Parents and Digital Technology

How to Raise the Connected Generation

Suzie Hayman, John Coleman

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781317391975
• Topic: Psychology
• Subtopic: Developmental Psychology
• Index: Psychology

Children today are digital natives, growing up in an age where social media and online communication is the norm. This book is an indispensable guide for parents who may feel they are struggling to keep up, addressing the issues that young people and their families face in the world of modern technology. Suzie Hayman, a parenting counsellor, and John Coleman, a distinguished psychologist, use their combined expertise to explore the challenges and possibilities of being constantly connected, helping parents to make choices about how they communicate, set boundaries and establish rules.

Using real-world examples and solid psychological theory, the book looks first at the anxieties parents express about digital technology, followed by the serious potential threats such as cyber-bullying, sexting and easy access to pornographic or violent materials. However, the internet is also full of enormous potential and a further chapter explores the positive side of the digital playground. The authors also share their expert understanding of child and adolescent development and how this relates to the appeal of digital media, with special attention paid to the importance of good communication. The end result is a toolbox for parents, full of tips, strategies and techniques designed to help navigate the digital world, ensuring it is safe yet still exciting for young people.

Parents and Digital Technology is essential reading for all parents and guardians as well as those caring for children and teenagers in a professional setting, who want to get the best out of life and modern technology while keeping safe in a family that talks to each other, spends time with each other and enjoys each other.

1
Introduction

“If you have a child, you’ll notice they have two states; asleep or online.”

Eric Schmidt, Chair of Google

“I hardly see my son these days, he’s on his mobile phone or tablet from the time he leaves school to when he goes to bed – and often beyond that! I know I check my Facebook page all too often but I’m just lost at how I can get him to talk to me. Trying to get him to put it all aside to come and be with us just leads to arguments. I have no idea what he does all that time.”

Letter to Suzie Hayman’s Woman magazine agony page

“Our sires’ age was worse than our grandsires’. We, their sons, are more worthless than they; so in our turn we shall give the world a progeny yet more corrupt.”

Horace, Book III of Odes, circa 20 BC

In 2015 TV Channel 4 broadcast a series about teenage life in which they followed 13 sixth formers for nine months, tracking every tweet, WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram post they exchanged. It amounted to over a million exchanges.

Being a parent has never been easy. We have often felt challenged by our young charges – you can find quotes from parents and other adults bemoaning the bad manners and careless behaviour of children and teenagers from Socrates’ Athens to Shakespeare’s London, and beyond. Psychologist and educator Granville Stanley Hall said:

“Never has youth been exposed to such dangers of both perversion and arrest as in our own land and day. Increasing urban life with its temptations, prematurities, sedentary occupations, and passive stimuli just when an active life is most needed, early emancipation and a lessening sense for both duty and discipline, the haste to know and do all befitting man’s estate before its time, the mad rush for sudden wealth and the reckless fashions set by its gilded youth – all these lack some of the regulatives they still have in older lands with more conservative conditions.”

Apart from some of the words used, doesn’t that sound like the sort of complaint we hear so often these days? He said this in 1904 in his book The Psychology of Adolescence.

In many ways, the job of parent has hardly changed since we climbed from the primordial ooze. We worry about outside influences, our skills, our children’s abilities or their demands, and always have done. And yet, a wholly new issue with wholly new consequences appears to have developed in the last 25 years – digital technology and the internet. Should we worry about it, and our children’s use of it, or celebrate it? Should we try to control their use or leave them to it? And is it really that different to the sorts of opportunities or indeed dangers we encountered when we were young?

Many of our children are ‘digital natives’. By this we mean they were all born into and grew up in this world. Most of them know the language, are comfortable with using the technology, feel happy to manipulate and even make the customs. They have little fear about simply diving in and having a go. Depending on what access they have to the technology at home or at school, they may be proficient in coding or simply able to use texting and social media. To them it is merely a resource to be used, a playground to access as much as they can.

Some parents – particularly those with young children – may be equally at home and nonchalant about the possibilities and the potential. Tablets and smart phones, apps and social media are part of their lives and aspects they take for granted. They use it all, so why shouldn’t their children? But some parents are better described as digital immigrants, coming into new territory and perhaps struggling with the language and customs found there. Immigrants to the digital world can range from those who have dipped their toes into the digital world, to those who have moved on from sending texts on their mobiles and emails on their laptops to using social media, to those who have so integrated into the village that they feel fully at home. And they are occasionally brought up short when a ‘local’ reminds them they are ‘recent arrivals’! The reality is that for most parents our children, even those of primary school age, probably know a lot more about digital media than we do.

