May 14, 2023 • 17 mins
Justin joins some big names to discuss a smart phone ban in schools
Topics included in this episode -
- Swombies - social media zombies
- How social media effects kids -
- Self expression & validation
- Appearance comparison
- Fear of missing out
- Bullying & harmful content
- The brain drain studies
- As smart phone use goes up, academic performance goes down
- Arguments from the other side of the debate
Find us on Facebook at Dr Justin Coulson's Happy Families
Email us your questions and comments at podcasts@happyfamilies.com.au
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:03):
It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the
time poor parent who just wants answers Now.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Studies show that the people who benefit the most from
removing the distraction of a smartphone from the school classroom
are the students who struggle at school.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And now here's the stars of our show, my mom
and dad.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Well Kylie. The topic of smartphones in schools has arisen
once again. My friend Madonna King and another one a
friend of mine, Rebecca Sparrow, have joined forces and I'm
doing some work with them on this, as well as
a couple of other people around the country who really
care about this issue a lot to discuss whether or
not Queensland should be doing what several other states have
(00:46):
now done and bring in a smartphone ban in schools
because smartphones calls distraction. I note that while I'm having
this conversation with you, you are staring at your screen
and not paying attention to what I'm saying. You're literally
doing that, and we did not rehearse this, and I'm
so upset at you.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
I was halfway through watching a recipe.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And look, you don't even you haven't even got your
microphone in front of your face. Because you're so distracted
by your phone. You have literally just closed the argument
for me. And we haven't knew what the answer was
from the beginning, but you literally lived it for me.
Right then, folks, this is not pre arranged. That literally happened.
(01:26):
I can't believe you. Hello, my name's Doc Justin Coslin
here with my somewhat distracted perpetually on her phone wife Kylie.
As we can't believe you said, as we talk about
the challenge of smartphones in schools and whether or not
they should or should not be banned, I note that
you are still Oh that's right, you're turning it off now, fantastic.
Just as well. We do have some conflict in our
(01:48):
home about this, don't we a little? Okay? So, Rebecca
and Madonna and myself and a half of others Michelle
Mitchell are pushing really hard to ban smartphones in Queensland's
as other states have done, and I thought today it
was probably worth just unpacking this a little bit on
the podcast and talking about the reason that I'm so
against it, and I.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Don't even against spanning it.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
No, no against smartphones being available in schools, but I
just realized we literally have not I've worked out what
I want to talk about. I don't even know your
position on this. I don't even know if you agree
with me should smartphones be in schools? I'd love to
get an opinion from you before I share my myriad
of reasons and all of the stuff that I want
(02:30):
to share here. I've got a lot to say, as
you no doubt not going to be surprised about. I'd
love to know what somebody who's a mum who doesn't
read psychological research thinks about whether or not kids should
have smartphones in schools, Like, what's your general take on this?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
I think it's absolutely unnecessary and it causes so much
conflict and challenge and exposure for our kids that's completely unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah, I hadn't thought about that. So kids are being exposed.
I mean I hear from parents constantly about how their
eight year olds, their ten year olds have been exposed
to explicit content because some kid had a smartphone at
school or an iPad at school or something like that.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
You know, we had a challenging situation on our recent
crewis with one of our children, and the comment that
you made was you were so grateful that we weren't
connected and as a result, she didn't have access to
any social media or which would have had just exacerbated
the situation.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, she had a tough time. We ended up saying, look,
don't go to the teenage hanging out kids club thing today.
You can just stay home with us, or stay in
the cabin with us, come and do our stuff, and
especially tonight you're staying in And she was really unhappy
about it. But having that distance, not having the screen
and the connection and the ongoing interaction, it made all
the difference.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
You know, outside of all of those things, it's just
a distraction, an unnecessary distraction in the learning environment. I
don't it's absolutely unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Do you have anything that you'd like to add? No,
ask me what I think?
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Do you think?
Speaker 2 (04:00):
I'm so glad you did you say what do you think? Doctor?
