show and get the information that they need. See you next time. A Sonic Universe.