206. Technology & Families With Psychologist Brad Marshall

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Welcome to a special episode. Here we've got a phenomenal guest. We're going to listen and hear a lot more about him, his story and what he does. And that's just Drew McKenna. We've also got a friend that he's brought along called Brad, but I'm just kidding. We've got an amazing psychologist. He's called the unplugged psychologist. And a lot of the specialties around Brad Marshall is really helping us navigate in the modern world with technology, the good, the bad and the ugly. And we also do have. Yes, we've got Drew McKenna, one of our mindset and performance coaches on the inside of our HPF program. But, Brad, thanks for joining us, mate. Love having you on and looking forward to a bumper episode for the men.

Yeah, thanks for having me on.

Pleasure, mate. And Drew, how are you traveling, mate? Good to have you on here as well. It's been a little while since we've done a podcast.

It's been a long time. I'm just here for the ride.

Yes, well, we're definitely going to pep around examples and stories, obviously with Brad, but with myself and with you, Drew, us all being fathers and the ins and outs of fatherhood and I guess the role of technology. Before we dive into that, I'd love for you to just share a little bit about yourself, Brad, and what you do just to paint a bit more of a clearer picture for our listeners.

Yeah, sure. So I guess I have many hats. I'm a child psychologist, as you said, by training or by trade. And in the last sort of 10 to 15 years, I somehow found my way into gaming and screen addiction. Some people call it addiction, other people don't. But anyway, so I have a clinic called the Screens and Gaming Disorder Clinic in Sydney, and we see hundreds of kids every year with all sorts of difficulties with screens and gaming. I also do a lot of speaking events with parenting authors and other sort of conferences, training for police education, teachers, parents. I wrote a book called the Child. Sorry, got the name of my own book wrong. The Tech Diet for your child and Teen, which went to about 12 different countries in a couple of different languages, which is pretty cool. And on top of that, I'm doing a PhD at the moment because I didn't have enough on. So I'm doing clinical research in that. And the running joke between my wife and I is that if I ever come home and say I'm going to run for Parliament, she's going to leave me. So that's where she draws the line. I'm not allowed to become a politician apparently, but yeah, so many hats. But most of the time in my clinic and helping families.

And you're apparently planning a run around Australia as well at the same time.

Yeah, I think that would be another one of those in the basket. If she's going to leave me if I do that.

I don't think Ash is there for that.

No, she wouldn't be happy.

Yes, Lots of moving parts and, you know, it sounds like a pretty phenomenal rap sheet when it comes to spreading the message. And the Tech Diet wouldn't mind diving into a little bit more around, I guess, what that entails. And then also, why did you. Why did you then sort of veer into that or specialize and start to move into that space?

Yeah. So, I mean, the why, how did I end up where I am? I typically tell this sort of this story or this anecdote about. It wasn't by design. I was a child psychologist about 15 years ago in a major hospital in Sydney. And, you know, we were sitting around what they call an intake meeting with heaps of, you know, professors and doctors and whatnot and very experienced people. And the first real referral that I'd ever heard of for a, you know, gaming disorder or gaming addiction. Came across the table as a young bloke, 13 I think at the time, had dropped out of all sport, wasn't sleeping, was barely going to school because he was engrossed in this online Harry Potter world. And so as this professor who's running the meeting is saying, well, who's going to see this young Man. Everyone was very quiet and of course I was as well. I was the most inexperienced person in the room. And he finally said, well Brad, you're it. And I said, what do you mean I'm it? And I said, I don't know anything about this. And he said, well, you game, don't you? And you know, I was a youngish bloke in the room and so sure I'd gamed as a young fella, he said, well therefore you know more about this than anyone else does in this room, so you're it. And that's literally how I ended up on this path. It wasn't because I set out to do it, it's just because I was a young male psychologist who knew something about gaming and therefore had to apply. So, you know, 10, 15 years later I've really had to do some trial and error in what works for families. And then about three years ago I wrote the book as well. It was another scenario where I wasn't looking to write a book. I'd had a couple of publishing houses approach me about doing that and I'd said no because they basically wanted most of them an academic style book. You know, what do clinicians do, what academics do, what doctors do. And to be honest with you, that kind of bored me. I thought, well, no one's going to read that. It wasn't until one publishing house, HarperCollins and the publisher there really had a vision for a book for parents. Write it in a style that his parents that are stressed can read, don't write it in a stuffy academic style. And that just piqued my interest. So that's why I ended up writing the book. It's very much for parents, it's not academic, you know, I put a bit of research stuff in there but I just try and make it relatable to parents who are often really stressed in these situations.

That's a great approach too, mate. Look, I find that sometimes it doesn't matter how much information or the quality information they have, it's just, is it received? Can you connect? Is it something that they're actually going to absorb and take on board? And if you're not speaking the same language, it'll never be understood, will it?

Absolutely, absolutely.

That's great, mate. What. I guess diving into that and now with obviously a fair chunk of experience under the belt, what is the biggest problem or what are the issues that you see? You know, families, so mothers and fathers, but families, parents and the children who are immersing or engaging in technology Maybe in excessive ways. What have you found, mate? What's the biggest problem that we currently face today in the house?