Justin calls, I did say, Okay, So I have put
together a long list of what's going on here. I
don't want kids to become smombies. You're looking at me
like that's a funny word smomby social media zombie is
what smomby is. You've not heard of swomby. I'm gissing,
(04:21):
that's so let's be really clear. As time is going
on and research evidence is accumulating, we're starting to see
that there are both positives and negatives when it comes
to children having access to screens generally, but social media specifically.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Well, most schools these days have laptops. That's the chosen
mode of.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
A lot of schools are demanding that kids are on
a screen.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Yeah, so a phone is literally an unnecessary accessory to learning.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
This raises an important point in this whole conversation. You
can ban smartphones, but kids are We've got iPads, they've
still got tablets, they've still got computers. So it doesn't
completely resolve the issue. Kids are still going to be
on screens, They're still going to have access to social
media and so on.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Most school's laptop structures are such that a lot of
those things are.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
The school shuts a lot of stuff down, and they've
got the resources, the technological resources to do that or
at least to minimize the extent which kids are doing stuff.
Having said that, I remember several of our kids have
been able to work their way around this stuff pretty easily,
and the school hasn't done anything at all about it,
which has driven both you and I up the wall.
But here's what research tells us around the different way
(05:42):
that social media affects kids, and this is from the
kids themselves. So one of the positives is the self
expression that it facilitates and also the validation that kids get. Now,
both positive and negative, it can be really great for
self esteem and social support and identity experimentation. Negatives around
identity experimentation, social comparison, anxiety, fear of judgment, risk of behavior.
(06:05):
That kind of thing is challenging. We know that it's
bad when it comes to appearance comparison and body ideals.
We know that it's bad from the pressure to stay connected,
the fear of missing out. We know that that increases distraction.
We also know that it's bad from exposure to bullying
and harmful content, explicit content, that kind of thing. But
(06:29):
the positives around social engagement peer support are really strong.
So the argument that we need to just get rid
of it because it's bad doesn't completely stack up. There
are some positives as well as some negatives. I guess
the big question is to what extent, to what extent
are the positives and negatives affecting schooling. And that's where
I really want to go with this conversation. But you're
(06:50):
busting to ask me a question.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Now, I was going to ask you a question. I
was just going to say, well, there are definitely some
positives to having it. The reality is they're not big
enough to warrant having them on site.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Well, let me share with you a couple of things
that I think are fascinating from a research point of
view around why I believe that we should be Like,
my position for the last fifteen years has been as
a parent, don't ban your kids from X, Y and Z.
When it comes to screens, you can't ban them. It
won't work. I still stand by that from a parenting
point of view. So I just want to distinguish here
(07:21):
we're not talking about parenting. We're talking about whether mobile
phones should be allowed in schools. It's a very different
context with completely different objectives and a totally different control
structure around it compared to what happens in the family home.
I can't be explicit enough about that you cannot do
this at home. It won't work, and I don't think
(07:44):
that it's going to be good for your children. But
we're talking about an educational context here, and this is
why it's different. So I want to start with something
really simple. There's this thing that we call the brain
drain studies. When we're talking about social media and telephones.