They seem so much more at home in this field, and we often feel at a loss about what they might be doing. For this reason many parents say knowing how to deal with digital media is No. 1 on their list of anxieties. That lack of knowledge, or lack of confidence in what knowledge we have, results in our finding it difficult to know what to say and how to discuss this issue. That’s true whether it’s with our children or with the other adults we know, such as relatives, friends or our children’s teachers. And even those with total facility, who perhaps have brought children into the world to be surrounded by digital technology and parents who use it all the time, are beginning to wonder whether simply accepting what is offered to us online is the best approach. Should we be considering how we and our children use digital technology and the internet? Should we be having discussions with them about all our use? Is there a need for boundaries and rules?

In this book we (John Coleman – a distinguished Oxford University psychologist whose primary focus is adolescence – and Suzie Hayman – a counsellor, agony aunt, accredited parenting educator and author) will address the issues surrounding what young people and their parents face, now and in the future. We’ll explore what both the challenges and the possibilities might be and will provide tips, strategies and techniques to help parents make choices about how they communicate, set boundaries and establish rules. We hope that the end result will be to help parents and young people to get the best out of life and modern technology while keeping safe in a family that talks to each other, spends time with each other and enjoys each other. This is a manifesto for understanding and being in control; for managing our and our children’s use and balancing the advantages and disadvantages of what we and they may be encountering.

What will we offer to help you make sense of what your children are doing and why, and what you can and perhaps should be doing about it? We’ll look first at the anxieties parents express about internet and digital technology. We’ll be using real-world evidence: the results from discussion with parents and young people, and letters and emails from them, surveys and data from charities that help parents with such issues. The words, queries and ideas from parents and young people will feature throughout the book. You may find your anxieties echoed by other parents – you may uncover a few that haven’t yet occurred to you, or realise you have some that don’t feature here. We’ll then look at the actual worries we think you should have, and follow with the more serious threats, which may reassure you or focus your mind on what needs to be done. On a more upbeat note, we’ll then explore the positives in the digital world, which is likely both to inspire and restore confidence in what is out there for you and your children.

We will then take a look at child and adolescent development. We as parents cannot understand the digital world our children inhabit, and learn how to respond to it, unless we also understand something about the way our children develop and how this reflects on their internet use, and the appeal of digital media. You don’t need to be a university psychologist or a counsellor to understand your child – it just helps to have one of each offering you some insight to help you do so! We’ll offer assistance on effective, positive parenting. Setting boundaries around internet and digital use starts with being able to confidently set boundaries around other behaviour, and understand why such boundaries are important.

We’ll explore communication – how to listen as much as talk, how to phrase questions and how to open channels of communication, and how to dive under bad behaviour to understand what is really going on. We’ll explore our own use of and understanding of digital media, and how this impacts on our ability or desire to help our children. We’ll look at how to guide them, discipline them and ultimately, once we have reason to trust them, have confidence in them doing their best for themselves. And we’ll look at the particular issues families living apart from each other may experience in this area and what to do about them. These may be families in which parents have separated or children are fostered or adopted or living with members of their family other than their parents – kinship care.

In effect, this book will be a toolbox, designed to help you navigate the digital world and make it both safe and still exciting for yourselves and your children.

Why are any of us but perhaps especially young people and children so drawn to digital technology? One reason may be that shiny toys, whether real or online, are appealing to us all. Gaming is fun. Talking to friends is fun. For young people, being different or having separate realms from adults is fun. Being better – more skilled – than adults is even more fun. Children want to imitate their parents – so if you use digital tech, they will want to too. They also eventually want to go one better. All these draw young people to screens.

But what we as adults perhaps less knowledgeable and skilled in these fields need to accept is – why wouldn’t they? Digital technology has made so many new activities available to all of us, with young people in the vanguard. Some of us might have been able to make music, write novels, take and edit photographs in the past. Now all of us can do so, and so easily. And much, much more. No wonder they gravitate towards the internet and its possibilities.

Commercial interests, keen to take advantage of all this, make their products available in ways and under certain conditions that harness all of our love of the new and exciting. And, often, of the free – or what looks to be free. Adults, however, may be able to recognise that if it seems too good to be true it possibly is, and to be more cynical and careful about online behaviour. Children, with their naiveté, and teenagers, with their inherent love of excitement and risk, can put themselves in undesirable situations.

Many of the challenges families face in the digital world are hardly new. Bullying has always occurred, young people have always grasped at excuses not to do homework or chores or even join in with the rest of the family, and teenagers have always got hold of pornography. None are new threats because of digital media. But certain aspects of these issues have changed with digital use, and we all need to understand and know how to deal with this development.

