June 19, 2025 • 36 mins
The world is way behind on understanding tech and smartphone addiction. In this episode Eddie and Justin discuss how much progress has been made in the 3 years since Dr. Justin released his TEDx talk on the subjuect. Find out what countries are doing to protect their youth, and what states are leading the charge.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
So ready to set go Eddie right now? How many
hours of screen.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Time do you have per day?
Speaker 3 (00:05):
Oh? Fuck? Okay.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Welcome to MMHC, your go to mental health podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
I'm Eddie Koreo, a licensed professional counselor.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
And I'm Justin Romano, a Board certified child and Adolescent psychiatrist.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
We created MMHC to give listeners evidence based information directly
from professionals who work in mental health.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
We're not influencers, We're not trying to sell you anything.
We just want to bring love, empathy, and understanding of
mental health into this world.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
And we really think that learning about mental health should
be fun, interesting, and most importantly honest.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
So thanks for tuning in. This is a show by
two millennials, but it is intended to be for everyone.
We hope you enjoy the show. MMHC is a production
of Speaker from iHeartMedia.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I heartma It's gotten better research recently. I was pretty thrilled.
I had one that was like in the five hour range,
like that, you know, not bad. I've definitely seen some
where it's eight. I just hit it. We just started
(01:17):
Summer break two days ago, so that that is something
that worries me a little bit. I'm gonna need to
figure something out. But yeah, I would like to say
I think I've gotten a lot better with it at work.
And actually I can bring this up again later. But
we're moving to a door to door policy at my
school next year, so we're actually gonna do as soon
(01:38):
as kids get into the building until they walk out,
no cell phones anywhere. That means during passing period, during lunch,
if they're a teacher's assistant or an office aid and
they're sitting there and just kind of hanging out, they
just gotta hang out no phones. So the expectation is
that staff and teachers do that too. So I think
that'll help me a ton. I'm just gonna leave it
(02:00):
at my desk and you know, kind of going from there.
But yeah, I feel better about it. Yeah, thanks for
putting me on the spot. What are you at? Like
an hour and a half?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
About three mother on average? I mean, not trying to
be like, oh lower than you. But and it went
down after I had a child because he just you know,
he takes a lot of attention and focus.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
I got a really funny story too, where the other
day I had let out a flatulence.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
I had tooted.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Hard to say that I'm trying to be the doctor
persona here on the show. Here hard to say that
I farted in doctor speak. But he actually like came
around and like checked my pants and looked at me
and went poopoos. And I was like, I was like, no,
no poopoos. And then he puts his hand on my shoulder,
it looks me dead in the eye, and goes, let's
change your diaper. I could not believe that he said
(02:58):
that he's two years.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Ago, that he's been wearing a diaper for a week.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
I have to at his recommendation.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
Yeah, no choice, doctor's orders.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
So today we are talking smartphones and tech addiction. One
of the reasons why we wanted to talk about this
is because the tech talk that I did back.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
In twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Man, it's already been a long time now, twenty twenty Yeah,
November twenty twenty two, it's almost is at half a
million views, so it's I know.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
It's been. It's been totally wild.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
I've had people reach out to me from all over
the country wanting to talk about cell phone and tech
addiction stuff. So it's been such a cool thing, a
great way to meet people, a great way to talk
to people, great way to connect. So we wanted to
give a little update on the situation in these past
couple of years and see if there's been any big
changes and updates. So that's why we were doing this today.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Justin talked about a lot has happened. There was the
there's a bunch of states led by Colorado suing Meta.
There haven't really been any updates since twenty twenty three,
but I think one of our previous episodes we talked
about how there's a quote unquote whistleblower in Meta that
basically was like, hey, we're kind of doing some sketchy
stuff here, like we need to stop. And I think
(04:14):
they even helped to stop the release of a was
it an Instagram for like children or for preteen something
like that. Meta was working on something and right around
the same time the plans got squashed because all the
stuff came out. Some other updates include Australia they banned
social media for children under sixteen. This actually places a
(04:34):
burden of responsibility on tech companies, which is something that
Justin has talked about for a long time and that
we've kind of advocated for tech companies face a fine
of thirty two million dollars if they do not stop
children from logging in. So there's been some changes. What
else have we seen, justin in the last couple of years.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
In the state of Florida, they are the process of
banning social media accounts for anyone under the age of fourteen,
So go Florida.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
That's pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
South Korea banned video games for children under sixteen during
the timeframe of midnight to six am, which that would
have affected me when I was younger if I had
lived in South Korea.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
That's prime gaming time.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Oh yeah, I remember playing games until the sun came
up over the summer, especially like I remember like getting
to bed and looking at my window and being like,
oh the sun is coming up now, maybe I should
maybe we should sleep more.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
The Netherlands has banned mobile devices in the classroom, which
is kind of what we're trying to do. And then
many European countries require parental consent if teens are to
use social media, so kind of a big deal. It's
it's nice to see some changes. I don't know what
made what's going to be best, but I mean, you
got to try something different. This is an ever changing beast.
(05:51):
We've talked about it for years, We're going to talk
about it for years, probably until we retire, and it's
something that changes all the time. But we've got to
try different things because if we don't, then you can
never expect anything to change.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
So it seems like the needle is finally turning right.
People are starting to understand that tech and screen addiction
is a real thing and we need to start making
big societal changes to try and combat it. One of
the biggest studies that the United States has going right
now on screen addiction is the ABCD study, the Adolescent
(06:23):
Brain Cognitive Development Study, which is the most comprehensive study
in the US going on right now on brain development
kids with screens, and they're starting to show some pretty
important findings. From the Dandelion Training and Development website which
kind of summarized some of the recent findings, they found
that screen uses causes children to score lower on tests
of language, literacy, critical thinking, and reasoning. The study found
(06:47):
that screen times correlated to a higher number of depression symptoms,
specifically video chats, texting videos, video games. These were the
screen types with the greatest association for depression symptoms. They
also found that screen exposure mediated the rewards system development
and the inhibitory control system of the brain, like over
(07:09):
a two year period of studying this. So these studies
are showing that there is brain development changes because of
how much our kids are consuming screens.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Did I ever tell you that we have an AP
psych at my school as a class and I asked
the teacher if I could do a like a AP
question for fun, just to see how we do. I
tell you, I don't think this is like a month ago. Yeah, yeah,
so it just clicked right now. I've totally forgot to
tell you. But the so what it's called the evidence
(07:42):
based question, So if there's anyone out there that's taken
an AP test recently or that's going to take one whatever,
And basically what it was is that I had a
prompt and the prompt was using the articles below, like
the short snippets create a hypothesis and like talk about
why or related to a psychological theory that helps support
(08:07):
it or whatever and over yeah, something like that. So
my overall hypothesis was that the excessive use of social
media and screens negatively impacts the overall well being of
teens and young adults, and so I must now, yeah,
thank you, I'm looking at it now. And one of them,
one of the sources said that, and these are real sources,
so this is not just pulling shit out of my ass,
(08:29):
this is like legit. One of them was that researchers
found a positive association between loneliness and longer screen time,
and the other sources found that researchers found a negative
association with social well being and social media use. So
I just used that along with what was it, Erickson's
theory of psychosocial development and then social learning theory to
like support my argument. And so, yeah, I just made
(08:52):
me think about that.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
What was your score, he said, I would.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Have got a five. Yeah, at least on that one,
he said, I would scored well.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Which is the highest score at Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:04):
I did tell him. I was like, I couldn't remember
the exact names of social learning theory or eric'son psychosocial development,
but I think about that stuff all the time when
I'm talking to parents and kids, so I did have
to look that up. So I'm fine with moving my
score down a little bit. But I thought that was
pretty good, not being in school for a while.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
And how much chat do youpt?
