{"id":101,"date":"2024-09-20T18:38:58","date_gmt":"2024-09-20T15:38:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/?p=101"},"modified":"2024-09-20T18:38:58","modified_gmt":"2024-09-20T15:38:58","slug":"journalist-sends-kids-off-on-a-smartphone-free-camping-trip-unsupervised-adults-quake-kids-flourish","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/?p=101","title":{"rendered":"Journalist Sends Kids off on a Smartphone-Free Camping Trip \u2013 Unsupervised. Adults Quake. Kids Flourish."},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/picture>\n
<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

The ten participants in Decca Aitkenhead\u2019s month-long experiment. Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/h3>\n

<\/h3>\n

The Sunday Times (UK) just ran a major story illustrating the twin prescriptions in The Anxious Generation<\/h3>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\"\"<\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n
\"\"<\/picture><\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
\n
\n
LENORE SKENAZY<\/a><\/div>\n

AND<\/p>\n

JON HAIDT<\/a><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
<\/div>\n
\n

Introduction from Jon Haidt:<\/strong><\/p>\n

Many journalists have written some version of this story: \u201cI ditched my smartphone for a week and here\u2019s what happened!\u201d\u00a0 Usually, they encounter some problems and withdrawal symptoms along the way, followed by some benefits. In the end, the journalists typically return to their smartphone-based lives, having learned a few valuable lessons.<\/p>\n

These self-experiments are fun to read, but they do little to test the claims I made in\u00a0The Anxious Generation<\/em>\u00a0for three reasons.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. The writer is an adult<\/li>\n
  2. One week is too short because it takes two or three to overcome withdrawal symptoms and develop new behavior patterns<\/li>\n
  3. The writer did it alone!<\/em>\u00a0The central point of Part 4 of the book was that we need\u00a0collective action<\/em>\u00a0to escape a collective problem. If you take away screens from one kid while all her friends stay online, then you\u2019ve isolated her. If you don\u2019t replace the virtual world with more independence in the real one, the whole experiment will feel to the kid as though a door is slamming shut instead of a new one opening.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    At last, a journalist has done the proper test, and the\u00a0results are thrilling<\/a>. Decca Aitkenhead, who writes for\u00a0The Sunday Times<\/em>\u00a0(UK), recruited her two sons (ages 13 and 14), along with six of their male friends, plus two teen girls with whom some of the boys were acquainted. They agreed to go for a month using basic phones with no internet access (although they got access to their smartphones for one hour each evening). In other words, Decca did a study with\u00a0teens,<\/em>\u00a0for a\u00a0long enough period<\/em>, in a\u00a0group<\/em>.<\/p>\n

    She then did something harder and more amazing: she added a mega-dose of independence. She sent them on an\u00a0unsupervised<\/em>\u00a0two-day camping trip\u2013\u2013a chance to experience independence, risk, and problem-solving in the real world, together, just as kids had always done before the 1990s.<\/p>\n

    The camping trip confirmed everything that Lenore Skenazy has been saying since her 2009 book\u00a0Free Range Kids<\/a><\/em>\u00a0(updated in 2021): Young people are starved for independence in the real world. Given some, they flourish.<\/p>\n

    Decca\u2019s group was incompetent at first, but the kids developed competence as the experiment went on. They took risks (some, admittedly, dumb). They tried new things. And without smartphones glued to their hands, they connected. Yesterday, I heard Decca\u2019s son Jake on a radio program, talking about how much he loved the month-long project. He said, of the camping trip, that it gave him \u201cone of the best nights of my year, maybe of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

    I invited Lenore, who co-founded\u00a0Let Grow<\/a>\u00a0with me, to comment on the lessons from the camping trip, below. Lenore helped me write the chapters in Part 4 of\u00a0The Anxious Generation<\/em>, and proposed many of the \u201creal world\u201d ideas and actions there, for parents and schools. The camping trip illustrates a collective action to implement the fourth norm:\u00a0\u201cFar more independence, free play, and responsibility in the real world.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

    But first, I want to comment on one aspect of the phone side of the story: the sex difference. The evidence that social media harms girls more than boys is\u00a0substantial<\/a>\u00a0and\u00a0consistent<\/a>, and it shows up in the essay. Decca had a much harder time persuading any girls to cut back on social media for a month, and it’s not because they love it. It\u2019s because girls are far more deeply trapped, hooked, and committed to spending hours a day on the platforms, even though they know it is bad for them. As one said, \u201cYou know it\u2019s all fake, but you still feel like it\u2019s real. You still can\u2019t help comparing yourself with everyone who looks pretty, and feeling bad about yourself. And you\u2019re going to get addicted. It\u2019s literally like a drug.\u201d Both the girls tell Decca, \u201cApps are targeting girls younger and younger,\u201d and one adds, \u201cIt\u2019s sickening. The people who own them are ruining children\u2019s lives just to get money.\u201d<\/p>\n

