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The smartphones have not defeated us. Yet.
Parents have a way to bring back childhood, but we have to act together to make it work.
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Over the last 15 years, as children began to receive these devices at ever younger ages, social media access followed inexorably.
PHOTO: ST FILE
Jonathan Haidt, Will Johnson and Zach Rausch
Since the dawn of the television age, parents have struggled to limit or guide their children’s screen time.
But with the arrival of smartphones that can – and do – go everywhere and with social media apps that teenagers now use for an average of five hours every day, many parents feel a sense of resignation. The struggle has been lost. Parents who try to delay giving a smartphone until high school or social media until 16 know that they’ll face the plaintive cry from their children: “But I’m the only one!”