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Did you use on.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Zero off the dome? Yeah? Old school? Yeah, tablet and
fucking chiseling' yep.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
That's oh yeah, that's what we had to do growing up, right,
that's right.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Well along the lines of my quick research with the
ap psychology Test practice questions, we have some stats in facts.
So from the cdc UH they said that about half
of teenagers get four plus hours of screen time per day.
I'd be willing to bet we can probably do half
get more than we can start the bottom like higher,
(10:00):
but maybe I'm just being an ass They also found
that sixty percent of black teens had over four hours
per day and that overall this disproportionately impacts impacts black people.
Kids with four plus hours of screen time have a
twenty five point nine percent chance of also being depressed,
which makes sense along with rates of anxiety. So if
(10:21):
you look at the numbers, children teens who get over
four hours have about a twenty seven point one percent
rate of anxiety, while those that get under four hours
are at twelve point three percent. It's a pretty big
junk over over double. Another association they found was that
lower parental education was associated with higher screen times than kids,
and these were based off of self reports of screen time.
(10:45):
So one thing to think about is that they might
be under reporting, which I might have done right at
the start of this episode. I don't think I did,
but just things to take into account from the CDC stats.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
One thing I've noticed in I talked to kids about
the screen time quite often is that they do under
report it. They'll tell be like, oh, yeah, it's totally
like two three hours a day, and it'll be like,
pull out your phone, show me your screen time app.
It's always higher than what they say because there isn't
an amount of shame that goes with it, an amount
of trying to underreport, because especially with parents, there's also
(11:17):
there's always this like transactional relationship where it's like they
don't want parents to know how much they are on
their phone because they don't want screen time limits enforced.
So there's reasons why that they're doing this, but I
think it's really important to understand why.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
You know, what else typically gets underreported by teens when
you ask them.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Drug use, drug use, yeah, bingo.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
It's like, I don't know if I've ever heard it
in a training or maybe it's just like a trick
of the trade. But when I was doing drug and
alcohol assessments, when I do like the what do we
used to call them integrated assessments or his mental health
and drug and alcohol, the advice I was given was
that anytime you ask specifically about a number of drinks
or time smoking and all that, you can kind of
(12:02):
assume it's a little higher because teams just tend to
under report, and honestly, we can go back. Adults tend
to under report too. I don't think it's just a
teenager thing.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Totally, especially in a healthcare setting where you're like, I
don't really want to tell my dentist how much I'm
smoking right now?
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Right? Yeahah, yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
So one thing I've heard a lot people speculating is like,
it seems like this younger generation just isn't driving as much,
they're not getting their licenses as much. So I wanted
to look into it, and I found an article from
USA Today which analyzed data from the US Department of Transportation,
which I have no reason to doubt at this point,
(12:40):
but between nineteen eighty three and twenty twenty two, the
number of sixteen year old driver's licenses is declining from
about one half to a quarter, so that's like a
lot less people driving at sixteen. In the rate of
eighteen year olds with driver license driver's licenses has dropped
from eighty percent to about sixty percent.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
As someone in the schools, I feel like I can
anecdotally agree with this. Yeah, I think a lot less
of our older sophomores and then junior seniors are driving
or getting parking permits like people were. Just yeah, that's interesting.
Along with the article, they also mentioned that since the
year two thousand, the number of sixteen year olds old
(13:21):
sixteen year olds with driver's license has decreased nearly twenty
seven percent, so a quarter. The article mentions that the
increase in technology is a big reason why people are
opting out of driving. They get their community online and
not in person, and there's also more writes share options
that there were in the past. I think that's a
I feel like that's an interesting point. The community online,
(13:42):
same thing with it and not even like people who
aren't in your general vicinity. I think even your friends,
everyone's snapchatting and FaceTime each other and like talking virtually
instead of like needing to be right next to each other.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
The screens have completely changed the young person experience in
the world to where for hundreds of thousands of years
you had to leave your house or at least bring
your friends to your house. You had to meet your
friends in person if you wanted to interact with them,
And now there are so many different ways to interact
with your friends outside of the house or sorry, in
(14:17):
your house with screens. Plus, young people also gravitate more
towards public transportation and biking, which is a good.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Thing in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
Yeah. Yeah, So one thing I'll add is I feel
like there's also been not that it was ever a
negative thing or should have been a negative thing, but
the normalization of online friends and people like saying like, oh,
I have an online friend. I met this friend online.
I feel like that was like stigmatized before, but now
it seems like less and less stigmatized, Like it's it
(14:47):
feels more accepted. I remember seeing or hearing of like
kids or even adults who met their like gaming friend
for the first time in like six years, like they
met online and they just started gaming together all the time,
and that being kind of like, oh, that's kind of
like weird or you know, people kind of like talking
down on it. But now it feels like pretty normalized
for people to make friends online and them having them
(15:10):
at the same value as like people that they know
in person. It's something I've thought about totally.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
And if you're spending hours talking to these people, you
really can't build a solid relationship with them. So I
know sometimes people look down on those types of relationships.
But I even remember being in junior high and one
of my best friends had a video game buddy that
we would play with that we had never met in
real life, and he like lived in Missouri or something,
(15:37):
and we would play with him like all the time,
and I got to know him a little bit too,
and it was just it felt a little weird at
the time, like being like, I know this guy, but
I've never actually.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Met this guy.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, but now it's become commonplace.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Yeah. In the state of Oregon right now, it's a
long session right legislatively, so people were trying to get
a bunch of bills passing all that. There's actually a
bill that was moving through and went through the House
and then it ends of dying in the Senate that
was going to ban cell phones from schools that they
were going to basically require every school district to do
(16:09):
a bell to bell rule ultimately didn't pass and it
died there. But it sounds like what they ended up at,
or what we're going to move forward with, is there
is going to be like a quote unquote cell phone ruling,
but it's basically up to every school district in the
state to have their own. Basically, every school district is
required to have a rule. Every school district is allowed
(16:31):
to choose what their rule is. So even more I
would be willing to bet that it's not just an
Oregon thing that's passing, right, the other states are probably
doing very similar things.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
Yeah, it seems like it, and we'll dive more into
those and keep giving you updates as they come, especially
once they are confirmed by states senates and get put
into place. So some of the recommendations, because we always
like giving you recommendations on the show to how to
live the healthiest life possible. So for screen time, and
(17:05):
I'm talking kids, I'm talking parents, I'm talking everyone, create
screen free times and places, family dinners, family game nights,
times where we say, hey, everyone's putting their phone away. No,
one's using their phones right now. Let's take a break
and let's be together in person, no distractions. Another thing
(17:26):
that people like to do are tech detoxes, like plan
a trip with no phones or no tech. I think
that's why so many young people are really getting into camping,
is because it's kind of a natural way to say, like, Okay,
I'm not gonna have my phone. There's no service out there,
so I'm going to leave it. Plus, one of the
things that I try and advocate for is like leaving
(17:47):
your phone in a place where you can't access it
and just like giving yourself a whole day, like if
you just like leave it on your nightstand with the
ringer on so that if anyone's really trying to get
a hold of you or get in touch with you,
you'll know what it is. But not having it in
your pocket, not having it with you and on your
person all the time to check because I notice if
(18:07):
I don't have my phone on me, I feel myself
reaching for my phone constantly, and that feels like addiction
to me, and I don't like that. So little tips.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Some other ones could be things like no phone phones
or video games in the room during bedtime, just trying
to especially if you have all the just like the
it's not letting you fall asleep when you have a
especially because I have my brightness up a lot. But
when you have your phone right in your face or
you're gonna get dryin in your face, you're not really
prepping for bedtime. Your body's not getting ready for it.