I mean, look, obviously I could list 100, if I just hone in on a couple here of common issues that sort of walk through the door in my clinic from a parenting perspective. And if we just talk mainly about fathers, I suppose quite often it's a lack of understanding of why kids are on screens and how they get hooked on it or addicted on it. Because, you know, I've often heard dad say to me, well mate, you know, I gamed back in the day, it wasn't that addictive. Look at me, I turned out just fine. And I really have to go through, in my book or my talks in my clinic, how gaming and screens in general has changed. And when I talk about gaming and screens, I'm not just talking about gaming, I'm talking about social media, I'm talking about YouTube, Netflix, streaming services, the whole package. And so, you know, the products that are out there for kids these days are much more addictive. And what I mean by that is the dopamine levels that are returned to the brain are much higher than they were in the 80s and 90s, right, when we all grew up playing, I don't know, Madden 92 or something, or Mario Kart on Nintendo 64, they're much higher. And so parents first of all have to appreciate how that works and that this is not the same scenario that they were up against some 20 or 30 years ago. Once they do that, the next, I guess step is for parents to understand what the warning signs are. And I'll go through some of them now, but you know, I'm not going to do it in a diagnostic way, right? Like I can sit here and quote to the fathers at home the diagnostic criteria for the World Health Organization for gaming disorder. And that's going to bore everyone. So I guess if we just look at holistically, what should parents be looking for? Screens and gaming impacts kids in five main areas of development. So there's the impact it has on emotional development, social development, education, behavior and health. And when I say health, health is not technically a developmental domain, but we're talking about sleep, exercise, nutrition. And I know you guys are not only, but sort of have your roots in that exercise, nutrition sort of field. And I can give you some examples that will just blow your mind, right? So I've had kids in the clinic this year, you know, primary school age kids that have blood work, that comes back where they've got a fatty Liver from being so sedentary, right. At age 10, I've had teenagers that have such low bone density from being so still and so sedentary that they've got a fractured femur, right? Like a hairline fracture of the femur when they get back to school. But this is not just clinical examples, this is also in the research, right? So there's a guy named Professor Leon Straker in the NWA who looks into this, you know, the impacts on eyes, on diet, on sugar intake, on obesity, on muscle strain, on everything you can imagine from screens. So that's just the health one anyway. But what we ask parents to do is look at those five main areas of development. And this is what my book does, and this is what I do in talks. And just look at. Compared to. If you say, if you have a child that's, I don't know, 11 and they're in year five, look at other boys that are in year five and compare him or her to that. So what I mean is, if you have a, you know, a year five child that has dropped out of every single sport that you could possibly imagine and just wants to sit at home and be on screens, that I would suggest to you is slightly different and out of keeping with what you would find for other year five kids. And that would be a warning sign, right? Versus if you have a year 8 child that's dropped out of sport or doesn't want to play footy anymore, that's fine. But then the question is, well, what are you going to do instead of that? So if you don't. If you don't play footy anymore, that's fine, right? I'm on the record as being the world's worst footballer. I played football, soccer for 32 years. I never scored a goal. My brother still gives me stick about that every Christmas. I was horrible. But I kept playing. I don't know why. I just. I thought I was going to get better. I never did so. But I think so. Kids go through that naturally in the teenage years. That's a normal stage of development. But the question then needs to be, if you don't want to play that, you tell me, what else are you going to do? You're going to do parkour, you're going to do gymnastics, you're going to do badminton. I don't care what it is, but you've got to do something, right? Not drop out so that you can become an esports champion or a gaming champion or sit on the couch. So for those five main areas and I go through examples of all of those. Social development, education. The education is a good one, right? Especially in the teenage years, you'll find that if kids are starting to skip days or not hand in assessments or not hand them in on time or rush through them so crazy quick that it's just not good work coming back, then I would suggest that that is the start of a warning sign that screens are getting in the way. So much so that just last week I was asked to go and speak at a police event for, you know, youth liaison officers and police commanders and stuff, because one of the biggest things they see these days in school refusal, which is kids just not going to school, or aggression in the home, is when parents are trying to take screens away. So even the, you know, New South Wales police are pulling their hair out going, what do we do about this? So I could keep going, but I hopefully I've sort of answered your question there a bit, Alex.

Yeah, no, that's been some really solid insights there, mate, especially around, well, the one around health. But I guess the big thing for us, even for men and fathers trying to invest in themselves and change their life, is how do we have that ripple effect to help our children? And the common denominator always seems to be the first step is awareness. So when you said that they don't know why they're on screens excessively or they don't know how it becomes a maintained addiction, I think they're two really fascinating points that we could probably explore and then look at, you know, at the back end of this episode, possible how to's and maybe suggestions and advice for fathers. So I guess, mate, I mean, that's a crazy. I remember looking at one of your posts around the sleep. Fifteen years ago, you know, children were 30% sleep deprived and now it's 70%. I mean, you couple that with what Brad just said, that's pretty insane, isn't it, Drew? Because you do a lot of the performance work with the fathers. You tell me, how do the fathers and the men who are our members, so they've got the right environment. How are they operating when they don't have the right sleep and routines to wake up for the next day?