There's a whole lot of studies that have been done
where literally the mere presence of a telephone on the
table distracts people, reduces the quality of interactions socially, empathically,
(08:06):
it's associated with decreased capacity for memory, attention, all that
kind of thing. If I'm having a conversation with you
and you're distracted, even though you're not looking at the phone,
simply the presence of the phone, what that does is
it makes the experience worse for you and it makes
it worse for me. So we've got a whole lot
of studies that show just having a phone on the table,
(08:27):
we'll do that keep the phones off the table that
you've literally just put your phone on the floor. So
that's the brain drain studies. Here's the next thing. A
meta analysis that was published just in the last year
or so showed that phones create distraction and with that
smartphone use. As smartphone use goes up, we see academic
(08:50):
performance go down. Now, the effect statistically isn't huge, but
it's there, it's present, and this is the bit that
gets really important to me. I mean, a meta analysis
is a study of all the studies. It's where we
get as many research reports as we can that are
relevant and that meet a minimal level of criteria, and
(09:11):
then we have a look at what their results are
and we work out overall what the results mean. The
fascinating part of this is that studies show that the
people who benefit the most from removing the distraction of
a smartphone from the school classroom are the students who
struggle at school. So if we talk about kids who
(09:33):
are having a hard time at school, the best thing
we can do for them is get the smartphones out
of the environment. Because a study from Spain showed the
most benefits experienced when removing smartphones go to struggling students,
and there's also a reduction in bullying plus students. Highlighted
that social interactions improved in a separate study, and fascinatingly,
(09:54):
in a qualitative study that I found kids actually prefer
it when phones are out of the environment, which I
find extraordinary. They're going to fight tooth and nail saying
you can't take our phones away and they're going to
do everything they can to make sure that they can
get access to their phones even when we've said no.
And yet they're actually happy when the phone's gone, which
I thought was fascinating. Now here's another study that I
(10:19):
think you'll love. Most of the time, when studies are done,
we say how much time are you spending on your screen?
And what are your grades? And so people have to estimate.
But if I was to literally ask you to estimate
how much time you spend on your screen each day,
could you do it? How many hours a day do
you spend on your screen?
Speaker 3 (10:35):
No? I am actually surprised how much screen time I have,
Like when I get my weekly analysis.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Yes, but and you think to yourself, I can't possibly
be spending five hours a day on my screen.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
But that's because I use Google Maps for everything.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
I don't know if it includes Google Maps, does right?
And podcasts and so. But this is the critical thing here.
If you listen to podcasts, if you're using Google Maps,
if you've got Spotify playing, shouldn't that be counting towards
whether or not you're doing well on your GPA with
your school performance? Like there are all kinds of things
that we use our phones. No, no, But the point
(11:07):
still stands, we use our phones for a multiplicity of actions,
for our range.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
During the school day, there shouldn't be any need for
a phone and for any of the things that the
phone offers.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
All I was going to say is we can't even
objectively guess how much time we use per day, Like,
we have no idea how much time we spend on
We have to go on look it up to find it.
But in a lot of the studies, they say how
many hours a day you spending and then they correlate
that with GPA and they come up with their thing.
But a recent study looked at Apple screen time stats,
so we've got exact numbers correlated that with GPA. Guess what,
the research.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Show, the greater the use of the phone, the lower
their GPA.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Pretty much, that was exactly it. So we see all
of these reasons that when it comes to distraction, when
it comes to relationships, when it comes to pressure to
state it connected, when it comes to bullying, no matter
what it is, if you look at it, we see
that smartphones are not giving us great things. My argument,
this is my summary argument for a smartphone ban in
(12:04):
schools The research shows that when there's less distraction, you
get better academic performance. The research shows that when there's
less smartphone usage, you get more physical activity. The data
shows that you see an increase in in person social interactions,
and those social interactions are improved when smartphones aren't in
the picture.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Well, how many times have you walked into a room
of teenagers and they're all sitting together, but they're on
their phones. That's just no conversation happening.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
But before I summarize my main point and really close
this argument down, I just want to acknowledge that there
are arguments against the smartphone ban, and they're good arguments,
and we need more evidence because we just don't have enough.
And those arguments include the value of children being able
to communicate with their parents. Like I've spoken to so
(12:55):
many parents who have said, my child has anxiety or
my child has specific health needs, and I want them
to be able to contact me. Now, I know a
lot of people say, we'll just go to the office,
and I'm kind of generally in agreement with that, but
I also understand that in some circumstances, your child being
able to access you.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Yeah, but having a few children with access to It
is totally different to having a classroom.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
But if you have a few children who have access
to it, then all the other students and many parents
will get upset about it. So that's a challenge. Another
argument against a smartphone ban is that like kids do
need to learn how to manage themselves in a world
full of distractions, because if they go home and they've
got access to absolutely everything all the time, the benefit
(13:37):
does happen at school, but.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
There's enough distraction at school without a phone. I was
completely distracted as a high school student.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
So was I how cute?
