Parenting

Social Media and Youth Mental Health

Mary Beth Woodward — Wed, 19 Jul 2023 17:52:26 +0000

Social Media and Youth Mental Health Mary Beth Woodward Wed, 07/19/2023 - 13:52

In May of 2023, Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy released a new advisory on social media and youth mental health. He urges action to ensure social media environments are healthy and safe, as previously-advised national youth mental health crisis continues. As youth are currently on summer break and may have additional free time to use social media, it is important to share this advisory.

Dr. Murthy shared that social media use by youth is nearly universal. Up to 95% of youth ages 13–17 report using a social media platform, with more than a third saying they use social media “almost constantly.”

Children and adolescents are affected by social media in different ways based on their individual strengths and vulnerabilities, and based on cultural, historical, and socio-economic factors. Social media can provide benefits for some children, including serving as a source of connection for youth who are often marginalized, such as the LGBTQ+ community and people with disabilities, providing positive or identity-affirming content, creating a space for self-expression, and helping youth feel accepted. However, increasingly, evidence is indicating there is reason to be concerned about the risk of harm social media use poses to children and adolescents. Children and adolescents on social media are commonly exposed to extreme, inappropriate, and harmful content, and those who spend more than 3 hours a day on social media face double the risk of poor mental health, including experiencing symptoms of depression and anxiety. This is deeply concerning as a recent survey of teenagers showed that, on average, they spend 3.5 hours a day on social media.

This extreme content can be spread through direct pushes, unwanted content exchanges, and algorithmic designs. In certain tragic cases, childhood deaths have been linked to suicide- and self-harm-related content, as well as risk-taking challenges on social media platforms. This content may be especially risky for children and adolescents who are already experiencing mental health difficulties. Despite social media providing a sense of community for some, a systematic review of more than two dozen studies found that some social media platforms show live depictions of self-harm acts like partial asphyxiation, leading to seizures, and cutting, leading to significant bleeding. Further, these studies found that discussing or showing this content can normalize such behaviors, including through the formation of suicide pacts and posting of self-harm models for others to follow.

U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy said, “The most common question parents ask me is, ‘is social media safe for my kids’. The answer is that we don't have enough evidence to say it's safe, and in fact, there is growing evidence that social media use is associated with harm to young people’s mental health,” “Children are exposed to harmful content on social media, ranging from violent and sexual content, to bullying and harassment. And for too many children, social media use is compromising their sleep and valuable in-person time with family and friends. We are in the middle of a national youth mental health crisis, and I am concerned that social media is an important driver of that crisis – one that we must urgently address.”

There is broad concern among the scientific community that a lack of access to data and lack of transparency from technology companies have been barriers to understanding the full scope and scale of the impact of social media on child and adolescent mental health and well-being. While more research is needed to fully understand the impact of social media, this gap in knowledge cannot be an excuse for inaction.

The Advisory outlines some immediate actions we can take to make social media safer and healthier for youth. This burden cannot simply fall to parents and children. We must engage in a multifaceted effort to maximize the benefits and reduce the risk of harm posed by social media, with actions taken by groups across the spectrum: policymakers, technology companies, researchers, families, and children and adolescents themselves.

• Policymakers can take steps to strengthen safety standards and limit access in ways that make social media safer for children of all ages, better protect children’s privacy, support digital and media literacy, and fund additional research.

• Technology companies can better and more transparently assess the impact of their products on children, share data with independent researchers to increase our collective understanding of the impacts, make design and development decisions that prioritize safety and health – including protecting children’s privacy and better adhering to age minimums – and improve systems to provide effective and timely responses to complaints.

• Parents and caregivers can make plans in their households such as establishing Tech-Free Zones that help protect sleep and better foster in-person relationships, teach children and adolescents about responsible online behavior, and model that behavior, and report problematic content and activity.

• Children and adolescents can adopt healthy practices like limiting time on platforms, blocking unwanted content, being careful about sharing personal information, and reaching out if they or a friend need help or see harassment or abuse on the platforms.

• Researchers can further prioritize social media and youth mental health research that can support the establishment of standards and evaluation of best practices to support children’s health.

As your youth are home this summer with extended periods of down time it is encouraged to plan now how to fill these long periods of time without a screen being the center of focus. While not all youth are able to participate in community summer camps, enjoy time at the beach or pool there are still ways to engage in other time well spent activities. This is not to say that screen time should be entirely revoked, but monitoring and time allotment needs to be a priority of all caretakers and parents. Together, let’s spread the word of Dr. Murthy’s advisory!

Link to U.S. Department of Health and Human Services Surgeon General’s Advisory:

https://www.hhs.gov/about/news/2023/05/23/surgeon-general-issues-new-ad…

Blog tags

Youth Mental Health

Parenting

Childhood Wellness

Desiree Huffnagle, LSW,

Quality Improvement Coordinator/Zero Suicide Committee

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part III

Tara Aquila — Tue, 31 Aug 2021 15:44:51 +0000

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part III Tara Aquila Tue, 08/31/2021 - 11:44

Giving Children Choices Part Three

When I was raising my two boys, I was learning about giving choices. One winter's day, we took a walk in Washington Crossing State Park. It was here I decided to practice my new skill.

"OK, guys, we can take this trail or that trail. What's your choice?"

"Do you want to rest now, or shall we keep going?"

"I have a snack; do you want an orange or an apple?"

Sometimes they would ask me to do something.

"Can we go explore that area?"

"Can we sit on the stone wall?"

I would consciously try to frame it as a choice. "Yes, that is a good choice. I'm glad you thought of that." Rather than saying, "Yea" or simply "OK.” But this is not the point of the story. What happened next during the trip, I found amazing.