Screen time limits are always a good idea. It helps
(18:41):
just prevent the problem from ballooning. I know it can
be hard. I know it can be pretty difficult, but
that's that's always a good option if you're the adult
in the situation trying to set a good example that's
going to fall to us this next school year. I'm
gonna do my best. I'm gonna just so usually we'll
stand in the in the hall in between passing periods
just like see students and you know, be available. I'm
(19:02):
just gonna have to leave my phone in the office
and not pull it out, and you know, got to
try to set a good example. I was in a
video chat like a meeting and virtual meeting the other
day where this high school in the area had implemented
kind of this program that just helps overall with like
school culture and like togetherness and connectedness to school. And
one thing that he said really stuck out and have
(19:23):
thought about in a lot of different instances, But basically
what he said was that with something new like this,
you're gonna have to expect that as the adult, you're
gonna have to take on a lot of the responsibility
in the beginning. And it's not because the kids don't care.
It's not because the kids are just trying to like
screw around. It's just one of those things that is
right now. So I think with this is the same thing,
(19:44):
as the adults, we're gonna have to lead by example
and start to kind of carry the heavy load in
the beginning because it's gonna be a shift. I I
don't know how it's gonna go. We get it back
in August, but we'll give it a shot.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
And it might be hard, but I'm guessing it'll get
easier with time, and before you know it, it'll be
second nature. We'll realize, like, oh man, I can't believe
we ever allowed phones in our schools, and I can't
believe we allowed this distraction to be in our school
twenty four to seven in the past.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Some other things can be to consider, only allowing social
media at older ages, or even not at all, continue
to advocate for legal change. I think it's been cool
to see different states and places trying to make changes
and try to enforce some things, not just community wide,
but you know, state wide and even state to state.
(20:43):
We also continue to advocate that tech companies are held
responsible because ultimately they knew what they were doing. Mark Zuckerberg, TikTok,
everybody else whoever made snapchat, YouTube, all that stuff. They
ultimately have known what they're doing, and they've taken advantage
of it. I saw a TikTok video the other day
(21:03):
where they talked about how social media has really shifted
from it used to be a chronological thing where you'd
want to see what your friends were doing and see
posts in chronological order, but now it's really shifted to
like an algorithm based thing where you want to see
new things that you're not really they're not following, or
that might be of interest to you, and these tech
(21:24):
companies have really taken advantage of that. You kind of
see it all over. I deactivated my Facebook a while ago,
but before I did, I felt like I was seeing
more things that were recommended to me than like people
I followed, and then on Instagram, same thing I'm getting,
you know, stuff that I'm like, I don't even follow
these people. I don't what the hell is who are
these people? I like, yeah, you know, seeing It's just
(21:46):
it's it's way more algorithm based and way more trying
to get you hooked into the app than it is.
Let me just see what Justin and Dana are posting, right,
it's way more, way more the algorithm stuff. And then
and they know what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
A big reason why we got to hold those tech
companies accountable. On the tech Talk, actually someone had put
a comment on there and said, like he's really going
after the tech companies, Like is this guy still alive?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
When I commented on.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
It, it was like alive and kick It's hell. I
saw a picture today too of it was like a
picture from nineteen seventy eight, and it was like a
bunch of old white dudes swearing on a bible under oath,
and it said, these are the tobacco company CEOs swearing
under oath that their product is not addictive. Wild companies
(22:40):
and big corporations are going to lie through their teeth
to protect their profits. So we have to hold them accountable.
That was the only way we got big change on
the tobacco industry. And I bring up the tobacco industry
a lot because that is a big success story from
us from a societal standpoint, where we were able to
(23:03):
turn things around. There have been other examples, especially like
the food industry, where we have not been able to
turn things around. We have not been able to hold
food companies accountable for causing the obesity crisis. So we
can either help this thing or make it worse. And
the first and best thing that we can do is say, hey,
(23:24):
you're making us all sick. You have to be accountable
for this too, because companies love passing the responsibility onto people.
Another big example of that is global warming. How they've
tried to say, oh, how can you reduce your carbon footprint?
How can you make a difference, instead of saying, like,
how can we stop polluting and raping the earth?
Speaker 3 (23:47):
I'll tell you that shit kind of worked because I
feel like I used to use straws for sure, and
now I never They fucking got me.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
It's the guilt, right, I mean, it's effective strategy and
that's why they do it.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
Same thing with plastic bags. We got a bunch of
reusable bags. That's all we use.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
That what I'm okay with.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
It's a good system.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
Yeah, but they shouldn't have just been given they still
we use millions of plastic bags every year at those stores,
and if they just made a dedicated effort to stop,
we wouldn't use them.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
So some discussion questions for today, like what are some
extreme cases?
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Can anything we're tech?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
You've seen it really get in the way of young
people's lives or adults lives.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Yeah, I mean I've seen instances where kids have full
on lack of a better word, just meltdown because they're
not they don't have their phone. Hey, you gotta put
your phone away? No, No, I can't. Well no, you
got to go back to No. I like, all right,
I guess we're calling home, or you know, kid pushing
a staff out of the way to try to get
(24:58):
their phone, or a kid reaching out a staff's arm
and scratching it up and an attempt to get their phone. Like,
we've seen it a good amount and it's just reactions
that don't seem to fit what's going on in the moment,
don't seem to fit the environment, but it's just what
our kids have. They've gotten addicted. Yeah, we'll say that
(25:21):
they've gotten addicted or highly highly dependable dependent on the phones.
And it's really tough. It's really tough to break that.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
I would say for my kids that I see that
have like ten plus around twelve even.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
More hours per day.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Yeah, they just they're highly anxious, they're super socially awkward,
they don't have any people skills, they don't have any hobbies.
All they do is screens, and they're just not really
living a full life. So that's one of my main
messages to kids. It's like my wife gives this example
all the time of on your gravestone, do you want
(25:59):
it to say like how many hours you spent on
your phone? Or do you want it to say all
the things you did in life? Like what's more important
is just staring at that screen or actually living your life.
So trying to get people to understand that that the
life you live on your phone just isn't nearly as
fulfilling as the life you can live in person.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
We've talked about it, but like, what are some some
positives that screens in tech can provide?
Speaker 1 (26:25):
You know, there's there's lots. The thing is, they just
have to be done in moderation. I've seen a lot
of kids get some really great drugs on Snapchat, and
you know, I think that's an awesome thing.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Just kidding, Okay. The semi funny thing about that is
when when like police departments or like county officials will
send out like these are what these emojis mean? And
then like you talk to kids and like, what the
fuck is that?
Speaker 2 (26:56):
What?
Speaker 3 (26:57):
Who talks like that? Yeah, we just there's a disconnect.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
Yeah, there's a disconnect.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And I know we talked a lot about it on
our last episode too. But I do like the fact
that kids can be connected, that there are a ton
of great tools on cell phones that kids can use,
and you know, there are some good things. It's just
it's gotten so out of hand. That's that the hours
and hours of screen time every day is really when
you run into the problems.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
Yeah, I think the same thing, the connection. You can
still have the positives the way things have been made
easier because of screens and tech. We were just talking
earlier about plane tickets. I can get my plane ticket
on my phone. I don't got to go print anything.
I don't got to go go to the stand. I
can take care of all that. I can do all
this thing, Like there's just so much. I can order
(27:47):
a lift when I get you know, I went to
South Korea in November and I could just order an
uber from the fucking airport. Like, man, it's so easy,
you know. Yeah, It's made it's good life easier for sure.