Well, everything goes out the window, as you know, and we're no, no different to that. But plenty of the dads, there's some guys that work on three or four hours sleep because that's just them. Others get three or four hours sleep and they know that they're going to be ratchet for the next day. And you Just go, you know what, it's pointless, mate. Don't, don't even bother training. Don't worry about. And when you get to know the blokes well enough and they'll go, oh, mate, I feel I didn't get much sleep on. This has happened and blah, blah, blah, and you go, mate, I don't want you to train. Just go and do what you got to do for the day and that's it. Because of how much that impacts. And that follow flows on with the way they behave with the kids, with themselves. They get frustrated really easy over dumb stuff and then it just flows on. And I've seen that happen with kids too. Pardon me? Like, even little kids like Brad, as you know, ours aren't very old and they're all about the same age. So. But you watch them and they're like six and under and you see. Or seven and under, eight and under and you see when they're missing out on sleep. And it's not even because of video games half the time. It's just because they haven't had enough sleep. And the kind of mood and behavior that they're in all the time when they're like that and you go, mate, by three o' clock in the afternoon, you want to punt them to their room because they're just out of control. And if you could couple that with kids that are only getting three hours sleep, imagine what that's going to be like. That's going to be. I'll use that word that I used the other day, exponential for. It's not even a word. But Brad knows I like to make words up.

But making words up, that's great.

It is very damaging though, isn't it, when you look at like, I mean, I guess it's almost like, is it the excess of dopamine or is it something that is really unwholesome when you couple, they're not doing sport, they're getting no sleep. So just like a father would be grumpy or triggered or irritated or frustrated. Shorter temperament. Temperament or short fuse. Well, the same probably applies to children. You're right, Drew. Like, I'll find that with my kids, whether they're overtired or they're just crazy early in the afternoon, you're like, wow, this is a real tough afternoon I've got ahead of me. Whether it could be nightmares, sickness and whatnot, when they're not getting sleep through some of those different pathways, it's challenging enough as it is, let alone when it's voluntary through excessive Screen time. Is that what you see when you dial it in on a more specific level with the kids you work with? Brad, you just mentioned aggression with the youth and working with the police. But what are some of the common things you see? I guess could you explain how that addiction is formed, like dopamine, that the perceived reward or what they're getting, or. So fathers can understand a bit more what's happening when they let their kids have that time?

Yeah. So I think a couple of the different points that you've raised there about how dads might be able to hone in on this. So when I refer to why this is different to 20 or 30 years ago, if I just give the really short and sharp version, essentially, there are many different reasons as to why social media and gaming and both together have what we call persuasive technology in them, which is just a fancy term for all the psychological underpinnings that the gaming and social media industry, I guess, use. There's an entire degree at Stanford. I forgot what the degree is called. But essentially it's a master's, and you need to be a psychologist or someone of the sort to get into it. And essentially they teach this persuasive technology they have done since about the mid-2005, 2010, around then. And if you look at the track record of all the people that go to Amazon or Netflix or any of these places and make a success, they've been through this training program, right? And so it's a very targeted, specific thing. So we can talk about the concept of flow, which is this idea that you need to make a game or a product increasingly more difficult in order for it to be, you know, for someone to enter, especially a child, into this idea of flow, which means that you lose track of time. It's associated with the distortion of time. You know, same technique that's been used by the gambling industry for God knows how long. And there are a lot of similarities in this, Right? So if you look back to the 1980s, and one of my mentors and research mentor, Professor Wayne Warburton, who I work with now, you know, he cut his teeth in gambling research in the 80s and 90s and whatnot, and. And people, like, laughed at that time that gambling was thought as an addiction, right? No, it's not. It's nothing. What are you talking about? It's fine. And now we sit here and go, well, of course it's an addiction. Right. So I would make a similar parallel for families out there. If there are fathers out there that can recognize that gambling for some people, not all, of course, I don't mind a punt, but for some people, they just, they can't manage it. So there's similar pathways that are used in persuasive technology. But the other really big one that you touched on, Alex, is this idea of dopamine. So for dads out there, dopamine is the feel good chemical, right? We get it from sugar, we get it from lots of different places, drugs, but you also get it from screens. And what we know in the functional MRI studies that we've done on the health side of this is that, you know, if you give a child a game or a product that is offline, there is a small amount of dopamine to the brain if you give them a product that is online. So they're gaming now with someone online, it doesn't matter if it's their best mate from school or someone from the other side of the world, it gives a much bigger dopamine effect. And essentially that's what's different between now and 20 or 30 years ago. One of the main things anyway, right, is that we were playing games where the only way to get that bigger dopamine hit is if you've got three mates sitting in the room with you playing FIFA. But you can't do that now. You can sit in a dark room and you can do that 24, 7. You don't need your mates can be at school, but you're playing with your mates from the US or India or wherever. So things are changing. And I guess the other point that I would make here, for fathers out there to really understand this industry, the gaming industry is worth something around £170. Billion. Okay? That's not social media, that's just gaming. If you look at the social media giants like Meta or even Google, Microsoft, they've all started buying up in the last year gaming companies. Now that's not by mistake. They're doing it because they know it's very profitable. So as Facebook's users and things go down, Meta has started buying, as has Microsoft. So Microsoft just bought a gaming company called Blizzard and Activision earlier this year, right? They're responsible for Call of Duty and World of Warcraft and Candy Crush and all these things, right? They bought it for just under 100 billion Australian dollars. Billion. So you're talking about all these companies are starting to meld together because they know that when the metaverse comes and we're all talking about 3D metaverse stuff and I won't go down that rabbit hole, but that this is a very profitable industry. Now, the reason I tell families that, and fathers that is because we have to understand here, this is an unfair fight. If I want to do research, which I'm doing at the moment, and I want to do a functional MRI scan as brain scan, right, I have to pay, I have to get funding for a thousand dollars per brain scan, even though I'm at a government, I'm at a Macquarie University, I'm at a major university, right, I need $1,000 per scan. Do you think I can get that funding in the health world? No chance. Absolutely no chance. I've tried. No chance. Now, the gaming industry have almost $200 billion to throw around, so they have dopamine labs, they have functional MRI machines that every time they're making a new app or a new game or whatever it may be, they test it all on a neurological level. They can tell you if there's a game. If I make that character red versus blue, what's the dopamine level? If I put that sound instead of that sound, what's the dopamine level? That's how, you know, that's how detailed this research gets. So again, for fathers, the point of all of this is it's an unfair fight. If your kids are getting stuck on screens, it's not because there's something wrong with them, it's because they're being persuaded by an industry that is a machine.