We came to a very unsafe-looking bridge. It was ice-covered and looked poorly constructed. Ed immediately asked, "Can we cross the bridge?" Instinctively I would respond with a loud "No!" But I calmed myself and said, "OK guys, you know I have been giving you choices this whole trip, but this time there is no choice here, that bridge is unsafe and icy, there is no choice, we are not crossing it."

To my amazement, both agreed, and we continued walking. Why was this so amazing? Ed was one of those kids that if you told him not to touch something, he had to touch it. I wouldn't say he was oppositional, but it was close. I think this was the first time Ed simply did what I asked without an argument or even ten thousand reasons why he should cross the bridge.

To be honest, it was just a good guess that I phrased my response that way ("Look, I been giving you choices all along, there is no choice here."). Years later, I found out that this technique has an official name. It's called "Cashing in.”

I discovered this when watching a video lecture from the parenting program “Love and Logic.” The lecturer described it as a bank account, you give children choices, lots of them, but when it comes to times that they cannot make a choice, you withdraw from the account. "Look, I've been giving you choices, but sometimes, I need to make a choice here." In general, children find this a reasonable argument and will not challenge you when you need to take over and choose for them.

One more thing about cashing in; it seems to work best if there is a reasonable explanation for not giving a choice.

"There is no choice here because it is unsafe."

"There is no choice here because, as the grown-up, I understand that this is not going so well, so I will stop it now."

If the child wants a more detailed explanations about why they cannot choose, you should provide them. However, in my experience, if you carefully explain why, you are denying the choice, the first explanation is usually enough.

Blog tags

Richard Lange, Ph.D., LPC, LCSW

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part II

Mary Beth Woodward — Mon, 09 Aug 2021 13:46:59 +0000

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part II Mary Beth Woodward Mon, 08/09/2021 - 09:46

In the last blog post, I talked about how giving children choices gives them some sense of power and control in their lives. Remember, children all day long are being told what to do. By providing children small choices in their lives, they feel that they have some say or some ability to make decisions independently.

In this part, we continue to discuss two different “choices” methods, the “forced choice” and the “alternative choice.”

Some children will refuse to make a choice. For example, you said to your child, “do you want to have milk or orange juice with your breakfast?”. Now, just to test to see if they have any power, some children will respond, “Neither, I am not going to choose.”

There are two ways of dealing with this. First, if the child is under six years (somehow it doesn’t work for children over six), you simply say, “Well, neither is a choice, I will give you one last chance to choose, and if you don’t make a choice, I will choose for you.” Surprisingly young children will always give in (they don’t want the power to be taken from them), “OK, I’ll take the milk.”

Over six, they might not buy this and dig their heels in: “I don’t care; I’m not going to drink either.” Here you can switch to the “alternative choice.”

“OK, maybe you are not in the mood for milk or orange juice. What would you like to drink? But one of the choices cannot be soda.” (Notice here you are giving what are called limited choices—this, this, but not this.) The child might have in mind they wanted to drink all along. “I want cholate milk.” Problem solved.

Or it could be possible they were just testing their power, and they might be thrown off that they can make a choice and are not prepared to decide what to drink, so they might ask, “What else do you have to drink.” So here again, you can use the limited choices, “Well, you can have cholate milk, water, yogurt drink, but no soda.”

Blog tags

center for family services

Richard Lange, Ph.D., LPC, LCSW

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part I

Mary Beth Woodward — Tue, 20 Jul 2021 20:05:05 +0000

Parenting - Giving Children Choices. Part I Mary Beth Woodward Tue, 07/20/2021 - 16:05

Image the daily life of a child.

"Elijah, you need to get up for school now.”

“Elijah, you need to brush your teeth now!”

“Elijah, stop yelling at your sister and get down here.”

“Elijah, do you have your bookbag? Where is your homework?”

“Elijah, you need to hurry, or you will miss the bus."

When Elijah gets to school, it starts again.

"No running on the playground!”

“Put your pencils away now.”

“No talking in the hallway."

From the time a child gets up to when they are ready for bed, children are being told what to do. So, it's no wonder some children will rebel against this. "Stop telling me what to do!" "I know, I know!" and the famous "You’re not the boss of me!"

These outbursts are not meant to be rude; they are reactions to a life of being told what to do all the time. While children still need directions (children cannot be left to make all their decisions, they are simply too young), there can be minor decisions children can make on their own, ones which give them the impression that they have some say in their lives and are not always being told what to do.

In the next couple of articles, I will explore this topic in more depth, but to get us started, we can explore some straightforward choices that children can be given to help them feel that they have some say in their lives to feel more empowered.

Start by giving your children simple choices.

"It's time for bed. Do you want to wear your yellow pajamas or red ones?"

"It's bath time. Do you want bubbles in the bath or not?"

"It's time for homework. Do you to do it at the kitchen table or in your room?"

Notice that these choices are simple, but more importantly, the parent is still in charge of the situation. Poor use of options would be "Do you want to go to bed or not?" That gives the child too much power. Bedtime is not a choice. Bedtime should be a regular set time (with some exceptions). However, what pajamas they wear can be a choice.

Think about what simple things you can let your children choose.

A shirt to go out and play: " "Do you want to wear the blue or yellow shirt."

How to help around the house: "I need help. Do you want to sweep the floor or help me unpack these groceries?"

And schedules: "Do you want to do your homework right after school or wait until later?"

Check back soon for more parenting tips!

Blog tags

Richard Lange, Ph.D., LPC, LCSW