Speaker 3 (13:45):
My HPA teacher.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Was, Oh gosh, I can't wie. You just said that.
That's really like in twenty twenty three, that's a creepy
thing to say. Oh mind you, it was you saying
that about him, not him saying that about you. So
there's the cost to the school, to the and we
know that kids are going to find a way around it,
like they just do. They find a way around it.
(14:07):
My biggest challenge philosophically is that a ban goes against
everything that I believe about what we should and shouldn't
be doing, and yet in this particular context, I think
that it makes sense. The last point that I'd make
is that the research evidence still isn't that strong. We
still really lack good evidence around this, but the evidence
is building, and I think that it's strong enough that
(14:28):
we should do it, and that the research evidence at
the moment is kind of circular. Like nobody's done an
experiment where they've gone into a handful of schools and said, guys,
we're going to ban phones in this school as part
of an experiment, but we're going to let the schools
next door, like those five schools over there, they're going
to keep their phones, and we're going to compare their
results with your results and see what happens with and
without phones at school. If we could run some experiments
(14:50):
like that, we'd get an answer pretty quickly about what's
going on. We'd find out academically, socially, physically, all the
ways whether it's a good or a bad thing. I
overall though, I think it's good and I think they
should be banned. And you know why. Ultimately, it's got
nothing to do with all the research evidence. It's just
personal preference. And I'll tell you when we went on
our crewise and we were away for a couple of
(15:11):
weeks we had no Wi Fi. I basically forgot that
I had a phone.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
How good was that?
Speaker 2 (15:17):
And it was so good? There was no distraction. There
was no news articles to read, no social media to
look at. There was no way for us to communicate
with anybody at all about anything. We were just in
the moment when we came home. I don't know if
you've noticed. Have you noticed my screen usage since we've
gotten home? Have you noticed the way I've been interacting
with a screen, Well, since you haven't been here, Oh,
(15:40):
come on, I've been around a fair bit. I know
I've traveled a lot for work, But my interaction with
screens other than when I'm working.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Obviously, well, I think I at about at seven o'clock
at night. So I actually don't know what your screen
usage is. Well, actually I am going to dub you
in I wake up because you were watching a screen
in our bed.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Well, I'm still glad to watch some TV now.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
And then, well, you just asked me I did notice.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Can't believe you dub me in. But I've not been
on social media. I haven't been reading the news sites.
I've been really present and available, and I've been keeping
my phone away and it's made a huge difference, and that,
more than anything, is why I think that kids don't
need them, especially at school. So join the conversation.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Well, I might not be an expert, but I already
had that opinion.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
Jumped over to our Facebook page and let us know
what you think. We're asking the question on the Facebook page.
We would love to get your idea based on the evidence,
based on your experience, based on your overall situation. Should
we or shouldn't we? Am I right? Is Beck right?
Is Madonna right? Is Michelle right? And we make it's
Kylie right? Is missus? Happy family is right? Jump over
(16:43):
and let us know your thoughts on this because it
is a complicated and nuanced issue. I've got some really
smart friends who are aware of the research evidence, and
their opinions are not nearly as strong as mine on this.
They actually disagree with me, and I think that it's
a fascinating conversation. Dr Justin Filson's Happy Families on Facebook
(17:04):
to join the discussion. The Happy Family's podcast is produced
by Justin Roland from Bridge Media. Craig Bruce is our
executive producer. And if you'd like more information about making
your family happier visitors at happy Families dot com, dot
a
It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the
time poor parent who just wants answers Now.
Speaker 2 (00:10):
Studies show that the people who benefit the most from
removing the distraction of a smartphone from the school classroom
are the students who struggle at school.
Speaker 1 (00:22):
And now here's the stars of our show, my mom
and dad.
