Science & Technology

New book explores how to raise kids in a high-tech world

WBUR | By Julia Corcoran,

Scott Tong

Published October 1, 2025 at 11:47 AM EDT

The cover of "10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World" and author Jean Twenge. (Courtesy of Atria Books and Pam Davis)

For parents raising their kids in the age of phones, social media and the internet, it can be tricky. Research links kids’ use of social media with depression and anxiety. A lot of content online isn’t appropriate for kids, and there’s not much keeping them from accessing it. Plus, people of all ages spend a lot of time staring at their phones, scrolling instead of engaging with the people and the world around them.

Jean Twenge knows this challenge well; she’s a psychology professor at San Diego State University, and she’s spent a lot of time researching the effects of technology on kids. She’s also a parent raising teenagers.

Here & Now‘s Scott Tong talks to Twenge about her new book, “10 Rules for Raising Kids in a High-Tech World,” that offers clear guidance on why and how to set boundaries.

8 questions with Jean Twenge

What did you learn writing your 2017 book, “iGen: Why Today’s Super-Connected Kids Are Growing Up Less Rebellious, More Tolerant, Less Happy, and Completely Unprepared for Adulthood”?

“About a decade ago, in the big national surveys of teens that I work with, I started to see some startling patterns that more and more teens started to say they felt left out, that they felt lonely, that they felt like they couldn’t do anything right, that their life wasn’t useful. Those last two are classic symptoms of depression. And those trends kept going.

“So clinical-level depression among teens doubled between 2011 and 2019. So, well before the COVID pandemic, we already had an adolescent mental health crisis. When I first started to see these trends, I had no idea what might be causing them. Then one day, I saw [the] whole thing started to fall into place, because you know what happened at the end of 2012, that was the first time the majority of Americans owned a smartphone. It was also around the time that more and more high school students started to use social media, that it moved from optional to almost mandatory among high school students to be on social media every day.”

Rule number one in the book is You Are in Charge. What does that mean, and what broader parenting strategy are you suggesting?

“We know from decades of research in psychology that the most beneficial parenting style is authoritative, but that’s a little bit of a mouthful. So some people call that dolphin parenting — firm, but flexible. So it’s loving but firm.

“Yes, you talk to your kids and you enjoy them as people, but you are their parent, not their friend. And so you have rules in place and boundaries in place and structure. And when they don’t like that, you can respond with empathy, but you hold your ground.”

Another rule you wrote about is No Social Media Until Age 16 or Later. How can social media be harmful for kids and teens?

“There are so many ways. I mean, first, we just have to acknowledge that these social media platforms weren’t designed for kids. They weren’t even designed for teenagers. They were designed for adults. And even many adults have a hard time closing the app because the companies have poured billions into making their products, as they call it, engaging, other people call it as addictive as possible. And it is hard enough for adults to manage their time on social media. And then we think a 10-year-old, 12-year-old, or even a 15-year-old can do so? They can’t.

“Which is why Gallup, for example, found pretty recently that the average American teen now spends 5 hours a day using social media, when you include YouTube and TikTok in that total, and that is way too much time. It’s crowding out the time that teens need to sleep. It’s crowding out time for them to spend time with each other in person. And then on top of that, there’s all of the toxic competition for likes and followers, the comparison to everybody else’s more glamorous life and perfect body online. I mean, we could talk for half an hour about all of the toxic things that kids are exposed to.”

How should parents respond to kids saying all their friends are on social media and not being on it would deprive them of connection to their friends?

“It’s not essential. There’s many ways that kids can communicate with their friends, even electronically. They can text them. They can call them. They can FaceTime them. Even better, they can see each other in person.

“But this idea that social media is absolutely essential for teens communicating with each other is a complete myth. Plus, as my 18-year-old told me recently, she said, ‘You know, anybody who refuses to communicate with you just because you don’t have a certain platform is not really your friend.’”

What rules have worked with your kids, and what has been challenging?

“So we have had the rule, which is also in the book, you get your first Internet-enabled phone — your first smartphone — when you’re 16 and you have your driver’s license. That means there’s kind of a long gap between when a lot of kids are going to get a phone for the convenience of, like, the bus stop being far away, or being picked up from sports practice, or things like that. So we’ve gotten our kids basic phones, they’re phones designed for children that do not have social media, do not have [artificial intelligence] boyfriends and girlfriends, and most of them also don’t have an Internet browser.

“So my 13-year-old and 15-year-old have phones like that. And that’s made things a lot easier, because there’s no capability on that device for them to be on social media. The place that was hardest for me was laptops. You can’t put parental controls on a school laptop, so you get them a personal laptop, but then you have to try to put parental controls on that. Sometimes kids find workarounds, especially to the device-based controls. The laptop’s kind of the bane of my existence.”

What does it mean to give kids real-world freedom, and why is that important?

“I’m so glad you asked about that, because that’s a crucial piece of the equation. We really have overprotected kids in the real world and vastly underprotected them online, and we need to bring things back into balance.

“So that’s things like kids making their own way to school, say walking or biking, sending them into a grocery store with cash or a credit card once they’re about 10 to go buy a few things, that they do their own laundry, that they cook for the family every once in a while. You drop them off with their friends at an amusement park or the ice cream shop or a movie.

“These things are all pretty familiar to many parents, especially Gen X parents, because this is how we grew up. Yet our kids often don’t have that freedom. So the idea is to shift the social norm, so that’s the way things are, that kids have some freedom to get on their bike and go to a friend’s house instead of having a feeling like it has to be social media or texting as the only way they can communicate.”

Are you optimistic that there are broader forces out there helping with this?

“Yes and no. I’m optimistic about some things. You know, phone bans during the school day bell-to-bell have really taken off. More and more schools are clearly going in that direction, which is amazing. There are more and more states that are passing reasonable independence laws, so parents don’t have to be afraid, you know, if I let my 10-year-old walk to the park or to school.

“There’s progress there. Where I’d love to see more progress now is in regulation around social media to keep kids off of it until they’re ready. I mean, right now the law is 13. Even that is not enforced. Plus, no developmental expert or parent or educator ever said, ‘13, you know, middle school puberty, that is the best time to introduce social media.’ But I would settle for even the existing age minimum of 13 being enforced, because it’s not, which is why you have 10-year-olds and 11-year-olds on Snapchat and TikTok on a regular basis. So more regulation around that would be amazing.”

If you had to narrow it down, what are one or two essential rules?

“It would be no phones or no devices in the bedroom overnight. Then you’re at least preserving sleep. Sleep is so essential for physical and mental health, and technology interferes with that. Most teens have their phone in their bedroom overnight and actually use it overnight.

“If I had to choose a second one, it would probably be the one about basic phones, not handing younger teens or kids an Internet-enabled phone, to give them a phone that’s more like training wheels, that is more appropriate for their age, but that they can still do some things that they want to do, like text their friends.”

This interview was edited for clarity.