Tech, mental health link ‘messy’ (copy) (copy) (copy)
To help kids with tech use, we must be honest about our own habits
During the recent Virginia School Boards Association annual conference, I attended a workshop about Teens, Tech, and Mental Health. Dr. Jill Walsh of Boston University delivered an interesting and data filled presentation about the effects of social media on teen mental health. She opened the talk with the statement, “We are giving kids devices that they are not developmentally ready to manage.”
Don’t assume Dr. Walsh was all gloom. From the outset, Walsh admitted that data supporting the link between social media and mental health are “messy.” Outcomes depend on the person using social media, their emotional state, the type of content they consume, and the time of day. A teen watching YouTube videos to change the oil in his car at 3pm on a Saturday is not the same as a teen mindlessly scrolling videos of heavily muscled men pushing protein supplements at 2am. As with so many things, context matters.
But here is one sobering fact Walsh shared: “Frequent and chronic use of social media leads to a loss of an inner life.” Because teens are constantly distracted by phones, they have no time (or desire) to sit with discomfort, figure out who they are, evaluate and respond to conflicts, or build independence. This concerns me.
As an only child with a vivid imagination, I grew up with, and maintain, an active inner life. I survived my teen years with a journal in one hand and a sketchbook in the other. As an adult, I still depend on those tools. They help me figure out the world and my place in it.
A person, of any age, who is numbed by scrolling through puppy videos or a steady stream of one-sided political diatribes cannot develop or maintain a healthy, engaged inner life. It’s an issue of
consumption over creation. As a person who believes strongly in the healing and contributing power of creativity, the thought of a society of people largely devoid of inner life horrifies me.
And while I contemplated the demise of inner life, the woman sitting next to me couldn’t keep her hands off of her two iPhones and an iPad. Even when the people surrounding our table engaged in discussion, this woman could not pass more than a minute without touching the screens of her three devices – tap, tap, tap – to wake them up and see if she had missed a notification.
There we were, adults invested in education, talking about how to help students learn to develop healthy relationships with technology. All while unhealthy use played out in front of our eyes. And my companion at the table was no exception. We are all guilty of chronic tapping, checking, and scrolling. If we adults haven’t figured out how to have a healthy relationship with tech, how do we expect to teach kids to do it?
Kids watch us. They see us scrolling. And kids, especially teens, sense hypocrisy in an instant. They perceive the disparity when they are forced to have phones “off and away” from “bell to bell” but see teachers standing in the hall at the start of the school day scrolling on their phones. Or parents checking texts while driving. Or a supervisor distracted by Facebook during work hours.
The issue is most critical for young people because their brains do not fully develop until they are 25. Yet, if we are going to address the matter of technology use effectively, we adults need to admit that we struggle ourselves. We must honestly, and regularly, examine our own habits and justifications for our use of technology. Only with clarity about our own tech use can we help the children we wish to protect.
Something good to think about for Advent, isn’t it?
Julia Tomiak lives in Wythe County and posts regularly to her site Diary of a Word Nerd about books, words, and inspiration. Visit her at www.juliatomiak.com.