Our aim is to explore digital technology and internet use, and help you work out how you and your family may best make use of what is enormous potential. But equally, to keep yourself and your family safe from what can be problematical. If you are concerned, we hope to reassure you that you are not the only ones experiencing worry and difficulties with this issue. We’re confident that whatever fears or conflict you may be having at the moment, letting us help and guide you can make a difference. We hope to help you gain the confidence and skills to make a difference in your family.

What can you do online?

One of the comments made repeatedly by parents we spoke to when researching and writing this book, even those with regular use themselves, was “What do they do on there?” Sometimes it was in exasperation, as in “What on earth do they find to spend so much time looking and tapping on those machines?” At other times it was genuine puzzlement, confusion and wonder as in “I really don’t understand the world they are accessing.” So before we go any further it is important to consider what young people (and you, in fact) can do and often choose to do on computers or devices. On the whole, we’re going to try to be sparing in naming particular websites, games, and applications purely because these change and develop so quickly – what is a favourite and ‘must use’ for our youngsters today will be used by parents tomorrow and old hat by next week. We will name some as examples – forgive us if they’ve already gone out of favour! But most of what you and your children can do fits into one or other or several of the following categories.

This is what people seek to do with digital devices:

Connect: be in touch with their face-to-face friends; be in touch with family; be in touch with people they see as friends but have never met; be in touch with random strangers; be in touch with a wider community.

Connect using: texts, messages, pictures, pre-filmed videos or live video calls via Facetime, Skype or Google Hangout, posts on social media sites. Accessing these via computers, phones, Blackberry Messenger, games consoles and other handheld or home-based devices. Information can be passed on through text-based messages, spoken word, videos with or without sound and emojis (little ideograms or pictures that convey emotion – a smile, a wink, a tear).

Talk anonymously: sites – forums and message boards – such as Yik Yak and Secret allow users to post anonymously with comments and questions – Ask.fm allows you the choice to show a name or be anonymous. Some sites are geofenced – that is, only allow you to be in contact with people near you. Or they use your own and other users’ contacts lists so that you are only in contact with people you know or who are known by people you know, albeit anonymously.

Find out stuff: use search engines such as Google and Bing to research and learn, for school/education, to research and learn for personal interest or to answer anxieties (about sex, health, weight, etc.) or go WWILFing (What Was I Looking For) – simply following links from one website you were on for a reason to another and then another, turning up all sorts of bits of information for the fun of it. Or follow links and look for websites suggested by friends or seen in the media.

Play games: play games alone; play games with friends; play online with friends; play online with other users; using websites, apps or games downloaded or on DVDs; on computers, laptops, tablets, phones or games consoles.

Be entertained: view films, TV programmes, videos, pictures on sites such YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram etc. Read books and other text content, on computers or reading devices such as Kindle. Listen to radio programmes.

Shop: using online shops or online facilities offered by real-world shops to buy toys, games, DVDs, clothing etc. etc. Also, to buy virtual or online items or add-ons for games, particularly multiplayer online role-playing games. With gift cards or vouchers or their parents’ credit or debit cards, with or without permission.

Music: stream music (ie play in real time on a website), download music (ie transfer music to your own device to play when you want when not on the internet) for free or paid; learn how to play a musical instrument, compose and make music and upload for friends or the wider community to enjoy.

Make content: take photos, write – either ‘diary entries’ (blogging), or short stories, novels, factual writing, plays or screenplays – make short or long videos (vlogging), make films, create animations or comics or graphic novels; do any or all of these for yourself, your friends and family, the world at large.

Send content: send texts, messages, pictures, sound files and videos to people you know.

Upload content: put videos on sites such as Vine or YouTube; photos, drawings, text and videos on sites such as Snapchat; texts, photos, audio and videos on sites such as WhatsApp; photos on sites such as Instagram. On some sites or apps you can keep the content private for the people you choose to invite to view, on others you can make them public. You should access and regularly check and update your privacy settings. You can’t always trust, however, private will remain private. Snapchat’s selling point was that users could send content to a controlled list of recipients – or one recipient – and set the amount of time before the content would delete itself. However, users found ways of saving snaps and then mailing these to other friends and an app was quickly developed that did this for you.

Chat with people you know: ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Contents
• Acknowledgements
• 1 Introduction
• 2 What parents tell us about their worries
• 3 The impact of the digital world on the family
• 4 The actual threats of the digital world
• 5 The opportunities of the digital world
• 6 Child development and technology
• 7 Adolescent development and technology
• 8 Positive parenting
• 9 The importance of communication
• 10 Co-parenting – digital technology when your family is divided
• 11 A family digital strategy
• Appendix: More help, support and information
• Index