    Boys in general are not as hooked and harmed by social media, but they spend even\u00a0more time<\/a>\u00a0on screens and are more likely than girls to get hooked by video games and pornography. To be clear, like girls with social media, most boys are\u00a0not\u00a0<\/em>addicted to those platforms, and that seems to be true of the eight boys in Decca\u2019s essay. And yet, even still, these boys enjoyed major improvements in their lives from greatly reducing phone use and hanging out with their friends, phone-free. In that radio interview, Decca\u2019s son said that in the weeks since the experiment ended, he has kept his screen time down to around 25% of what it was before, and he is using some of those recovered hours each day to read books and get more sleep.<\/p>\n

    Decca\u2019s essay illustrates that collective action can be as simple as a few families aligning on following the four norms recommended in\u00a0The Anxious Generation<\/em>, so that none of the kids feel alone. Decca spoke with each of the kids afterward, who all said that doing it solo would have been awful:<\/p>\n

    \u201cIt would have felt like a punishment,\u201d to Rowan; \u201cweird and isolating\u201d to Elliot. This may help explain why Edie and Rose [the 2 girls] sound least enthusiastic by the end. None of their local friends took part, indicating that Haidt might be right that only collective action, rather than individual family rules, will work.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

    Those four norms for collective action, once again, are:<\/p>\n

      \n
    1. No smartphones before high school (age 14)<\/li>\n
    2. No social media accounts until 16<\/li>\n
    3. Phone-free schools<\/li>\n
    4. Far more independence, free play, and responsibility in the real world<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

      For advice on how to implement the norms in your own life, see our\u00a0\u201cTake Action\u201d page<\/a>\u00a0at\u00a0AnxiousGeneration.com.<\/a><\/p>\n

      And now, here\u2019s Lenore, summarizing Decca\u2019s experiment and the lessons learned from implementing the fourth norm.<\/p>\n

      It was after\u00a0interviewing Jon<\/a>\u00a0about\u00a0The Anxious Generation<\/em>\u00a0that British journalist Decca Aitkenhead decided to try an experiment with her sons Jake, 14, and Jody, 13: She would lock away their smartphones for 23 hours a day and replace them with Light Phones that allowed calls, texts, music, maps and little else. The sweetener was that they could sell the phone at the end of the month. That\u2019s what it took to get six of their buddies, 13-15, to participate as well.<\/p>\n

      It was harder to get girls, but eventually, Decca snagged two.<\/p>\n

      The\u00a0ensuing article in yesterday\u2019s<\/a>\u00a0Sunday Times Magazine<\/a><\/em>is funny, warm, and shocking, especially because most of these kids already had screen time limits. Decca notes they also seemed pretty well-adjusted, \u201cunafflicted by the social anxiety and depression Haidt writes about.\u201d So it would seem that there was not a lot of room for improvement.<\/p>\n

      And yet the experiment changed their lives\u2014and Decca\u2019s.<\/p>\n

      How?<\/p>\n

      The boys had used their smartphones mostly for Snapchat, Spotify, and sports videos, wrote Decca, which seemed rather \u201cwholesome.\u201d The girls spent far more time on social media \u2013 and desperately wished they didn\u2019t.<\/p>\n

      \u201cThere\u2019s no escape because your social popularity is totally linked to your social media,\u201d said Rose, 14, who\u2019d spent 41 hours online that week.<\/p>\n

      \u201cIt\u2019s a trap,\u201d said her sister Edie, 15. \u201cDo you know why I still sleep with stuffed cuddly toys? To try to get back to how I used to feel when I felt happy and free. Before all this shit kicked in.\u201d<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      \"\"<\/picture>\n
      <\/div>\n<\/div>
      Decca\u2019s sons Jake, left, and Jody.<\/em>\u00a0\u00a0Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

      Halfway through the month, Decca suddenly realized she\u2019d focused on phones but completely ignored the second half of Jon\u2019s anti-anxiety prescription \u2013 \u201ccuriously overlooked in all the debate about his book\u201d\u2014\u00a0more autonomy.\u00a0<\/em><\/p>\n

      Kids today have almost no unsupervised time. Yet for most of human history, kids have played and roamed in mixed-age groups, without adults. That\u2019s how they learned to manage \u201crisk, responsibility, and relationships.\u201d<\/p>\n

      Safety fears have \u201cincreasingly confined children indoors, denying them developmentally essential adventures.\u201d As a result, many are \u201ctoo fearful and fragile to function outside their bedrooms. [Haidt] urges us to reintroduce physical freedom to their childhoods.\u201d<\/p>\n

      So Decca hatched a plan.<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      \"\"<\/picture>\n
      <\/div>\n<\/div>
      Into the woods.<\/em>\u00a0Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

      She\u2019d send the kids on a one-night campout, with only their Light Phones.<\/p>\n

      No adults.<\/p>\n

      The kids, experienced campers, loved the idea.<\/p>\n

      Her newspaper did not. The editor declared any campfire a \u201cno-no.\u201d The lawyer wanted to GPS the teens and send a chaperone to shadow them. Decca refused and, five pages of waivers later, she won.<\/p>\n