What about Okay, so you are a father, what are
you going to do screen time wise with Liam? What
(28:08):
are we doing and for any potential future children or
what would you tell parents in terms of like what
could be helpful. It's not a one size fits all, but.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
Trying to lay it as much as possible. Try and
not give kids phones until a set age. I know
it's so hard, and I know that kids are going
to whine and complain, and I know I've talked about
like third graders who have told me like I feel
like an outcast because I'm the only one in my
class who doesn't have a phone. And it's really tough too,
because we try and not give my son our phones,
(28:40):
and then of course he hangs out with grandparents for
a day and and he's on the phone the whole time,
and he asks for it, he requests it, but just
trying to lay it. If you do give phones, set
screen time limits, try and set up some sort of
parental control stuff, so you know, they're not getting into
the things they should not be getting into, communicating with
the people should not be communicating with, because that phone
(29:02):
literally connects them with any one on earth.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
That's wild.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
You ever heard of the bark phone. Yeah, yeah, it's
very popular. Yeah, I know, I know a bunch of
kids that have one. It looks just like which is good.
I mean, not only does it look, but it is.
It's just a regular kind of Samsung phone and you
can either get the phone or you can get the app.
But they're all kind of helpful and helping to limit
(29:29):
things that kids are doing. If you if you really
feel like it's time to give your kid a phone,
there's ways that you can help protect kind of what's
going on. And I've even heard of like parents like hey,
I saw my kid type. I mean, we've gotten kids
have gotten busted with drugs in their backpack because someone
that texted them something and their mom'saw it or their
dad saw it and they told the school. So you know,
(29:50):
it's it is a lot of responsibility, but there's ways
that you can help manage that.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
So one thing I wanted to talk about to discussion wise,
like what's still needs to happen in this world to
really start pushing back on cell phone addiction. And you know,
I mentioned in the TED talk that there is no
recognized DSM diagnosis or ICD diagnosis for cell phone addiction.
(30:16):
And you know, the TED talk was years ago and
there is still nothing, Like there is still no ICD code.
There is still no DSM diagnosis for screen time and
phone addiction other than like Internet gaming disorder that's the
only one, or Internet gambling I think is one two
on there too. But yeah, there is nothing that allows
(30:37):
us to identify and label this track it treat it
that this has been a huge failure of I think
the mental health community, in a psychiatric community, that we
have not been able to come together and come down
with a specific set of criteria for creating this diagnosis.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
You got to think with the DS like, there's gonna
be something.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
And if there's not, I'm gonna be a ks.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Yeah, So I just googled, and of course I get
the Google Gemini to give me like a quick thing,
and then I clicked on an article so from mastermind
Behavior dot com. Uh, there hasn't been anything official with
the DSM six, but you know, historically there's a lot
of time and research and things that goes into the
(31:26):
development of a new version of it, the next version.
If you think back, so the DSM four, between the
four and the five, there's fourteen years, and it looks
like between the DSM three R and the DSM four
there was seven years. So you can assume it's probably somewhere. Well,
I mean right now we're at twelve years. I think
(31:47):
came out in twenty thirteen. The DSM five yes, yes,
or at about twelve years, so you can assume in
the next two to five years maybe something might come out.
So yeah, you gotta you gotta that there's that's next, right,
Like that's yeah, you.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
Would hope and if there's not, there's gotta be.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
And I talked about this, We're gonna be doing a
podcast with the Ritual Sisters. I was just a guest
on their show, and we talked about how like this
is my conspiracy theory cap coming on that I think
maybe the tech companies are are stopping this from happening,
are changing the way we communicate online and trying to
prevent people from actually coming together. So you know, that's
(32:31):
my conspiracy. I don't know if that's actually I have
no evidence to support that, but there seems like, why
is this not happening. It seems so obvious, it seems
so needed, and it's just we're not even close.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
I don't know. Yeah, it's just like when those companies
like try to donate money and the lobbyists. That's what
it is. When they get like lobbyists and shit in
their favor so that things don't go against them. I
don't think that's a conspiracy at all. That feels legit.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
And then you found as we get ready to wrap up,
you found like an article that links potentially just just
some speculation, just some numbers, but still of interest. It's
something that links screens and autisms, tell autisms, autism, tell
us more. Well.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I know that we just did an episode on autism
and we said there's probably not an environmental factor. But
this was kind of interesting on the American Academy of
Pediatrics website. This there was an article that came out
in twenty twenty four that talked about a journal paper
from Japan and showed that we don't know if there's
(33:40):
a causal relationship between screen time and autism, but in
Japan they did a prospective cohort study of eighty four
thousand kids, so it's like a pretty big study that
showed that the more screen time that boys have, and
that was the surprising thing, is that boys made a
(34:01):
big difference with screen times. So then we actually just
back up and say, the more screen time you had
at one year old predicted the rate of autism diagnosis
at three years old. So surprisingly, for boys it was
a big association, but for girls there was no association. Fascinating, right,
(34:23):
because we know the boys get diagnosed much more frequently
than girls. But for kids who got one to two
hours of screen time per day, we're about twice as
likely to be diagnosed with autism at three years old,
and then two to four hours of screen time per day,
we're three point five times more likely to be diagnosed
(34:43):
with autism. So kind of a fascinating study. It's one study,
not enough to say like, oh, screens are absolutely associated
with autism, but something we should continue to consider and
look into.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
Well, I wonder then if this is looking at ages
one and three, I think we both know or have
seen that diagnoses autism, and girls tend to be harder
to get. So I wonder if they would continue to
like look at the children as they get older and
as they're more like socially developed, is it can they
potentially diagnose?
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Wonderful point? Bam, That's why I keep you around, Eddie.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
Man, I'd be thinking sometimes let's.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Go so I'm hoping that they're continuing to follow these
kids into their early adulthood so that we get some
of those numbers.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
Yeah, man, look at that. Just fucking reading articles and ship.
Let's go well being Well, we've reached the end of
today's episode. We appreciate you all. We'll play it out
Apple podcast, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts. You can
find us on there. Please like, subscribe, share, leave us
(36:00):
five star review. If you'd like to, you can leave
us a comment. We'll see it on social media at
MILLENNIOIMHC and MILLENNIUMIMAHC dot com. And remember, take care of
y'all mentals and lower your screen time.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
The content provided in this podcast is for informational purposes. Only,
and does not constitute legal, medical or professional advice. Always
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or mental health concern. The hosts and the producers disclaim
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(36:32):
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So ready to set go Eddie right now? How many
hours of screen.
Speaker 2 (00:04):
Time do you have per day?
Speaker 3 (00:05):
Oh? Fuck? Okay.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Welcome to MMHC, your go to mental health podcast.
Speaker 3 (00:16):
I'm Eddie Koreo, a licensed professional counselor.
Speaker 1 (00:19):
And I'm Justin Romano, a Board certified child and Adolescent psychiatrist.
Speaker 3 (00:23):
We created MMHC to give listeners evidence based information directly
from professionals who work in mental health.
Speaker 1 (00:29):
We're not influencers, We're not trying to sell you anything.
We just want to bring love, empathy, and understanding of
mental health into this world.
Speaker 3 (00:36):
And we really think that learning about mental health should
be fun, interesting, and most importantly honest.
Speaker 1 (00:41):
So thanks for tuning in. This is a show by
two millennials, but it is intended to be for everyone.
We hope you enjoy the show. MMHC is a production
of Speaker from iHeartMedia.
Speaker 3 (00:55):
I heartma It's gotten better research recently. I was pretty thrilled.
I had one that was like in the five hour range,
like that, you know, not bad. I've definitely seen some
where it's eight. I just hit it. We just started
(01:17):
Summer break two days ago, so that that is something
that worries me a little bit. I'm gonna need to
figure something out. But yeah, I would like to say
I think I've gotten a lot better with it at work.