Speaker 2 (00:26):
Well Kylie. The topic of smartphones in schools has arisen
once again. My friend Madonna King and another one a
friend of mine, Rebecca Sparrow, have joined forces and I'm
doing some work with them on this, as well as
a couple of other people around the country who really
care about this issue a lot to discuss whether or
not Queensland should be doing what several other states have
(00:46):
now done and bring in a smartphone ban in schools
because smartphones calls distraction. I note that while I'm having
this conversation with you, you are staring at your screen
and not paying attention to what I'm saying. You're literally
doing that, and we did not rehearse this, and I'm
so upset at you.
Speaker 3 (01:03):
I was halfway through watching a recipe.
Speaker 2 (01:05):
And look, you don't even you haven't even got your
microphone in front of your face. Because you're so distracted
by your phone. You have literally just closed the argument
for me. And we haven't knew what the answer was
from the beginning, but you literally lived it for me.
Right then, folks, this is not pre arranged. That literally happened.
(01:26):
I can't believe you. Hello, my name's Doc Justin Coslin
here with my somewhat distracted perpetually on her phone wife Kylie.
As we can't believe you said, as we talk about
the challenge of smartphones in schools and whether or not
they should or should not be banned, I note that
you are still Oh that's right, you're turning it off now, fantastic.
Just as well. We do have some conflict in our
(01:48):
home about this, don't we a little? Okay? So, Rebecca
and Madonna and myself and a half of others Michelle
Mitchell are pushing really hard to ban smartphones in Queensland's
as other states have done, and I thought today it
was probably worth just unpacking this a little bit on
the podcast and talking about the reason that I'm so
against it, and I.
Speaker 3 (02:08):
Don't even against spanning it.
Speaker 2 (02:10):
No, no against smartphones being available in schools, but I
just realized we literally have not I've worked out what
I want to talk about. I don't even know your
position on this. I don't even know if you agree
with me should smartphones be in schools? I'd love to
get an opinion from you before I share my myriad
of reasons and all of the stuff that I want
(02:30):
to share here. I've got a lot to say, as
you no doubt not going to be surprised about. I'd
love to know what somebody who's a mum who doesn't
read psychological research thinks about whether or not kids should
have smartphones in schools, Like, what's your general take on this?
Speaker 3 (02:45):
I think it's absolutely unnecessary and it causes so much
conflict and challenge and exposure for our kids that's completely unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (02:56):
Yeah, I hadn't thought about that. So kids are being exposed.
I mean I hear from parents constantly about how their
eight year olds, their ten year olds have been exposed
to explicit content because some kid had a smartphone at
school or an iPad at school or something like that.
Speaker 3 (03:08):
You know, we had a challenging situation on our recent
crewis with one of our children, and the comment that
you made was you were so grateful that we weren't
connected and as a result, she didn't have access to
any social media or which would have had just exacerbated
the situation.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Yeah, she had a tough time. We ended up saying, look,
don't go to the teenage hanging out kids club thing today.
You can just stay home with us, or stay in
the cabin with us, come and do our stuff, and
especially tonight you're staying in And she was really unhappy
about it. But having that distance, not having the screen
and the connection and the ongoing interaction, it made all
the difference.
Speaker 3 (03:48):
You know, outside of all of those things, it's just
a distraction, an unnecessary distraction in the learning environment. I
don't it's absolutely unnecessary.
Speaker 2 (03:56):
Do you have anything that you'd like to add? No,
ask me what I think?
Speaker 3 (04:00):
Do you think?
Speaker 2 (04:00):
I'm so glad you did you say what do you think? Doctor?
Justin calls, I did say, Okay, So I have put
together a long list of what's going on here. I
don't want kids to become smombies. You're looking at me
like that's a funny word smomby social media zombie is
what smomby is. You've not heard of swomby. I'm gissing,
(04:21):
that's so let's be really clear. As time is going
on and research evidence is accumulating, we're starting to see
that there are both positives and negatives when it comes
to children having access to screens generally, but social media specifically.
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Well, most schools these days have laptops. That's the chosen
mode of.
