‘Mom, do you love your phone more than me?’: Children of screen‑absorbed parents are more insecure

Scientific evidence has already shown that early exposure to screens has consequences for children’s neurological development. With this in mind, schools and parents across Spain are trying to limit the amount of time children spend in front of computers, cellphones, and tablets. But there is one front in this fight against the digitalization of everyday life that often goes overlooked: parents themselves. And the data suggest it shouldn’t be ignored. A study recently published in the journal Frontiers in Psychology reveals that adolescents whose parents are frequently distracted by their phones are more likely to display insecure behaviors, which can have negative consequences for their future well-being.

Many children feel they are competing with cell phones for their parents’ attention, as shown by other studies. But does parents’ overuse of cell phone devices really affect their children? That is what the lead author of the study, Dr. Don Grant of the Newport Healthcare Center for Research and Innovation — a U.S. organization with several clinics focused on youth mental health — set out to investigate. More specifically, the team wanted to see whether it affects how adolescents relate to others.

To measure this, Grant’s team asked 600 adolescents aged 12 to 17 to rate how they felt about their parents’ phone use and how they perceived it affected their attention, availability, and interactions with them. The goal was to determine whether there was a correlation between high scores on this measure and higher levels of insecurity in other assessments. And the answer was yes.

“This problem seems to be far more widespread than I myself thought,” Grant says. “I think millennials, who are now beginning to become parents, should be aware of this study. Considered the first generation of digital natives, they are in turn potentially more vulnerable to developing a dependence on their devices.”

“There are studies linking parental phubbing [term meaning ignoring someone in front of you because you’re looking at your phone] to anxiety problems,” says Walter Jones, spokesperson for the Adolescence Free of Phones platform, who was not involved in the study. “It is also known to make children feel displaced within the family nucleus and more likely to seek approval on social media.”

Jones and his colleagues give talks in primary and secondary schools and always ask children whether they suffer parental phubbing. “Many tell us they do, that they often have to repeat things to their parents because their parents are on their phones and don’t listen when they speak.”

Parental responsibility

The harmful effects of screens on children’s cognitive development are well-documented. The Spanish Association of Pediatrics (AEP) recommends that children avoid screens entirely up to the age of six — the period of greatest neural plasticity — and that, between the ages of seven and 12, their use be limited to one hour a day, including time spent on screens at school. A meta-analysis involving data from 300,000 children confirmed that those who use screens more at age five tend to have more problems by age seven, a finding that had already been observed among adolescents.

Cell phones are also many adolescents’ gateway to toxic or outright illegal content, which is why many families try to delay adolescents’ access to these devices as long as possible. In the U.S., courts have ruled that platforms such as Instagram and YouTube are guilty of creating addiction among minors, and that Meta (the parent company of Instagram and Facebook, among others) deceived consumers about the safety of its platforms and put minors at risk. In countries such as France and Spain, bans on social media for adolescents are being processed (in Spain, the proposed minimum age has been set at 16).

“We have growing evidence that digital hyperconnectivity, largely driven by smartphones, has contributed to the deterioration of mental health seen over the last 15 years in a fairly uniform way around the world,” says Diego Hidalgo, founder of the Movement Off, an initiative that carries out various actions to “combat growing technological alienation.”

For Hidalgo, it is important to lead by example. “Children copy what their role models do, starting with their parents. If you internalize that adults are constantly distracted and do not pay attention to their closest loved ones, you will tend to reproduce that kind of behavior,” he explains.

Smartphones became ubiquitous just over a decade ago. In 2013, they outsold conventional cell phones for the first time. A few years later, Dr. Grant began noticing “some concerning behaviors in parents’ use of devices” in his practice. At the same time, some of his teenage patients “started to express negative feelings about it.” The moment he realized there was something to it came when a colleague of his, a clinical psychologist, told him that her daughter had asked whether she loved her phone more than her. “My brilliant colleague was left speechless and devastated,” he recalls.

How can parents avoid being bad role models for their children? The answer is simple: use the phone less when around them. But that’s not always easy, especially when work messages keep coming in outside working hours. For Hidalgo, some basic rules for maintaining a healthy digital environment at home would include keeping the phone in a specific place — and not in bedrooms. “That means not carrying it on you so it can’t interrupt you,” he says.

Another rule is not using phones during meals, which are usually times when family members can come together in a relaxed way. This applies to families with or without children. “I think there should be moments devoted purely to face-to-face interaction, without the possibility of interruptions. And if someone really has died or there is a huge emergency, then they can call you.”

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