Are Our Kids Anxious or Just Unprepared?

(Editor Note: This post has been reposted from https://drpam.substack.com/p/are-our-kids-anxious-or-just-unprepared with permission from the author)

Key Points:

• Tech bans and limiting access don't teach kids essential skills for making good decisions on and offline.

• Social media platforms amplify challenges like bullying, peer pressure, and FOMO, but they did not create them.

• Kids' social development makes them vulnerable to online influence and requires targeted education and skills.

• Less than half of all U.S. states have media literacy legislation, and fewer have implemented classroom instruction, leaving many students unprepared.

• Online resources can help parents and communities build kids’ media literacy skills while we wait for legislation to play catch up.

Finally, journalists are calling out misinformation from what should be credible sources. It’s about time. Celebrity comes with privileges and power, but it should not include a free pass to share lies or promote false information. The upside is that things have gotten so bad that we are reaching a tipping point. It’s beginning to sink in that lack of accountability on social media fuels extremism and misinformation and talking about the need for media literacy to help stop misinformation from spreading in a world ripe with AI images and conspiracy theories. There's a big gap between recognition of need and implementation. So, where are we?

On September 24, Diana Graber, CEO of Cyberwise.com, and I will be joined by Erin O'Neill, CEO and Founder of Media Literacy Now, on our free monthly Zoom chat to discuss the current state of media literacy education and what we can do to lend our support. See https:/ /www.cyberwise.org/cyberwisechats. Media literacy for schools is essential for kids, but we all need the skills to stay safe online, build healthy relationships with technology, and identify online manipulation and misinformation.

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Media literacy is getting some long-overdue attention. Whether it’s in response to the rising awareness of political disinformation, the threat of AI, Russian hackers, or cell phones in the classroom, discussions about media literacy are on the uptick. In Sept ember, the APA Monitor joined the fray in arguing for equipping K-12 students to identify misinformation and manipulative content. Evidence shows that children are confident they can identify false news but are ill-equipped to do so (Zozaya-Durazo et al., 2024). Across the U.S., media literacy is slowly working its way onto the agendas of elected officials. The adoption and implementation in the classroom, however, lags far behind.

It may surprise you that this definition of media literacy predates the public availability of the Internet in 1993. It came from a 1992 National Association for Media Literacy (NAMLE) meeting and was defined as the ability to access, analyze, evaluate, create, and act using all forms of communication. Little did the folks at NAMLE know how much communication would change in a few short years.

Social media platforms emerged a few years later, starting with Six Degrees in 1996, MySpace in 2003, and Facebook in 2004. The innovation of peer-to-peer connectivity took flight in social networking platforms and completely disrupted communications and the world as we knew it. Consumers could also be media creators and distributors with no barrier to entry. Society was largely unprepared for the implications—both good and bad. Media literacy today still suffers from definitional indigestion, struggling to keep up with the evolving media landscape, but broadly includes media and social media literacy, digital literacy, information and news literacy, digital citizenship, and digital wellness.

At this juncture, it should be painfully apparent that we ALL should have media literacy skills to safely and productively use technology, if not preserve science and democracy. But nowhere is that need more pronounced than with our kids, who live in worlds that flow seamlessly from offline to online.

Technology Panic vs. Teaching Digital Skills

The impetus for providing kids with media literacy skills often gets lost in the moral panic over technology and kids. Fear has overrun reason, and even though people can't decide whether to blame social media, mobile devices, tech companies, or the Internet. They are preoccupied with claims that technology and social media are the causes of adolescent mental health issues despite the weak associations, lack of consistent definitions, and absence of meaningful causal evidence (Odgers, 2024; Orben et al., 2024; Valkenburg et al., 2022). In response, too many solutions are "ostrich" proposals that want to suppress access, ban devices, shut down social media, and sue tech companies but don't address more fundamental issues.

For many, messaging that blames all our problems on social media "feels right," making it more persuasive to scared brains than facts. In a chaotic world, we seek certainty. Politicians take advantage of this by revving up anxiety and fear to get votes, just like algorithms take advantage of FOMO to generate clicks. At the very least, fear gets more headlines and sells more books. Action in response to fear can make us feel better. But if we're hoping for results, solutions driven by emotion will disappoint us and do little for the anxious generation of parents promoting them. These solutions ignore two critical facts: 1) technology isn't going away, and 2) kids will use it.  Focusing on suppression rather than education leaves the kids unprepared and vulnerable.

Social Media Didn't Invent Bullies, FOMO, or Peer Pressure

Policies that impose age limits on social media access and limit devices during school to minimize distractions can be helpful but they are incomplete solutions. What happens after 3 pm when the school bell rings? As the research shows, social media didn't invent bullies (Whitney & Smith, 1993), the shift to consumerism, the lack of teen's impulse control (Babbitt & Burbach, 1990), or the overwhelming effect of peer pressure to conform to social norms, especially on females (Brown, 1982). Social media platforms may be a new battleground, but they are not the source.