And actually I can bring this up again later. But
we're moving to a door to door policy at my
school next year, so we're actually gonna do as soon
(01:38):
as kids get into the building until they walk out,
no cell phones anywhere. That means during passing period, during lunch,
if they're a teacher's assistant or an office aid and
they're sitting there and just kind of hanging out, they
just gotta hang out no phones. So the expectation is
that staff and teachers do that too. So I think
that'll help me a ton. I'm just gonna leave it
(02:00):
at my desk and you know, kind of going from there.
But yeah, I feel better about it. Yeah, thanks for
putting me on the spot. What are you at? Like
an hour and a half?
Speaker 1 (02:09):
About three mother on average? I mean, not trying to
be like, oh lower than you. But and it went
down after I had a child because he just you know,
he takes a lot of attention and focus.
Speaker 3 (02:23):
Yeah, that makes sense.
Speaker 1 (02:24):
I got a really funny story too, where the other
day I had let out a flatulence.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
I had tooted.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Hard to say that I'm trying to be the doctor
persona here on the show. Here hard to say that
I farted in doctor speak. But he actually like came
around and like checked my pants and looked at me
and went poopoos. And I was like, I was like, no,
no poopoos. And then he puts his hand on my shoulder,
it looks me dead in the eye, and goes, let's
change your diaper. I could not believe that he said
(02:58):
that he's two years.
Speaker 3 (02:59):
Ago, that he's been wearing a diaper for a week.
Speaker 2 (03:03):
I have to at his recommendation.
Speaker 3 (03:06):
Yeah, no choice, doctor's orders.
Speaker 1 (03:10):
So today we are talking smartphones and tech addiction. One
of the reasons why we wanted to talk about this
is because the tech talk that I did back.
Speaker 2 (03:19):
In twenty twenty two.
Speaker 1 (03:21):
Man, it's already been a long time now, twenty twenty Yeah,
November twenty twenty two, it's almost is at half a
million views, so it's I know.
Speaker 2 (03:29):
It's been. It's been totally wild.
Speaker 1 (03:31):
I've had people reach out to me from all over
the country wanting to talk about cell phone and tech
addiction stuff. So it's been such a cool thing, a
great way to meet people, a great way to talk
to people, great way to connect. So we wanted to
give a little update on the situation in these past
couple of years and see if there's been any big
changes and updates. So that's why we were doing this today.
Speaker 3 (03:52):
Justin talked about a lot has happened. There was the
there's a bunch of states led by Colorado suing Meta.
There haven't really been any updates since twenty twenty three,
but I think one of our previous episodes we talked
about how there's a quote unquote whistleblower in Meta that
basically was like, hey, we're kind of doing some sketchy
stuff here, like we need to stop. And I think
(04:14):
they even helped to stop the release of a was
it an Instagram for like children or for preteen something
like that. Meta was working on something and right around
the same time the plans got squashed because all the
stuff came out. Some other updates include Australia they banned
social media for children under sixteen. This actually places a
(04:34):
burden of responsibility on tech companies, which is something that
Justin has talked about for a long time and that
we've kind of advocated for tech companies face a fine
of thirty two million dollars if they do not stop
children from logging in. So there's been some changes. What
else have we seen, justin in the last couple of years.
Speaker 1 (04:49):
In the state of Florida, they are the process of
banning social media accounts for anyone under the age of fourteen,
So go Florida.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
That's pretty cool.
Speaker 1 (04:58):
South Korea banned video games for children under sixteen during
the timeframe of midnight to six am, which that would
have affected me when I was younger if I had
lived in South Korea.
Speaker 3 (05:12):
That's prime gaming time.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Oh yeah, I remember playing games until the sun came
up over the summer, especially like I remember like getting
to bed and looking at my window and being like,
oh the sun is coming up now, maybe I should
maybe we should sleep more.
Speaker 3 (05:29):
The Netherlands has banned mobile devices in the classroom, which
is kind of what we're trying to do. And then
many European countries require parental consent if teens are to
use social media, so kind of a big deal. It's
it's nice to see some changes. I don't know what
made what's going to be best, but I mean, you
got to try something different. This is an ever changing beast.
(05:51):
We've talked about it for years, We're going to talk
about it for years, probably until we retire, and it's
something that changes all the time. But we've got to
try different things because if we don't, then you can
never expect anything to change.
Speaker 1 (06:01):
So it seems like the needle is finally turning right.
People are starting to understand that tech and screen addiction
is a real thing and we need to start making
big societal changes to try and combat it. One of
the biggest studies that the United States has going right
now on screen addiction is the ABCD study, the Adolescent
(06:23):
Brain Cognitive Development Study, which is the most comprehensive study
in the US going on right now on brain development
kids with screens, and they're starting to show some pretty
important findings. From the Dandelion Training and Development website which
kind of summarized some of the recent findings, they found
that screen uses causes children to score lower on tests
of language, literacy, critical thinking, and reasoning. The study found
(06:47):
that screen times correlated to a higher number of depression symptoms,
specifically video chats, texting videos, video games. These were the
screen types with the greatest association for depression symptoms. They
also found that screen exposure mediated the rewards system development
and the inhibitory control system of the brain, like over
(07:09):
a two year period of studying this. So these studies
are showing that there is brain development changes because of
how much our kids are consuming screens.
Speaker 3 (07:19):
Did I ever tell you that we have an AP
psych at my school as a class and I asked
the teacher if I could do a like a AP
question for fun, just to see how we do. I
tell you, I don't think this is like a month ago. Yeah, yeah,
so it just clicked right now. I've totally forgot to
tell you. But the so what it's called the evidence
(07:42):
based question, So if there's anyone out there that's taken
an AP test recently or that's going to take one whatever,
And basically what it was is that I had a
prompt and the prompt was using the articles below, like
the short snippets create a hypothesis and like talk about
why or related to a psychological theory that helps support
(08:07):
it or whatever and over yeah, something like that. So
my overall hypothesis was that the excessive use of social
media and screens negatively impacts the overall well being of
teens and young adults, and so I must now, yeah,
thank you, I'm looking at it now. And one of them,
one of the sources said that, and these are real sources,
so this is not just pulling shit out of my ass,
(08:29):
this is like legit. One of them was that researchers
found a positive association between loneliness and longer screen time,
and the other sources found that researchers found a negative
association with social well being and social media use. So
I just used that along with what was it, Erickson's
theory of psychosocial development and then social learning theory to
like support my argument. And so, yeah, I just made
(08:52):
me think about that.
Speaker 1 (08:54):
What was your score, he said, I would.
Speaker 3 (08:56):
Have got a five. Yeah, at least on that one,
he said, I would scored well.
Speaker 1 (09:01):
Which is the highest score at Yeah.
Speaker 3 (09:04):
I did tell him. I was like, I couldn't remember
the exact names of social learning theory or eric'son psychosocial development,
but I think about that stuff all the time when
I'm talking to parents and kids, so I did have
to look that up. So I'm fine with moving my
score down a little bit. But I thought that was
pretty good, not being in school for a while.
Speaker 2 (09:21):
And how much chat do youpt?
Speaker 1 (09:23):
Did you use on.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
Zero off the dome? Yeah? Old school? Yeah, tablet and
fucking chiseling' yep.
Speaker 2 (09:32):
That's oh yeah, that's what we had to do growing up, right,
that's right.
Speaker 3 (09:39):
Well along the lines of my quick research with the
ap psychology Test practice questions, we have some stats in facts.
So from the cdc UH they said that about half
of teenagers get four plus hours of screen time per day.
I'd be willing to bet we can probably do half
get more than we can start the bottom like higher,
(10:00):
but maybe I'm just being an ass They also found
that sixty percent of black teens had over four hours
per day and that overall this disproportionately impacts impacts black people.
