In less than a month the ban on young people under 16 having their own accounts on social media platforms including Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, X and YouTube will begin, allowing them access to public content but unable to post. The legislation has been welcomed by practitioners who, daily, see the damaging effects fuelling eating disorders, self-harm, suicidality and mental health concerns.
Less dramatic is the consequences in families with parents frequently requesting help to manage family conflict as they attempt to address their children’s social media use.
A Study Exploring Adolescent and Parent Perspectives
Catherine Page Jeffery (2024) drew on results of a participatory research project to understand the main sources of digital conflict in Australian families. She identified four themes. These were the amount of time spent on digital devices at the expense of activities parents viewed as more important, with young people neglecting homework, time with the family, chores, physical play and self-care including bathing, teeth brushing and sleep. A second major concern was ‘inappropriate’ content and on-line purchases. This included exposure to sexual and violent content and a ‘dumbing down’ inherent in the content, which young people acknowledged was a source of conflict. The effects on children’s behaviour was another major source of dispute with parents reporting their children were ‘zoned out’ and unresponsive when engaged with devices and became rude and disrespectful when required to stop. They also noted an increase in dishonest or ‘sneaky’ behaviour in their child as they sought to access their devices. Young people also recognised and acknowledged that these behaviours caused difficulties. The final issue was sibling conflict over access to devices which was of greater concern to parents than their children.
What Does Each Side Want the Other to Know?
The divide between parents and young people over their perspectives and knowledge about the value of digital technology fuels family conflict. In addition to analysing sources of family conflict Jeffrey (2024) asked both what they wished the other understood. Parents wanted their children to appreciate that they understood that technology had an important role in their lives but ‘it was not the “be all and end all,” and was no replacement for the “real world.” By contrast young people wished their parents understood the important role it played in their lives and wished parents were more trusting of them and their knowledge, self-control and competence.
What are the Implications?
The author notes that parent-adolescent conflict is characteristic of this life phase as the young person struggles to establish their sense of identity and agency and their parent tries to control and protect. Conflict over technology is one obvious place where this is currently transacted. Adopting an authoritative, communicative approach which allows parents to gain greater knowledge of their children’s online lives and children to feel respected and hear their parents’ concerns is advice that is generally helpful in reducing family conflict. As the author concludes ‘we need to stop forcing adolescents into adult ways of being and knowing about the world but instead try to insert ourselves into their worlds.’
Catherine Page Jeffery (2024) ‘Trust us! We know what we are doing!’ Parent-adolescent digital conflict in Australian families, Journal of Children and Media, 18:4, 472-488, DOI: 10.1080/17482798.2024.2358947
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