That's insane, man. Like, that is. I mean, maybe it's not a word you might agree with, but I think that's complete manipulation, especially with such vulnerable minds. Most adults in their 20s, let's say you're 18, right, and you're at the legal age. It's like most people in their 20s are still trying to work their way through the world after schooling and education and social groups and relationships and careers and money and business like, let alone your children, who have such a sponge like mind and they're so susceptible regardless of whether they're 6 or 16. That's crazy. But I really like how you just reaffirmed that, you know, for a lot of parents and fathers especially, that you're right, mate. It's not the kid's fault. And you can see that, seen that when I've done little bits of tech time, like reading Eggs with my girls and yeah, sure, it's educational, but you just see this, it's like a, you know, a waving in front of the eyes and they just get entrenched, man. It's like they're in. It's trance is probably the word I'd use, Brad. That that's, that's what it looks like. And this is with me, with very good control and balance with what the children actually do with the tech, let alone if you're fully immersed. And look, the dopamine. The thing I find when you shared that about the FIFA with the mates, is you're not always focused on the screen, are you? In between, you're looking at mates, you're hi fi. You may be hacking shit or taking the piss or stirring. And that's great because there's still that physical human element and connection. Whereas when you're doing that with your mates, you're still doing that channel through the screen, aren't you? So I can see how even though, let's say the dopamine might have been bigger when you're playing with mates or the same size as opposed to then playing alone, but with people online, I think it's definitely more wholesome because you still have that human element and it can break up the actual, the connection into the screen. But what's this all. Probably two things, Brad. We'll start with, I guess, the dangers, like what is all this becoming and what is this leading to for children and families? And then I guess, secondly, why do you think they jump on technology to start with? Are they missing something? Is their father not being present, engaging in sports with them? And I've asked two there, mate, but I mean, we can ask the second one after you answer the first. But yeah, where's all this going? And why do they get to that point in the first place where they're starting to dive onto the screen a little bit too much?

Yeah. So if I answer the first question, you know, it's a really tricky one. I mean, essentially, where is all this going? Is a hard one to answer because we are about 10 years behind. When I say we, I mean the health research is about 10 years behind the gaming industry and the screens industry. Okay. So we're so far woefully underfunded that parents asked me, well, what does all this mean for long term and all the rest of it? I mean, I have some studies. So, for example, there's a longitudinal study out of the US in 2019 by a guy named Paulus. I shouldn't assume it's a guy, sorry, an academic named Paulus who did 11,000 kids over four years and did functional MRI scans. Right. Because somehow they got funding, which is great. What they found is that when kids go over seven Hours of recreational screen use a day. Seven hours of recreational use. Doesn't matter if that's reading eggs or YouTube or Netflix or gaming or whatever. It doesn't matter that they actually proved that the brain cortex was thinning prematurely. It's not good. Right? So what does that mean for those kids when they're 10 years on? Does it recover and just, you know, maybe, who knows? It's all uncharted territory. We don't know. But am I going to risk my kids brain cortex from that? No, I'm not going anywhere near seven hours. Now. That doesn't mean, and I get this a lot as of like, oh, gee, so your kids, you know, they must never be on screens. No, that's a lie. I mean, there are days where I'm stressed or I'm tired or I'm sick and my kids will be watching TV or doing something else. But it's about balance, right? So there are some, some studies there around seven hours and fathers would be at home going, oh, my child doesn't get anywhere near that. Well, 10% of Australian teenagers were doing more than seven hours before COVID before. So I'm thinking it's bigger after Covid. And again, we've got to remember here, this is not like a discussion about seven hours of gaming. You know, you get those fathers or parents that say, you know, standing around the footy pitch on the side, oh, my child doesn't game, you know, during the weekends I stop him, you know, I just take the device. Well, that's fine. But if he's got a phone, he's watching eight hours of YouTube. The research says there's no difference in that. No difference, Right. So I think fathers get overwhelmed as well. Because if you're sitting there speaking to another dad and he's claiming that his kids don't game and he's got some perfect scenario going on, he's not actually telling you the full story. Right? So I think, where is this headed? This is headed where? In my experience, for kids that have somewhere between three and five or six hours a day of recreational screen use, you start to get those impacts I was talking about on development. You know, the five areas I was talking about, it's different for every child. But when you go over seven hours, we have measurable neurological impact. So that's stuff that we wouldn't go anywhere. I've forgotten your second question, Al. What was your second question?

