Excerpt from a YouTube video in which Jonathan Haidt argues for restoring childhood by delaying smartphone and social media use: no smartphone before high school, no social media until 16, phone-free schools, and promoting independence, free play, and responsibility. He emphasizes synchronized norms across families to avoid isolating children who are kept off devices.
I think we can restore childhood in the real world. No smartphone before high school, no social media till 16, phone free schools, more independence, free play and responsibility in the real world. Those four things, and these are things that we can all do if we work together, if we do them at the same time. If you're the only family that's keeping your kid off a smartphone till high school and off of social media till 16, you're imposing a cost on your child and she may be lonely and she'll say, mom, I'm left out. Now she might still thank you. As we saw last night, one of the women said her daughter thanked her for keeping her off, but at the time it was painful for her. And so my hope is by spreading these norms no parent will ever be in that position again where their kid is the only one in the class who doesn't have a smartphone at age 10.