Kids with four plus hours of screen time have a
twenty five point nine percent chance of also being depressed,
which makes sense along with rates of anxiety. So if
(10:21):
you look at the numbers, children teens who get over
four hours have about a twenty seven point one percent
rate of anxiety, while those that get under four hours
are at twelve point three percent. It's a pretty big
junk over over double. Another association they found was that
lower parental education was associated with higher screen times than kids,
and these were based off of self reports of screen time.
(10:45):
So one thing to think about is that they might
be under reporting, which I might have done right at
the start of this episode. I don't think I did,
but just things to take into account from the CDC stats.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
One thing I've noticed in I talked to kids about
the screen time quite often is that they do under
report it. They'll tell be like, oh, yeah, it's totally
like two three hours a day, and it'll be like,
pull out your phone, show me your screen time app.
It's always higher than what they say because there isn't
an amount of shame that goes with it, an amount
of trying to underreport, because especially with parents, there's also
(11:17):
there's always this like transactional relationship where it's like they
don't want parents to know how much they are on
their phone because they don't want screen time limits enforced.
So there's reasons why that they're doing this, but I
think it's really important to understand why.
Speaker 3 (11:31):
You know, what else typically gets underreported by teens when
you ask them.
Speaker 2 (11:36):
Drug use, drug use, yeah, bingo.
Speaker 3 (11:41):
It's like, I don't know if I've ever heard it
in a training or maybe it's just like a trick
of the trade. But when I was doing drug and
alcohol assessments, when I do like the what do we
used to call them integrated assessments or his mental health
and drug and alcohol, the advice I was given was
that anytime you ask specifically about a number of drinks
or time smoking and all that, you can kind of
(12:02):
assume it's a little higher because teams just tend to
under report, and honestly, we can go back. Adults tend
to under report too. I don't think it's just a
teenager thing.
Speaker 1 (12:10):
Totally, especially in a healthcare setting where you're like, I
don't really want to tell my dentist how much I'm
smoking right now?
Speaker 3 (12:16):
Right? Yeahah, yeah, that's fair.
Speaker 1 (12:19):
So one thing I've heard a lot people speculating is like,
it seems like this younger generation just isn't driving as much,
they're not getting their licenses as much. So I wanted
to look into it, and I found an article from
USA Today which analyzed data from the US Department of Transportation,
which I have no reason to doubt at this point,
(12:40):
but between nineteen eighty three and twenty twenty two, the
number of sixteen year old driver's licenses is declining from
about one half to a quarter, so that's like a
lot less people driving at sixteen. In the rate of
eighteen year olds with driver license driver's licenses has dropped
from eighty percent to about sixty percent.
Speaker 3 (13:00):
As someone in the schools, I feel like I can
anecdotally agree with this. Yeah, I think a lot less
of our older sophomores and then junior seniors are driving
or getting parking permits like people were. Just yeah, that's interesting.
Along with the article, they also mentioned that since the
year two thousand, the number of sixteen year olds old
(13:21):
sixteen year olds with driver's license has decreased nearly twenty
seven percent, so a quarter. The article mentions that the
increase in technology is a big reason why people are
opting out of driving. They get their community online and
not in person, and there's also more writes share options
that there were in the past. I think that's a
I feel like that's an interesting point. The community online,
(13:42):
same thing with it and not even like people who
aren't in your general vicinity. I think even your friends,
everyone's snapchatting and FaceTime each other and like talking virtually
instead of like needing to be right next to each other.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
The screens have completely changed the young person experience in
the world to where for hundreds of thousands of years
you had to leave your house or at least bring
your friends to your house. You had to meet your
friends in person if you wanted to interact with them,
And now there are so many different ways to interact
with your friends outside of the house or sorry, in
(14:17):
your house with screens. Plus, young people also gravitate more
towards public transportation and biking, which is a good.
Speaker 2 (14:25):
Thing in my opinion.
Speaker 3 (14:26):
Yeah. Yeah, So one thing I'll add is I feel
like there's also been not that it was ever a
negative thing or should have been a negative thing, but
the normalization of online friends and people like saying like, oh,
I have an online friend. I met this friend online.
I feel like that was like stigmatized before, but now
it seems like less and less stigmatized, Like it's it
(14:47):
feels more accepted. I remember seeing or hearing of like
kids or even adults who met their like gaming friend
for the first time in like six years, like they
met online and they just started gaming together all the time,
and that being kind of like, oh, that's kind of
like weird or you know, people kind of like talking
down on it. But now it feels like pretty normalized
for people to make friends online and them having them
(15:10):
at the same value as like people that they know
in person. It's something I've thought about totally.
Speaker 1 (15:15):
And if you're spending hours talking to these people, you
really can't build a solid relationship with them. So I
know sometimes people look down on those types of relationships.
But I even remember being in junior high and one
of my best friends had a video game buddy that
we would play with that we had never met in
real life, and he like lived in Missouri or something,
(15:37):
and we would play with him like all the time,
and I got to know him a little bit too,
and it was just it felt a little weird at
the time, like being like, I know this guy, but
I've never actually.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
Met this guy.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, but now it's become commonplace.
Speaker 3 (15:48):
Yeah. In the state of Oregon right now, it's a
long session right legislatively, so people were trying to get
a bunch of bills passing all that. There's actually a
bill that was moving through and went through the House
and then it ends of dying in the Senate that
was going to ban cell phones from schools that they
were going to basically require every school district to do
(16:09):
a bell to bell rule ultimately didn't pass and it
died there. But it sounds like what they ended up at,
or what we're going to move forward with, is there
is going to be like a quote unquote cell phone ruling,
but it's basically up to every school district in the
state to have their own. Basically, every school district is
required to have a rule. Every school district is allowed
(16:31):
to choose what their rule is. So even more I
would be willing to bet that it's not just an
Oregon thing that's passing, right, the other states are probably
doing very similar things.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
Yeah, it seems like it, and we'll dive more into
those and keep giving you updates as they come, especially
once they are confirmed by states senates and get put
into place. So some of the recommendations, because we always
like giving you recommendations on the show to how to
live the healthiest life possible. So for screen time, and
(17:05):
I'm talking kids, I'm talking parents, I'm talking everyone, create
screen free times and places, family dinners, family game nights,
times where we say, hey, everyone's putting their phone away. No,
one's using their phones right now. Let's take a break
and let's be together in person, no distractions. Another thing
(17:26):
that people like to do are tech detoxes, like plan
a trip with no phones or no tech. I think
that's why so many young people are really getting into camping,
is because it's kind of a natural way to say, like, Okay,
I'm not gonna have my phone. There's no service out there,
so I'm going to leave it. Plus, one of the
things that I try and advocate for is like leaving
(17:47):
your phone in a place where you can't access it
and just like giving yourself a whole day, like if
you just like leave it on your nightstand with the
ringer on so that if anyone's really trying to get
a hold of you or get in touch with you,
you'll know what it is. But not having it in
your pocket, not having it with you and on your
person all the time to check because I notice if
(18:07):
I don't have my phone on me, I feel myself
reaching for my phone constantly, and that feels like addiction
to me, and I don't like that. So little tips.
Speaker 3 (18:18):
Some other ones could be things like no phone phones
or video games in the room during bedtime, just trying
to especially if you have all the just like the
it's not letting you fall asleep when you have a
especially because I have my brightness up a lot. But
when you have your phone right in your face or
you're gonna get dryin in your face, you're not really
prepping for bedtime. Your body's not getting ready for it.