Why are they on the screens? What are they missing or lacking in their environment? That's not guiding them towards better Options or choices.

So we know in Australian populations now that when we do studies in Australian schools in the last couple of years, and this has been replicated time and time again, that about 10% of Australian kids are at risk or have subclinical levels of gaming and screen disorders. 10%, okay. About 1 to 3% have clinical diagnosis. Like, you're coming to my clinic type thing. Right. But if you just think about how many kids that is, there's like 4 or 5 million kids in Australia, according to the statistics. You're talking about 500,000 kids that are at risk. And so this is the quiet pandemic, you know, from my view, where no one's really doing anything from a government and a health perspective other than a private clinic like mine. The shame of this is that if you can't afford to go to a private clinic like mine, then you don't get help. And that is, if I'm honest, pretty shameful in this country. So I'm the biggest proponent for there should be free access or at least some kind of subsidized healthcare access to this. And if that put me out of business, then I'd be okay with that. Right. So to answer your question, though, about what are the triggers or the risk factors, I guess, is what we would call them, you know, what are the underlying things? It's different for every child. So there are no one risk factor. There are six or seven common ones that you find. So things like if there is increased family conflict at home for whatever reason, that can be everything from, you know, mum got cancer and dad's really stressed and the whole house is in conflict through to a domestic violence situation, through to, you know, strained marriages or whatever it may be. But that's just one risk factor. Another is something called difficulties with impulse control and processing speed. Again, I won't bore dads at home, but essentially it's a neurological impact. It's one that kind of. You get born with. It's a genetic type 1. So social disconnection is another one. So for a lot of these risk factors, we end up in a chicken in the egg situation. Did this young man or young lady become socially disconnected and therefore go to screens and start to use them excessively, or did they start using screens excessively because the industry persuades you to do that? And we chased dopamine and then they became disconnected from real world. We don't know in every situation, clinically, it can be one, it can be both, it can be the other.

It's fascinating, isn't it mate. When you look at that, I think one of the biggest things is what you said, Brad, that there's no real spotlight from a larger governing body or organ. There's no real spotlight on this being, let alone a spotlight on it being a problem, you know, that needs us collectively together. If it's half a million, you know, that's a lot. And that's not to say maybe there's 1.5 million that are. Because could be 10 years behind like you said with the research that are maybe being slightly affected, that could just drop their quality of life by 10 to 20% as they enter adulthood. Who knows mate? This is the hard part. Even with the social distancing and the pandemic in the last couple of years where people don't understand that the damage hasn't even started yet. When it comes to generational damage with social connections, social order, belief systems, living out of fear, driving through a level of resilience, solving problems, taking, taking action when they feel like they couldn't. Or just you know, being someone who trains their subconscious from excessive screen time where they don't think as much as they should, or become critical thinkers. It's quite, it's quite scary, mate, to be fair. So you know, it's just that number alone, half a million is scary, let alone. Okay, what about the ones that may be affected? We might not have the up to speed data or time or research to go.

Wow.

I mean that's a, that's. And it is something that we shouldn't just turn a blind eye to. Cause you're right, I look now and I'm like, yeah, well my kids don't game. But essentially if they watch Paw Patrol one or two movies and then they select some music because we, you know, we play some fun songs and whatnot on Spotify. Children's songs. There you go. There's some screen time couple with reading eggs. Yeah, you know what Stella my could do probably two and a half hours a day to three hours and then. And she doesn't on most days. But essentially the big thing is awareness or lies. This can creep in. You can't just justify a pigeonhole and go, oh, you know, they're not on YouTube. But also they're okay, that's a good environment. Reading eggs. Because education is like no, that's not the point. It's. It's the connection and relationship that they're making with this, this device. And then the chemical releases which. It's almost like it trains the monkey mind mate where this is what we Want monkey gets rewarded it.

Yeah. I mean, I think that some of those apps you were talking about, reading eggs and stuff like that, it's not as big of a dopamine effect. And so therefore, you know, parents feel like they're on top of it. When your child's three or six or seven or eight, really, the crunch time becomes later in primary school and we see this even in the sort of a paper that I released last year on this. There's this critical period between sort of year five and year six and then high school where if you don't have good boundaries in place and good techniques and discussions about this and plans in place in primary school, again, I'm not trying to be an alarmist and say that every child's going to have this problem. 90% of them don't. Right. But for the 10%, when you go into year seven, that's where we see a lot of these symptoms and problems really just exacerbate pretty quickly.

Yeah. Wow. Do you think, like when we're talking about the environment and socially disconnected, the chicken and the egg, like it's never for me, it's not a pointing the finger or a judge or judgment or blame thing. Although I'll tell you what I mean, persuasive courses in university certainly have an agenda that may not serve with the best interests of heart as opposed to margins and bottom line and profits, that's for sure. But the environment of the children, who controls that? It's the parents. Right? I mean, that's why we look at on the inside. For fathers who are still in a marriage, your marriage is critical because you and your wife collectively, that's why Marri has an important role because that creates the stability for the household and the environment for the children, that plays a big role. But I guess instead of just focusing on the bad, the negative, we should probably focus on, you know, when fathers listening to this might have that problem, focus on the opportunity and maybe the ownership and responsibility. And I might just throw to you quickly, Drew, and then we'll, we'll go to you, Brad, with maybe some tips or advice for fathers and what they could do. But what do you see as being one of the great things when the father does take responsibility over the environment, what does that then mean for the children and what opportunities are there?