Speaker 2 (04:45):
A lot of schools are demanding that kids are on
a screen.
Speaker 3 (04:48):
Yeah, so a phone is literally an unnecessary accessory to learning.
Speaker 2 (04:56):
This raises an important point in this whole conversation. You
can ban smartphones, but kids are We've got iPads, they've
still got tablets, they've still got computers. So it doesn't
completely resolve the issue. Kids are still going to be
on screens, They're still going to have access to social
media and so on.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
Most school's laptop structures are such that a lot of
those things are.
Speaker 2 (05:18):
The school shuts a lot of stuff down, and they've
got the resources, the technological resources to do that or
at least to minimize the extent which kids are doing stuff.
Having said that, I remember several of our kids have
been able to work their way around this stuff pretty easily,
and the school hasn't done anything at all about it,
which has driven both you and I up the wall.
But here's what research tells us around the different way
(05:42):
that social media affects kids, and this is from the
kids themselves. So one of the positives is the self
expression that it facilitates and also the validation that kids get. Now,
both positive and negative, it can be really great for
self esteem and social support and identity experimentation. Negatives around
identity experimentation, social comparison, anxiety, fear of judgment, risk of behavior.
(06:05):
That kind of thing is challenging. We know that it's
bad when it comes to appearance comparison and body ideals.
We know that it's bad from the pressure to stay connected,
the fear of missing out. We know that that increases distraction.
We also know that it's bad from exposure to bullying
and harmful content, explicit content, that kind of thing. But
(06:29):
the positives around social engagement peer support are really strong.
So the argument that we need to just get rid
of it because it's bad doesn't completely stack up. There
are some positives as well as some negatives. I guess
the big question is to what extent, to what extent
are the positives and negatives affecting schooling. And that's where
I really want to go with this conversation. But you're
(06:50):
busting to ask me a question.
Speaker 3 (06:52):
Now, I was going to ask you a question. I
was just going to say, well, there are definitely some
positives to having it. The reality is they're not big
enough to warrant having them on site.
Speaker 2 (07:00):
Well, let me share with you a couple of things
that I think are fascinating from a research point of
view around why I believe that we should be Like,
my position for the last fifteen years has been as
a parent, don't ban your kids from X, Y and Z.
When it comes to screens, you can't ban them. It
won't work. I still stand by that from a parenting
point of view. So I just want to distinguish here
(07:21):
we're not talking about parenting. We're talking about whether mobile
phones should be allowed in schools. It's a very different
context with completely different objectives and a totally different control
structure around it compared to what happens in the family home.
I can't be explicit enough about that you cannot do
this at home. It won't work, and I don't think
(07:44):
that it's going to be good for your children. But
we're talking about an educational context here, and this is
why it's different. So I want to start with something
really simple. There's this thing that we call the brain
drain studies. When we're talking about social media and telephones.
There's a whole lot of studies that have been done
where literally the mere presence of a telephone on the
table distracts people, reduces the quality of interactions socially, empathically,
(08:06):
it's associated with decreased capacity for memory, attention, all that
kind of thing. If I'm having a conversation with you
and you're distracted, even though you're not looking at the phone,
simply the presence of the phone, what that does is
it makes the experience worse for you and it makes
it worse for me. So we've got a whole lot
of studies that show just having a phone on the table,
(08:27):
we'll do that keep the phones off the table that
you've literally just put your phone on the floor. So
that's the brain drain studies. Here's the next thing. A
meta analysis that was published just in the last year
or so showed that phones create distraction and with that
smartphone use. As smartphone use goes up, we see academic
(08:50):
performance go down. Now, the effect statistically isn't huge, but
it's there, it's present, and this is the bit that
gets really important to me. I mean, a meta analysis
is a study of all the studies. It's where we
get as many research reports as we can that are
relevant and that meet a minimal level of criteria, and
(09:11):
then we have a look at what their results are
and we work out overall what the results mean. The
fascinating part of this is that studies show that the
people who benefit the most from removing the distraction of
a smartphone from the school classroom are the students who
struggle at school. So if we talk about kids who
(09:33):
are having a hard time at school, the best thing
we can do for them is get the smartphones out
of the environment. Because a study from Spain showed the
most benefits experienced when removing smartphones go to struggling students,
and there's also a reduction in bullying plus students. Highlighted
that social interactions improved in a separate study, and fascinatingly,
(09:54):
in a qualitative study that I found kids actually prefer
it when phones are out of the environment, which I
find extraordinary. They're going to fight tooth and nail saying
you can't take our phones away and they're going to
do everything they can to make sure that they can
get access to their phones even when we've said no.
