Ban Social Media for Your Kids? - Therapist Opinion

0:00So yeah, I think social media is an awful, awful thing. I use it beautifully and I don't see anything too awful apart from things occasionally like the Charlie Kirk thing. But generally speaking, kids, their algorithms are screwed. You know, the music that they listen to is violent. And I know some of it could be excused as poetry or art, but on the whole, it's not. It's very, very graphic. so I think we're moving into a time that's it's it's concerning and and it's devastating and if we were saying okay Ella you're you're now in charge everything runs through you I guess what what is the what do you think the solution is well I don't know how you would police this but I don't think I mean bear in mind that the prefrontal cortex isn't developed I said this before it's executive function so it does analysis logic it does organization it does imagination all those really important things that's not fully developed until you're 25 so to give time reference to development the reptilian brain develops first it starts to develop in the womb the emotional center the limbic part of the brain called the mammalian brain that's usually developed by two or three years old that's where the the amygdala is that's the danger tracker but also the pleasure center the rest takes until you're 25 to develop so i don't think kids should be allowed on social media full stop i don't think they should have access i think it should be no we're getting this government id they're going to use it for anything use it for social media and stop all young people going on it until 21 at least i genuinely think that's the only way that you'll ever stop the problem is the the problem is the problem started we've seen with the new laws around porn and access to porn for young people that they're just getting vpns you know it's not hard for them to do that so there needs to be so many things put in place to prevent what is happening now but also hugely and i always go back to this point community family education system which needs to be completely reformed connection we need to be around the kitchen table again you know arts and crafts people in their communities getting together spending time together getting if you You can't stop it.

2:13You've got to get away from it. It comes down to the parents. Charlotte and I, Dr. Charlotte Armitage and I discussed this on one of our episodes and she's talked about this broadly. You know, if your child is on a phone and you are on a phone and you're not looking at each other, where's the relational skills? Where's the interpersonal skills? So it comes down to the home again. Parents need to put their own phones down, get out into nature, go for a walk, spend time in water or by water learn new things read books but that takes a societal shift which is why it's so important for me to keep talking about these things because so many people will never go to therapy they don't know what therapy really is they think it's the old school tell me how you feel and nod away while someone tells their life story other people can't afford it um and and for that reason podcasts or books are these free educational resources we we all need to do it it's our duty if we've got the information to go out there and speak about these things and educate even if someone only takes five minutes of this and goes oh that's interesting i didn't know that then that's a step more than what they did before you mentioned earlier the world we live in you know the social media we're seeing now children and i'm not knocking single parent families because i actually think some single parent families are probably better than the two parents staying together to be honest but the framework of the family system is broken down the framework of society is breaking down the framework of community is breaking down all of those things that keep us safe and balanced and able to concentrate and thrive the education system is not coping it's broken and that's something that's so important to the child growing up so of course when we look at adhd and we see i'm not saying that that people shouldn't be diagnosed i'm saying is the problem much bigger