Screen time limits are always a good idea. It helps
(18:41):
just prevent the problem from ballooning. I know it can
be hard. I know it can be pretty difficult, but
that's that's always a good option if you're the adult
in the situation trying to set a good example that's
going to fall to us this next school year. I'm
gonna do my best. I'm gonna just so usually we'll
stand in the in the hall in between passing periods
just like see students and you know, be available. I'm
(19:02):
just gonna have to leave my phone in the office
and not pull it out, and you know, got to
try to set a good example. I was in a
video chat like a meeting and virtual meeting the other
day where this high school in the area had implemented
kind of this program that just helps overall with like
school culture and like togetherness and connectedness to school. And
one thing that he said really stuck out and have
(19:23):
thought about in a lot of different instances, But basically
what he said was that with something new like this,
you're gonna have to expect that as the adult, you're
gonna have to take on a lot of the responsibility
in the beginning. And it's not because the kids don't care.
It's not because the kids are just trying to like
screw around. It's just one of those things that is
right now. So I think with this is the same thing,
(19:44):
as the adults, we're gonna have to lead by example
and start to kind of carry the heavy load in
the beginning because it's gonna be a shift. I I
don't know how it's gonna go. We get it back
in August, but we'll give it a shot.
Speaker 1 (19:59):
And it might be hard, but I'm guessing it'll get
easier with time, and before you know it, it'll be
second nature. We'll realize, like, oh man, I can't believe
we ever allowed phones in our schools, and I can't
believe we allowed this distraction to be in our school
twenty four to seven in the past.
Speaker 3 (20:23):
Some other things can be to consider, only allowing social
media at older ages, or even not at all, continue
to advocate for legal change. I think it's been cool
to see different states and places trying to make changes
and try to enforce some things, not just community wide,
but you know, state wide and even state to state.
(20:43):
We also continue to advocate that tech companies are held
responsible because ultimately they knew what they were doing. Mark Zuckerberg, TikTok,
everybody else whoever made snapchat, YouTube, all that stuff. They
ultimately have known what they're doing, and they've taken advantage
of it. I saw a TikTok video the other day
(21:03):
where they talked about how social media has really shifted
from it used to be a chronological thing where you'd
want to see what your friends were doing and see
posts in chronological order, but now it's really shifted to
like an algorithm based thing where you want to see
new things that you're not really they're not following, or
that might be of interest to you, and these tech
(21:24):
companies have really taken advantage of that. You kind of
see it all over. I deactivated my Facebook a while ago,
but before I did, I felt like I was seeing
more things that were recommended to me than like people
I followed, and then on Instagram, same thing I'm getting,
you know, stuff that I'm like, I don't even follow
these people. I don't what the hell is who are
these people? I like, yeah, you know, seeing It's just
(21:46):
it's it's way more algorithm based and way more trying
to get you hooked into the app than it is.
Let me just see what Justin and Dana are posting, right,
it's way more, way more the algorithm stuff. And then
and they know what they're doing.
Speaker 1 (22:00):
A big reason why we got to hold those tech
companies accountable. On the tech Talk, actually someone had put
a comment on there and said, like he's really going
after the tech companies, Like is this guy still alive?
Speaker 2 (22:14):
When I commented on.
Speaker 1 (22:15):
It, it was like alive and kick It's hell. I
saw a picture today too of it was like a
picture from nineteen seventy eight, and it was like a
bunch of old white dudes swearing on a bible under oath,
and it said, these are the tobacco company CEOs swearing
under oath that their product is not addictive. Wild companies
(22:40):
and big corporations are going to lie through their teeth
to protect their profits. So we have to hold them accountable.
That was the only way we got big change on
the tobacco industry. And I bring up the tobacco industry
a lot because that is a big success story from
us from a societal standpoint, where we were able to
(23:03):
turn things around. There have been other examples, especially like
the food industry, where we have not been able to
turn things around. We have not been able to hold
food companies accountable for causing the obesity crisis. So we
can either help this thing or make it worse. And
the first and best thing that we can do is say, hey,
(23:24):
you're making us all sick. You have to be accountable
for this too, because companies love passing the responsibility onto people.
Another big example of that is global warming. How they've
tried to say, oh, how can you reduce your carbon footprint?
How can you make a difference, instead of saying, like,
how can we stop polluting and raping the earth?
Speaker 3 (23:47):
I'll tell you that shit kind of worked because I
feel like I used to use straws for sure, and
now I never They fucking got me.
Speaker 1 (23:58):
It's the guilt, right, I mean, it's effective strategy and
that's why they do it.
Speaker 3 (24:02):
Same thing with plastic bags. We got a bunch of
reusable bags. That's all we use.
Speaker 2 (24:09):
That what I'm okay with.
Speaker 3 (24:10):
It's a good system.
Speaker 1 (24:12):
Yeah, but they shouldn't have just been given they still
we use millions of plastic bags every year at those stores,
and if they just made a dedicated effort to stop,
we wouldn't use them.
Speaker 3 (24:24):
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (24:25):
So some discussion questions for today, like what are some
extreme cases?
Speaker 2 (24:30):
Can anything we're tech?
Speaker 1 (24:34):
You've seen it really get in the way of young
people's lives or adults lives.
Speaker 3 (24:38):
Yeah, I mean I've seen instances where kids have full
on lack of a better word, just meltdown because they're
not they don't have their phone. Hey, you gotta put
your phone away? No, No, I can't. Well no, you
got to go back to No. I like, all right,
I guess we're calling home, or you know, kid pushing
a staff out of the way to try to get
(24:58):
their phone, or a kid reaching out a staff's arm
and scratching it up and an attempt to get their phone. Like,
we've seen it a good amount and it's just reactions
that don't seem to fit what's going on in the moment,
don't seem to fit the environment, but it's just what
our kids have. They've gotten addicted. Yeah, we'll say that
(25:21):
they've gotten addicted or highly highly dependable dependent on the phones.
And it's really tough. It's really tough to break that.
Speaker 1 (25:28):
I would say for my kids that I see that
have like ten plus around twelve even.
Speaker 2 (25:33):
More hours per day.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
Yeah, they just they're highly anxious, they're super socially awkward,
they don't have any people skills, they don't have any hobbies.
All they do is screens, and they're just not really
living a full life. So that's one of my main
messages to kids. It's like my wife gives this example
all the time of on your gravestone, do you want
(25:59):
it to say like how many hours you spent on
your phone? Or do you want it to say all
the things you did in life? Like what's more important
is just staring at that screen or actually living your life.
So trying to get people to understand that that the
life you live on your phone just isn't nearly as
fulfilling as the life you can live in person.
Speaker 3 (26:20):
We've talked about it, but like, what are some some
positives that screens in tech can provide?
Speaker 1 (26:25):
You know, there's there's lots. The thing is, they just
have to be done in moderation. I've seen a lot
of kids get some really great drugs on Snapchat, and
you know, I think that's an awesome thing.
Speaker 3 (26:37):
Just kidding, Okay. The semi funny thing about that is
when when like police departments or like county officials will
send out like these are what these emojis mean? And
then like you talk to kids and like, what the
fuck is that?
Speaker 2 (26:56):
What?
Speaker 3 (26:57):
Who talks like that? Yeah, we just there's a disconnect.
Speaker 2 (27:04):
Yeah, there's a disconnect.
Speaker 1 (27:05):
And I know we talked a lot about it on
our last episode too. But I do like the fact
that kids can be connected, that there are a ton
of great tools on cell phones that kids can use,
and you know, there are some good things. It's just
it's gotten so out of hand. That's that the hours
and hours of screen time every day is really when
you run into the problems.
Speaker 3 (27:26):
Yeah, I think the same thing, the connection. You can
still have the positives the way things have been made
easier because of screens and tech. We were just talking
earlier about plane tickets. I can get my plane ticket
on my phone. I don't got to go print anything.