Well, we've seen on the inside, Al, that it creates a much more stable environment because you've got that great. Well, the blokes are leading by example. They're taking that time to go, you know what and it might be at different stupid times in the morning we've got guys that go and train at 4 o', clock, but their kids still know that they're going to go and train and they've got work to do. They're going to get them stuff ready for school, to drop them at school, go to work, come home, do all the things with sports, right, I've got to run it, run around for footy. And I'm not saying that mums don't do that too, because they do. But when you've got both parents in that same environment doing this on the even keel and the leadership is coming from the father and there is property leadership there, it's not right, I'm going to tell you what to do. It's not a dictatorship, it's one where guys, you're having that chat between each other going, oh, what do you reckon we do about this? Okay, yep, no worries. And that's when you see not just the kids or the dad, but you see the whole family start to really kick goals. And that's where they start to get more benefit and more, what do you call it? They're getting a lot more their love out of just being outside doing things because they're taking the time to go out and do things they're not entrenched in just doing all the work, they're not entrenched and just doing housework and giving them dumb shitty things on YouTube to go and watch or, okay, mate, here's the PlayStation 5 control. Off you go. They're getting that balance that Brad was talking about where there are days where even here we'll just bang the telly on and go, mate, you know what, you guys are driving us insane right now. Watch a movie and then we'll come back in a minute and once we've been able to recoup, get a few things done and then we'll come back when they will disappear down the path. And it's about that balance. And once you've got that balance through the leadership in the family, then that creates a much more wholesome environment that's been able to kick goals and be able to get that spread where you're not relying on technology quite so much. Because it's funny, I tend to think of all the things that dad used to do with us when we were kids. So you go, right, what was weekends? Well, weekends you might watch the cartoons for an hour at breakfast time and back then they weren't on all the time, they were only on like a 30 minute period. And out of that 30 minutes there was 10 minutes of ads. So you only saw 20 minutes a show. And then that'd be already dressed and you'd be still in your pajamas and you go, right, how come we're going? Where are we going? We're going down the beach, we're going down the park, we're going on our bikes, we're doing something. And rather than just sitting around and loafing on the lounge because our dad's busy doing whatever or he's busy working or whatever it is, sometimes that's. You can't get around that. But it's how you manage the balance off on the external of that. And that's where we got dads that can't do that to start with. And then once you give them that awareness that you really see kids even, they might start to come off the gadgets as well. There's some kids that have dropped off the gadgets and going, you know what, I only need it for an hour. And other ones, they're still having that battle that blows. Like Brad would be able to help them out with because of that. That. Actually I just wanted to quickly go back to when, when you said aggression with video games and things and the dopamine that comes off video games. Now we don't play a lot of video games at home. I've got a gadget there that doesn't get turned on too often for games. Sometimes, like the three of us will sit and play. So it'll be Addie, Ashton and myself will sit and play for a bit. And when, when you take the gadget off, like the control off Addie, she's much more understanding. But because Ash is only four, you take the control off him and because of that dopamine, he just ramps it up hard and goes, nah, nah. Throws a massive tantrum because he doesn't want to come off the game. And you go, mate, it's been half an hour now. That's all we're doing, put it down. And then. But because as you say, the games have changed so much. Where before we used to play like you'd want to get to a safe point. Went back in Alex the kid because. Because you knew that you'd lose all that game data. So you're there for the next 20 minutes to get that save point, but now you can save it anywhere. So it doesn't make that much of a difference. But that connection with the game and the little, the world that they build now is incredible.

