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> “One possible explanation for these results is that parents are doing a good job matching their decisions to give their kids phones to their child’s and famil
by sudobash1 4y ago
> “One possible explanation for these results is that parents are doing a good job matching their decisions to give their kids phones to their child’s and family’s needs,” Robinson said. “These results should be seen as empowering parents to do what they think is right for their family.”
This was my immediate thought. Self-selection (and other forms of non-random selection) is the bane of psychology studies. One cannot draw as broad a conclusion from this study as the title would imply. It has the important qualification that these were children that the parents deemed ready.
It is still a nice study to see, and may be rightfully reassuring to parents.
- MBCook 4y agoI agree. At a minimum it’s reassuring that if you feel it’s ok to give your kid a phone at 9 you’re probably not doing significantly more harm than if you waited 3 more years. It may not be an ideal study (a few hundred kids, 5 years, whatever else people are identifying) but it’s far better than random anecdotes from people who have their own biases as to what age is good/bad.
- aidenn0 4y agoAlso, phone ownership is an imperfect measure of phone use; for spending multiple hours a day on social media, it's a good proxy, but for other things, less so. I have a (well one that I know of) child who was exposed to hardcore pornography in 2nd grade from the phone of an older student.