I don't got to go go to the stand. I
can take care of all that. I can do all
this thing, Like there's just so much. I can order
(27:47):
a lift when I get you know, I went to
South Korea in November and I could just order an
uber from the fucking airport. Like, man, it's so easy,
you know. Yeah, It's made it's good life easier for sure.
What about Okay, so you are a father, what are
you going to do screen time wise with Liam? What
(28:08):
are we doing and for any potential future children or
what would you tell parents in terms of like what
could be helpful. It's not a one size fits all, but.
Speaker 1 (28:16):
Trying to lay it as much as possible. Try and
not give kids phones until a set age. I know
it's so hard, and I know that kids are going
to whine and complain, and I know I've talked about
like third graders who have told me like I feel
like an outcast because I'm the only one in my
class who doesn't have a phone. And it's really tough too,
because we try and not give my son our phones,
(28:40):
and then of course he hangs out with grandparents for
a day and and he's on the phone the whole time,
and he asks for it, he requests it, but just
trying to lay it. If you do give phones, set
screen time limits, try and set up some sort of
parental control stuff, so you know, they're not getting into
the things they should not be getting into, communicating with
the people should not be communicating with, because that phone
(29:02):
literally connects them with any one on earth.
Speaker 2 (29:06):
That's wild.
Speaker 3 (29:08):
You ever heard of the bark phone. Yeah, yeah, it's
very popular. Yeah, I know, I know a bunch of
kids that have one. It looks just like which is good.
I mean, not only does it look, but it is.
It's just a regular kind of Samsung phone and you
can either get the phone or you can get the app.
But they're all kind of helpful and helping to limit
(29:29):
things that kids are doing. If you if you really
feel like it's time to give your kid a phone,
there's ways that you can help protect kind of what's
going on. And I've even heard of like parents like hey,
I saw my kid type. I mean, we've gotten kids
have gotten busted with drugs in their backpack because someone
that texted them something and their mom'saw it or their
dad saw it and they told the school. So you know,
(29:50):
it's it is a lot of responsibility, but there's ways
that you can help manage that.
Speaker 1 (29:56):
So one thing I wanted to talk about to discussion wise,
like what's still needs to happen in this world to
really start pushing back on cell phone addiction. And you know,
I mentioned in the TED talk that there is no
recognized DSM diagnosis or ICD diagnosis for cell phone addiction.
(30:16):
And you know, the TED talk was years ago and
there is still nothing, Like there is still no ICD code.
There is still no DSM diagnosis for screen time and
phone addiction other than like Internet gaming disorder that's the
only one, or Internet gambling I think is one two
on there too. But yeah, there is nothing that allows
(30:37):
us to identify and label this track it treat it
that this has been a huge failure of I think
the mental health community, in a psychiatric community, that we
have not been able to come together and come down
with a specific set of criteria for creating this diagnosis.
Speaker 3 (30:58):
You got to think with the DS like, there's gonna
be something.
Speaker 1 (31:03):
And if there's not, I'm gonna be a ks.
Speaker 3 (31:05):
Yeah, So I just googled, and of course I get
the Google Gemini to give me like a quick thing,
and then I clicked on an article so from mastermind
Behavior dot com. Uh, there hasn't been anything official with
the DSM six, but you know, historically there's a lot
of time and research and things that goes into the
(31:26):
development of a new version of it, the next version.
If you think back, so the DSM four, between the
four and the five, there's fourteen years, and it looks
like between the DSM three R and the DSM four
there was seven years. So you can assume it's probably somewhere. Well,
I mean right now we're at twelve years. I think
(31:47):
came out in twenty thirteen. The DSM five yes, yes,
or at about twelve years, so you can assume in
the next two to five years maybe something might come out.
So yeah, you gotta you gotta that there's that's next, right,
Like that's yeah, you.
Speaker 2 (32:04):
Would hope and if there's not, there's gotta be.
Speaker 1 (32:09):
And I talked about this, We're gonna be doing a
podcast with the Ritual Sisters. I was just a guest
on their show, and we talked about how like this
is my conspiracy theory cap coming on that I think
maybe the tech companies are are stopping this from happening,
are changing the way we communicate online and trying to
prevent people from actually coming together. So you know, that's
(32:31):
my conspiracy. I don't know if that's actually I have
no evidence to support that, but there seems like, why
is this not happening. It seems so obvious, it seems
so needed, and it's just we're not even close.
Speaker 3 (32:43):
I don't know. Yeah, it's just like when those companies
like try to donate money and the lobbyists. That's what
it is. When they get like lobbyists and shit in
their favor so that things don't go against them. I
don't think that's a conspiracy at all. That feels legit.
Speaker 2 (32:59):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (33:01):
And then you found as we get ready to wrap up,
you found like an article that links potentially just just
some speculation, just some numbers, but still of interest. It's
something that links screens and autisms, tell autisms, autism, tell
us more. Well.
Speaker 1 (33:17):
I know that we just did an episode on autism
and we said there's probably not an environmental factor. But
this was kind of interesting on the American Academy of
Pediatrics website. This there was an article that came out
in twenty twenty four that talked about a journal paper
from Japan and showed that we don't know if there's
(33:40):
a causal relationship between screen time and autism, but in
Japan they did a prospective cohort study of eighty four
thousand kids, so it's like a pretty big study that
showed that the more screen time that boys have, and
that was the surprising thing, is that boys made a
(34:01):
big difference with screen times. So then we actually just
back up and say, the more screen time you had
at one year old predicted the rate of autism diagnosis
at three years old. So surprisingly, for boys it was
a big association, but for girls there was no association. Fascinating, right,
(34:23):
because we know the boys get diagnosed much more frequently
than girls. But for kids who got one to two
hours of screen time per day, we're about twice as
likely to be diagnosed with autism at three years old,
and then two to four hours of screen time per day,
we're three point five times more likely to be diagnosed
(34:43):
with autism. So kind of a fascinating study. It's one study,
not enough to say like, oh, screens are absolutely associated
with autism, but something we should continue to consider and
look into.
Speaker 3 (34:56):
Well, I wonder then if this is looking at ages
one and three, I think we both know or have
seen that diagnoses autism, and girls tend to be harder
to get. So I wonder if they would continue to
like look at the children as they get older and
as they're more like socially developed, is it can they
potentially diagnose?
Speaker 2 (35:18):
Wonderful point? Bam, That's why I keep you around, Eddie.
Speaker 3 (35:26):
Man, I'd be thinking sometimes let's.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
Go so I'm hoping that they're continuing to follow these
kids into their early adulthood so that we get some
of those numbers.
Speaker 3 (35:38):
Yeah, man, look at that. Just fucking reading articles and ship.
Let's go well being Well, we've reached the end of
today's episode. We appreciate you all. We'll play it out
Apple podcast, Spotify, wherever you get your podcasts. You can
find us on there. Please like, subscribe, share, leave us
(36:00):
five star review. If you'd like to, you can leave
us a comment. We'll see it on social media at
MILLENNIOIMHC and MILLENNIUMIMAHC dot com. And remember, take care of
y'all mentals and lower your screen time.
Speaker 1 (36:11):
The content provided in this podcast is for informational purposes. Only,
and does not constitute legal, medical or professional advice. Always
seek the advice of a qualified professional for any legal, medical,
or mental health concern. The hosts and the producers disclaim
any liability for any direct, indirect, incidental, consequential, or specific
damages arising from the use of this podcast or any
information contained therein. Opinions expressed by the hosts and guests
(36:32):
are their own and do not necessarily reflect the view
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By accessing and listening to this podcast, you agree to
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