And yet they're actually happy when the phone's gone, which
I thought was fascinating. Now here's another study that I
(10:19):
think you'll love. Most of the time, when studies are done,
we say how much time are you spending on your screen?
And what are your grades? And so people have to estimate.
But if I was to literally ask you to estimate
how much time you spend on your screen each day,
could you do it? How many hours a day do
you spend on your screen?
Speaker 3 (10:35):
No? I am actually surprised how much screen time I have,
Like when I get my weekly analysis.
Speaker 2 (10:40):
Yes, but and you think to yourself, I can't possibly
be spending five hours a day on my screen.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
But that's because I use Google Maps for everything.
Speaker 2 (10:47):
I don't know if it includes Google Maps, does right?
And podcasts and so. But this is the critical thing here.
If you listen to podcasts, if you're using Google Maps,
if you've got Spotify playing, shouldn't that be counting towards
whether or not you're doing well on your GPA with
your school performance? Like there are all kinds of things
that we use our phones. No, no, But the point
(11:07):
still stands, we use our phones for a multiplicity of actions,
for our range.
Speaker 3 (11:12):
During the school day, there shouldn't be any need for
a phone and for any of the things that the
phone offers.
Speaker 2 (11:19):
All I was going to say is we can't even
objectively guess how much time we use per day, Like,
we have no idea how much time we spend on
We have to go on look it up to find it.
But in a lot of the studies, they say how
many hours a day you spending and then they correlate
that with GPA and they come up with their thing.
But a recent study looked at Apple screen time stats,
so we've got exact numbers correlated that with GPA. Guess what,
the research.
Speaker 3 (11:38):
Show, the greater the use of the phone, the lower
their GPA.
Speaker 2 (11:42):
Pretty much, that was exactly it. So we see all
of these reasons that when it comes to distraction, when
it comes to relationships, when it comes to pressure to
state it connected, when it comes to bullying, no matter
what it is, if you look at it, we see
that smartphones are not giving us great things. My argument,
this is my summary argument for a smartphone ban in
(12:04):
schools The research shows that when there's less distraction, you
get better academic performance. The research shows that when there's
less smartphone usage, you get more physical activity. The data
shows that you see an increase in in person social interactions,
and those social interactions are improved when smartphones aren't in
the picture.
Speaker 3 (12:25):
Well, how many times have you walked into a room
of teenagers and they're all sitting together, but they're on
their phones. That's just no conversation happening.
Speaker 2 (12:33):
But before I summarize my main point and really close
this argument down, I just want to acknowledge that there
are arguments against the smartphone ban, and they're good arguments,
and we need more evidence because we just don't have enough.
And those arguments include the value of children being able
to communicate with their parents. Like I've spoken to so
(12:55):
many parents who have said, my child has anxiety or
my child has specific health needs, and I want them
to be able to contact me. Now, I know a
lot of people say, we'll just go to the office,
and I'm kind of generally in agreement with that, but
I also understand that in some circumstances, your child being
able to access you.
Speaker 3 (13:12):
Yeah, but having a few children with access to It
is totally different to having a classroom.
Speaker 2 (13:16):
But if you have a few children who have access
to it, then all the other students and many parents
will get upset about it. So that's a challenge. Another
argument against a smartphone ban is that like kids do
need to learn how to manage themselves in a world
full of distractions, because if they go home and they've
got access to absolutely everything all the time, the benefit
(13:37):
does happen at school, but.