Yeah, I think it gets A little bit complicated these days, Drew, because it's not as simple as sort of just saving it at a certain point. And maybe for a four year old it is. But for older kids with fathers out there, with older kids, there are games out there that essentially, if you leave before the game ends, if you look at CS Go, or some of these first person shooter games, games, you leave before the game ends, you get banned from the game for like a day or a week, right? So literally, yeah. So you know, the games are persuasive in that way, right? And they get more persuasive as kids get older, essentially. But I think that when you guys were just talking, then one thing to point out to parents here is that parents that are sitting there going, okay, well where do I start with this, right? So many parents come in to say to me and fathers as well, like, well he's 12 or he's 14, he's going to have to learn how to deal with technology because technology is all around us. And I don't disagree with that. But that is like saying, and I use this analogy all the time when I'm giving talks to students because I go out and talk to school students quite a bit as well. In fact, just did recently at Saint Aloysius in Milson's Point. Really intelligent blokes, Year eight guys. So I use this analogy of short sugar, this idea of a healthy diet, right? So everyone can agree, kids will even agree with you, even the most Sturden 14 year old teenager who wants to argue every point with you because that's what teenage boys do. They can agree that there is some limit to any sugar intake that you should have, right? Depending on where that is. Now the amount of teaspoons of sugar and the heart association and what they recommend is one thing, but they can agree with that. And so what I say to young blokes and to parents is, well, for parents, you're not going to just stack the cupboards full of chocolate and ice cream and all this sort of stuff and then leave and say, now don't eat that because you know that the kids are going to eat it, right? It's the same effect as dopamine. Me as a 14 year old bloke, I did, I can remember sneaking ice cream out of the freezer and trying to make sure I didn't take too much so it wasn't noticed. Like it's a temptation. So you know, this idea that teenagers or kids are going to be able to regulate their own screen use is just fancy on A neurological level, they are not old enough. Their prefrontal cortex and their amygdala will not allow them for at least 10%, if not more of them. Right. So you do have to put healthy boundaries in, in the same way that you would encourage healthy eating. So, you know, Alex was talking before about that idea of having some, you know, giving them choices. And so what we're talking about there is, is it's a. Hey, mate, listen, you can have an hour of a movie today. Do you want to do that this morning or do you want to do that this afternoon? Now that's not a question of how much do you want to have or when are you going to come off or anything. I'm just giving you the decision. Now, most kids are going to choose the earlier time, right, because they want it quicker. But that's the same thing you would say with a diet. Hey, listen, you can have one sometimes food today, you can have one ice cream or you can have one treat. When do you want it? Are they going to ask you later? Yeah, of course they are, but we're going to cap it at that. I think if we talk about Alex though, you know, you mentioned what's the take home for parents? What do they do if there are parents out there in the primary school age, kids that are physically taking devices that will probably work until they hit somewhere around 10, 11, 12. Physically taking devices creates a lot of confrontation and it's really difficult to do. It's what I call in my book and my videos, guerrilla warfare. Right? Like I took that phone from them and then the 12 year old's like, you know, commando crawling through the bedroom to steal it back. Or I've had kids like put the book in the laptop case and the parent wakes up the next morning. It's like a science book in a laptop case. Hilarious, right? And again, like you, you shouldn't get angry at that. That's just essentially you didn't kind of check that. Right? So essentially what I encourage parents to do is think more as kids are older at removing the WI fi. You've got to do that on a mobile phone level, which is complicated because the telcos don't help you with that. But also fundamentally with a home router system, and there are some out there that are software systems that are really tricky because they claim to be able to do stuff and they can't. Kids can get around them really easy, but essentially a home WI fi system that allows you to set limits or turn things on and off really quickly without having to run around and go, where's your iPad? Where's your phone? Where's your laptop? Where's your school laptop? Where's the iPhone 6s that I had? And I put it in the bottom of the filing cabinet and I didn't know you had it. You know, like you've. Rather than deal with every single device in the house, which is like a dozen, if we manage the home wifi, then it does remove a lot of the dopamine from that. So what I'm saying is, even if a child manages to get that iPhone from you in the middle of the night because you're tired and you're asleep, if there's no WI fi to it, it is much less dopamine to the brain. So half of your solution is there.