      Then, almost immediately, she wondered if maybe the worrywarts had been right.<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      \"\"<\/picture>\n
      <\/div>\n<\/div>
      Setting up the tents.<\/em>\u00a0Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

      To begin their adult-free adventure, Decca had to drive the kids to a Tube stop in London. They took the Tube\u00a0 to a train station, then took a train out of London to a bus, which then took them\u00a0 to the countryside. But for that first car trip, they packed the car so carelessly, that \u201cthe doors couldn\u2019t shut.\u201d<\/p>\n

      Once on their own, however, they made their way (with some wrong turns) to a field owned by Decca\u2019s friend and set up camp.<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      \"\"<\/picture>\n
      <\/div>\n<\/div>
      Music and marshmallows. Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

      When Decca arrived at noon the next day, as planned, she found the weather drizzly and the kids \u201celectric.\u201d<\/p>\n

      What was the best part of the trip? \u201cAll of it,\u201d they told her. \u201cOh my God, so much fun!\u201d \u201cSooo much fun.\u201d \u201cThe fire was amazing. We got a ton of logs from the wood, and we made s\u2019mores\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n

      \u201cAs the accounts of their adventure tumble out,\u201d Decca writes, \u201ctwo things become clear. The first will not please our health-and-safety team. The riskier things got, the more they enjoyed it.\u201d (Not that we endorse crazy risks!)<\/p>\n

      The second?<\/p>\n

      \u201c[B]y simply eliminating adults, even something as familiar as camping becomes thrilling,\u201d Decca wrote. \u201cWhat difference, I ask, would it have made had I taken their Tube, sat in another carriage on the train, and camped nearby in my own tent? Jake looks horrified. \u2018I would have hated it.\u2019 Through clenched teeth, \u2018Hated every single second.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

      \u201cDon\u2019t you see?\u201d says Albie earnestly. \u201cThe dream thing for people our age is to go camping and just have fun without parents. The no-adult aspect is literally the dream to us.\u201d<\/p>\n

      They packed up the car efficiently this time.<\/p>\n

      \u201cAll the hapless childish idiocy that worried me when they were planning the trip\u2026has vanished. In under 36 unsupervised hours, they appear to have grown up by about two years.\u201d<\/p>\n

      \n
      \n
      \"\"<\/picture>\n
      <\/div>\n<\/div>
      \u00a0Decca\u2019s crew with friends and family, in London. Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

      Back home, the kids were changed.<\/p>\n

      All of them said they hadn\u2019t missed their phones. They started using theirs less and doing more in the real world.<\/p>\n

      They also hadn\u2019t missed the constant supervision. In fact, Decca\u2019s son Jody, 13, spent his first night home alone, ever. \u201cI can\u2019t explain it exactly,\u201d he told his mom. \u201cI just really liked the feeling of it.\u201d<\/p>\n

      The fact that \u201cevery single teen would have \u2018hated\u2019 to do the experiment alone,\u201d writes Decca, proved to her that change requires lots of kids not having smartphones. And lots of parents letting their kids do far more on their own.<\/p>\n

      She also learned that:<\/p>\n

        \n
      1. Even well-adjusted kids who aren\u2019t watching porn and self-harm videos become better-adjusted after a month of Light Phones and two days of independence.<\/li>\n
      2. It is sickeningly ironic that \u201cschool timetables, sports clubs, public transport, homework are all organized around the assumption that every teenager owns a smartphone.\u201d<\/li>\n
      3. Simply tracking kids changes their childhood. As one of the boy\u2019s moms told Decca, \u201cHe came back from the camping trip revitalized. And it\u2019s the same with tracking, isn\u2019t it? Actually, giving them a bit of space and freedom is good for them.\u201d<\/li>\n
      4. Being allowed to do some things on their own seems to benefit kids at least as much as taking away their phones.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

        We\u2014Jon and I\u2014agree and urge you to read the whole\u00a0article<\/a>.<\/p>\n

        For help weaning kids off phones or onto \u201cdumb\u201d phones, please visit The Anxious Generation\u2019s\u00a0Take Action page<\/a><\/p>\n

        And for easy, actionable ideas on how to start giving kids more independence and free play, especially collectively via\u00a0school-wide programs<\/a>, or via\u00a0Independence Therapy<\/a>, visit\u00a0LetGrow.org<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

         <\/p>\n

        \u0391\u03bd\u03b1\u03b4\u03b7\u03bc\u03bf\u03c3\u03af\u03b5\u03c5\u03c3\u03b7 \u03b1\u03c0\u03cc https:\/\/www.afterbabel.com\/<\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n

         <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

        The ten participants in Decca Aitkenhead\u2019s month-long experiment. Photo: Dean Belcher for the Sunday Times Magazine The Sunday Times (UK) just ran a major story illustrating the twin prescriptions in The Anxious Generation LENORE SKENAZY AND JON HAIDT Introduction from Jon Haidt: Many journalists have written some version of this story: \u201cI ditched my smartphone […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":102,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-101","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=101"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/101\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=101"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=101"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/oudensxolion.gr\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=101"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}