Speaker 3 (13:38):
There's enough distraction at school without a phone. I was
completely distracted as a high school student.
Speaker 2 (13:44):
So was I how cute?
Speaker 3 (13:45):
My HPA teacher.
Speaker 2 (13:46):
Was, Oh gosh, I can't wie. You just said that.
That's really like in twenty twenty three, that's a creepy
thing to say. Oh mind you, it was you saying
that about him, not him saying that about you. So
there's the cost to the school, to the and we
know that kids are going to find a way around it,
like they just do. They find a way around it.
(14:07):
My biggest challenge philosophically is that a ban goes against
everything that I believe about what we should and shouldn't
be doing, and yet in this particular context, I think
that it makes sense. The last point that I'd make
is that the research evidence still isn't that strong. We
still really lack good evidence around this, but the evidence
is building, and I think that it's strong enough that
(14:28):
we should do it, and that the research evidence at
the moment is kind of circular. Like nobody's done an
experiment where they've gone into a handful of schools and said, guys,
we're going to ban phones in this school as part
of an experiment, but we're going to let the schools
next door, like those five schools over there, they're going
to keep their phones, and we're going to compare their
results with your results and see what happens with and
without phones at school. If we could run some experiments
(14:50):
like that, we'd get an answer pretty quickly about what's
going on. We'd find out academically, socially, physically, all the
ways whether it's a good or a bad thing. I
overall though, I think it's good and I think they
should be banned. And you know why. Ultimately, it's got
nothing to do with all the research evidence. It's just
personal preference. And I'll tell you when we went on
our crewise and we were away for a couple of
(15:11):
weeks we had no Wi Fi. I basically forgot that
I had a phone.
Speaker 3 (15:15):
How good was that?
Speaker 2 (15:17):
And it was so good? There was no distraction. There
was no news articles to read, no social media to
look at. There was no way for us to communicate
with anybody at all about anything. We were just in
the moment when we came home. I don't know if
you've noticed. Have you noticed my screen usage since we've
gotten home? Have you noticed the way I've been interacting
with a screen, Well, since you haven't been here, Oh,
(15:40):
come on, I've been around a fair bit. I know
I've traveled a lot for work, But my interaction with
screens other than when I'm working.
Speaker 3 (15:46):
Obviously, well, I think I at about at seven o'clock
at night. So I actually don't know what your screen
usage is. Well, actually I am going to dub you
in I wake up because you were watching a screen
in our bed.
Speaker 2 (15:55):
Well, I'm still glad to watch some TV now.
Speaker 3 (15:57):
And then, well, you just asked me I did notice.
Speaker 2 (16:00):
Can't believe you dub me in. But I've not been
on social media. I haven't been reading the news sites.
I've been really present and available, and I've been keeping
my phone away and it's made a huge difference, and that,
more than anything, is why I think that kids don't
need them, especially at school. So join the conversation.
Speaker 3 (16:19):
Well, I might not be an expert, but I already
had that opinion.
Speaker 2 (16:22):
Jumped over to our Facebook page and let us know
what you think. We're asking the question on the Facebook page.
We would love to get your idea based on the evidence,
based on your experience, based on your overall situation. Should
we or shouldn't we? Am I right? Is Beck right?
Is Madonna right? Is Michelle right? And we make it's
Kylie right? Is missus? Happy family is right? Jump over
(16:43):
and let us know your thoughts on this because it
is a complicated and nuanced issue. I've got some really
smart friends who are aware of the research evidence, and
their opinions are not nearly as strong as mine on this.
They actually disagree with me, and I think that it's
a fascinating conversation. Dr Justin Filson's Happy Families on Facebook
(17:04):
to join the discussion. The Happy Family's podcast is produced
by Justin Roland from Bridge Media. Craig Bruce is our
executive producer. And if you'd like more information about making
your family happier visitors at happy Families dot com, dot
a
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