That's a great point, mate. I love it. And a lot of the times, I think, Brad, it comes down to a container or some sort of framework where you just, I guess communication is very important. You're just starting to build these agreements and children, through no fault of their own, and through the attractions or lures, they're going to break those agreements. I mean, I laughed the other day with my wife. I was like, man, children are the biggest hypocrites in the daugh. Lillian will take something, but she won't want to give it or share it. I'm like, man, it's insane, that hypocrisy. I mean, it obviously exists on a large level with adults, but with children, it's rife. They don't even know, right, a lot of times. So how do we build this communication to a level where we can have this framework of agreements? And it's like, okay, you have the ace up your sleeve or the trump card when it comes to WI fi or other things. But like you said, giving them this framework and is a simple example, like, okay, cool, you know, we can have some, some, some tech time today. It can be for an hour. Do you want it in the morning, in the afternoon? And just giving them options within a scope of what you, with your developed adult mind, can see the benefits and the ROI by having some give and take, but not something that just becomes distorted or manipulated. And yeah, I guess a great point is what Drew was saying. Like, for a lot of the men listening as we, as we start to wrap this up, think about, like, go back to your era or your time, or maybe you want to be the father you didn't quite have. But either way, whether you had a great or poor experience with your father, that era or time. What were the things that they were doing? It was push bikes, was building go karts, was getting out with nature, out and about, and really leading by example, as Drew was saying in the household. I think I used to say the greatest form of communication is listening, Brad. But I actually think the greatest form of communication is example, because the children will respond and be reciprocal with the energy that you showcase and the results that come from that. I'll go in the gym instead of being in my phone and I'm on a bike and all of a sudden Stella's coming in and she's jumping on the row. Lillian's coming in, she's got six kilo kettlebell. And the kids are just all around me because there's a level of attraction to the energy I express, the power, what I'm doing, what I'm investing. Just like if I sat down on my phone and I was playing something that just had a little funny sound or voice, that all comes to me and I want to watch this stat and what's this that we're watching here? And that's where I think it's important when we're talking about the environment, ownership for the father and for parents, but for the father, listening to this on that environment and really building that relationship with the child and communicating the good, the bad and the ugly, which I think is probably going to be better as they get older, Brad. They probably understand a little bit more, even to the point where you could educate teenagers around dopamine, the good, the bad and the ugly. But I guess as we wrap up, mate, if you had another one or two or a couple of points on just pieces of advice for fathers or dads out there on the how tos or strategies or something, this is definitely something I've enjoyed. Mate. I'd love to get you on for another time, but, you know, with time running short, mate, I'd love to just wrap up maybe a couple of your points of advice or tips for how to start building or bridging the gap now for the men out there.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, we touched on this earlier, but, you know, it goes without saying that sleep is one of the most important parts here, that if screens is getting in the way of your child's sleep. So that means if they're staying up later than they should, if they're waking up in the middle of the night, setting alarms to get on while everyone's asleep, which a lot of kids will, or even younger kids that wake up early in the morning, wake up at 5am set an alarm because mum and dad are asleep. So if sleep goes downhill, not overnight, but after a couple of weeks, things are going to get tricky for you behaviourally, emotionally, educationally, et cetera. I think the second point I'd make is, is it's really difficult for families because. Yes, Alex, while you're saying that teenagers maybe can be involved in that conversation, they are a bit hypocritical. I was when I was a teenager. Right. And so they can engage in that conversation on an academic level about what the dopamine's doing, but it doesn't mean they're going to make a good choice because teenagers, at the end of the day, again, impulse control, emotional control, it's not there in fact for blokes, impulse control and emotional control, those areas of the brain that we're talking about, the prefrontal cortex for blokes, it doesn't fully develop until sometime in your 30s. You're going to do some pretty knucklehead stuff until that age. I know I did. So I think that for many of the fathers out there, we just need to put this in context of a lot of this is normal development and they're getting sucked into that. And so I think that being very calm about it and also just acknowledging that it's not personal. If you make a rule and say to a child you can't be on your phone until after 10 o' clock or whatever and they are, are, it's not personal. Right. It's just that they've been sucked into it. The more that fathers can see it as a. This is me and our family against the industry that are trying to take our time, our attention and our money versus it's not a. My 14 year old boy hates me because he doesn't listen to what I say. Right. So many fathers take this personally and mothers and it doesn't have to be okay. I think the last thing I would say is just be really careful with phone plans and mobile data and whatnot as well because phone Companies will sell 12 year olds data with 10 gigabytes and all of a sudden it's family sharing and automatic top ups and they've got 100 gigabytes and it just gets away from them really quickly because some of these apps that claim to be able to work screen time on a mobile phone or any of these other apps circle by Disney or any of these things, they're laughably easy to get around. Around 90% of kids I see will be able to get around them in about three Minutes, you can use a vpn, you can change the world clock. I mean again, we won't go down the conspiracy route of why these things are so porous, right? But at the end of the day, managing the mobile data that goes to a mobile phone and managing the home wi fi are the two best bets. They're not foolproof, but they're the best bets.

Mate. No, it's been awesome having you on, Brad, and thank you for that and wrapping up on that. I guess just to reiterate, couldn't agree more, mate. Like don't take it personal. You know, it's you and your family. If you're going to use a verse versus something that may not be as wholesome as what you envision in their upbringing and how they carry themselves into adulthood as a human being. And I guess the second one is just asking the question for fathers out there listening, the fundamentals of being human. Is this screen and tech time affecting my child's sleep, their eating regime, their social connection, their skill development which ties into all of that. Building relationships, communication skills, listening properly, absorbing. If that's something that's affecting them, if all those things are being affected, sorry, through screen time, well then something's got to give, right? There has to be something that comes into place. And you don't own your children per se over the course of your life, but you're certainly responsible for them before they either fly the nest or enter adulthood. And the biggest one above both of those not taking personally, making sure you're looking after them as an actual organism, as a human being is understand that you know what, through their own personal development and mental framework and what Brad was sharing there, hypocrite or not, they're going to make mistakes. I know I was certainly a risk taker and as were you, Brad, playing soccer for so long with no roi. Mate, I really commend you and appreciate you for your efforts but it's been awesome having you on, mate. And I think this is something that we'll definitely chat about in the future and try and get you on the inside maybe for Friday Night lights with the tribe. Yeah, it's been great having you on, mate. I'm definitely going to get that book immediately and see what I can apply for our men with our coaching sessions. And also good, good to have you on with us too, Drew. Any final thoughts or anything you wanted to add as we, as we wrap this up, Brad?

No, I mean, look, you know, my final thought most of the time when I'm speaking to parents is don't expect to be perfect at this. None of us are perfect. I'm not perfect. You know, so. And when it comes to screen time, you know, you've got to be getting it right most of the time, but not all the time. No one's perfect in parents. And yeah. So don't judge yourself too hard. Harshly if there's a day or two.

Where things blow out that champion, mate. Well said. Well said. Appreciate it. Thanks for coming on. And thanks for jumping on as well. Drew, good to have you on here too. No worries.

Thanks. Gentlemen.

Loved it. Thank you.

Thanks, Brad.

And that's a wrap. I hope you enjoyed this episode and got some golden nuggets with possibly more one or two aha moments as well. If you truly loved and enjoyed what you listened to, then I want to invite you to share this episode with someone who you know needs to hear this. It could be your brother, friends, colleagues, your uncle, even your wife. If there's one thing I've learned, it's that none of us are alone in the hardships we face. But the solution to getting back on top, winning can start with a gift from someone else. And that gift could build be an episode like this because another man transformed is another family saved. Which is exactly what we're all about, thriving and winning in life. There is no alternative. It's possible. It has been done. It can be done, so it should be done. I appreciate your support in spreading this message.

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