Screen time is screwing with all of our brains. Internet site-jumping in particular. I know my thinking/attention span has been fucked over the last few years.

I would say that our whole society needs to discuss the info-crack we carry around in our pockets. I'm as guilty as anyone (or more guilty).

i think limiting children's screen time is wise. i don't know how realistic a total ban is but regardless of age, i think most of us could use more time outdoors and/or being active.

it also boggles my mind that some kids have their own cell phones as young as five or six. people like to argue with me that someday if i have children, i'll get them a phone too for "safety issues". uhm, no. people raised children just fine without cell phones for most of history. it probably doesn't help that to this day, i've never owned a cell phone myself.

As to what age kids get cell phones, I think it depends on the situation: If you're a working single mom, and your 7-year-old has to jump around from after-school care to a pal's house... then yeah, a cell phone for the kid is necessary. If the kid only wants it to text their pals regarding the newest available Minecraft skin... OH HELL NO.

Someone much smarter than me is probably able to articulate this better than I can, but changes in media and shared culture production and accessibility have happened in such a short span of time that we don't really know definitively what, if any, effects they have on brains.

Maybe millennials (ugh) are the experimental group in our new digital society. But most of the arguments against media consumption have proven baseless. Violent video games don't cause school shootings, cel phones don't cause brain cancer, porn won't make you go crazy, etc. I'm sure similar outcries happened when the telegraph, radio, and television rolled out.

Decent parenting and a civil society that looks out for the safety of their youth is what turns kids into responsible, rational adults and not adult-adolescents. This is common fucking sense to anyone with half a brain. Everyone caring for a kid needs to monitor what they're doing and have a dialogue about it, not just censor it or limit it. Respect young people's curiosity and intelligence instead of diverting it.

This argument loses all grip with reality when it insists on keeping 13-18-year-old kids away from porn. Good luck with your heads in the sand, parents.

I remember when I saw Elian Gonzales on the news, chatting to god knows who on a flip phone. He was six, and it was the year 2000. Now all the kids have them

my husband was raised by a working single mother in the 80's and they got by fine without cell phones. though i will concede that giving a younger child a phone under those circumstances is a major convenience for all, it is by no means necessary.

They didn't give kids cell phones in the '80s because they were a foot and a half long and weighed 15 pounds.

Excellent book: The Shallows, What the Internet is Doing to our Brains
http://www.amazon.com/The-Shallows-Interne…

I probably need to read it one more time, though, because I'm back to my old habits.