Unfortunately, many current proposals overlook the need to teach kids how to manage these challenges.  Why aren't we preparing kids to use technology by giving them the skills to deal with bullies, understand their innate emotional responses to 'likes' and FOMO, challenge misinformation and inauthenticity, and bust the myth of multitasking? In all the regulations, proposals, and movements to restrict social media access, take away phones, and limit technology use, there is frighteningly little attention paid to preparing kids to make good decisions when they will, inevitably, get online.

Snail's Pace Adoption of Media Literacy in Schools

Some states are beginning to address media literacy in legislation, but few do more than establish task forces that are supposed to recommend curriculum changes. The U.S. has 50 states, but less than half have passed or have pending legislation to address media literacy. Mandating a commission to develop media literacy standards is a start, but committees and task forces don’t give teachers what they need to deliver content in every K-12 classroom now--not two years from now.

You Can Build Media Literacy Skills

On the bright side, people increasingly recognize that media literacy is about a lot more than kids who like to watch TikTok when they should be paying attention in class. The rapid development of AI and increasing attention to the amount of misinformation online have helped normalize the acceptance of media literacy as a core skill. Fake news gets headlines, as we saw with the viral AI-altered images of Taylor Swift endorsing Trump, but recognizing misinformation is only a small part of media literacy. Social media is powerful because of our innate emotional response to social cues that lower cognitive resistance and increase persuasion. Kids' young brains are especially vulnerable. Developmentally, their brains are socially focused on figuring out who they are and how they fit in the world, causing them to prioritize being liked and included today over longer-term goals.

While suggestions to limit excessive device use, increase face-to-face socialization, and engage in outdoor play are beneficial, they do not build the core skills that will keep kids safe on and offline and are fundamental to well-being and life success: good citizenship, critical thinking, self-awareness, self-control, self-respect, and empathy. Those things take teaching, whether you are online or outside. These well-meaning strategies are also highly privileged, overlooking those who do not have access to outdoor play or parental supervision, putting them at even greater risk online (Wijtzes et al., 2014).

Media literacy is an essential life skill that, once learned, can be applied to any content, from AI-generated content and conspiracy theories to Instagram filters.  We must speak up to avoid solutions that don't solve the core problems. We are waiting for legislation and public education to play catch up at the expense of our kids’ mental health. In the meantime, numerous resources are available to parents and educators to help foster media literacy skills at home and in the community. Many libraries now have media literacy resources and programs through the American Library Association. Sites like Cyberwise.org, CommonSenseMedia.org, or MediaLiteracyNow.org offer everything from family technology contracts and discussion guides to easy activities you can do with your kids at home to build media literacy skills.  

Upcoming Chat: September 24th

Register here: https://us02web.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_g1FA3beARiixinW4aGzBpg#/registration

Dr. Pamela Rutledge is a media psychologist–a social scientist who applies expertise in human behavior and neuroscience, along with 20+ years as a media producer, to media and technology. Working across the pipeline, from design and development to audience impact, she translates structures and data into the human stories that create actionable consumer engagement strategies. Dr. Rutledge has worked with a variety of clients, such as 20th Century Fox Films, Warner Bros. Theatrical Marketing, OWN Network, Saatchi, and Saatchi, KCET’s Sid the Science Kid and the US Department of Defense, to identify audience motivations, develop data strategies and hone brand stories. Dr. Rutledge was recently honored as the 2020 recipient of the award for Distinguished Professional Contribution to the Field of Media Psychology given by American Psychological Association’s Division for Media Psychology and Technology.

References

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Brown, B. B. (1982). The extent and effects of peer pressure among high school students: A retrospective analysis. Journal of Youth and Adolescence, 11(2), 121-133. https:/ /doi.org/10.1007/BF01834708

Odgers, C. L. (2024). The great rewiring: Is social media really behind an epidemic of teenage mental illness? Nature,  628(8006), 29-30.

Orben, A., Meier, A., Dalgleish, T., & Blakemore, S.-J. (2024). Mechani sms linking social media use to adolescent mental health vulnerability. Nature  Reviews Psychology, 3(6), 407-423. https:/ /doi.org/10.1038/s44159-024-00307-y

Valkenburg, P. M., Meier, A., & Beyens, I. (2022). Social media use and its impact on adolescent mental health: An umbrella review of the evidence. Current  Opinion in Psychology, 44, 58-68.

Whitney, I., & Smith, P. K. (1993). A survey of the nature and extent of bullying in junior/middle and secondary schools. Educational Research, 35(1), 3-25. https:/ /doi.org/10.1080/0013188930350101

Wijtzes, A. I., Jansen, W., Bouthoorn, S. H., Pot, N., Hofman, A., Jaddoe, V. W. V., & Raat, H. (2014). Social inequalities in young children's sports participation and outdoor play. International Journal of Behavioral Nutrition and Physical Activity, 11(1), 155. https:/ /doi.org/10.1186/s12966-014-0155-3

Zozaya-Durazo, L. D., Sádaba-Chalezquer, C., & Feijoo‐Fernández, B. (2024). "Fake or not, I'm sharing it": Teen perception about disinformation in social networks. Young Consumers, 25(4), 425-438. https:/ /doi.org/10.1108/YC-06-2022-1552