«Mobile phones have no place in the children's room at night»

Mrs Twenge, in your latest book you talk about the «selfie generation». Who do you mean by that?

These are all children born between 1995 and 2012. Our data shows that these children - at least in the USA - are indeed part of a new generation.

You have been researching the differences between the generations for 25 years. What is so special about the selfie generation?

My team and I regularly take a look at how teenagers in the USA are doing, what their emotional state is like ...

The more time a teenager spends on their smartphone, the lonelier they feel.

... In your book you mention factors such as loneliness, anxiety, depression, seeing no meaning in one's own life, having no joy in life and the like ...

... and you keep discovering small changes. Sometimes the curve points a little downwards, sometimes a little upwards. But around 2012, the graph suddenly looked as if someone had jumped off a cliff. The trend went steeply downwards. I had never seen anything like it.

What happened next?

I initially expected this trend to reverse soon. But that was not the case. In fact, it continued downwards.

What distinguishes the selfie generation from its predecessors, the so-called «millennials»?

This is the first group of teenagers who have spent their entire teenage years with their smartphones. And this has a massive impact on their behaviour and attitudes. These children spend much more time online than children did ten years earlier.

With what consequences?

The data shows: The more time a teenager spends on their smartphone, the unhappier and more depressed they are and the lonelier they feel. We also see an increase in various risk factors for suicide.

In your book, you write that young people today have the feeling that they are «not doing anything right». Values have deteriorated so much in just a few years that you speak of a «tsunami». Is the smartphone really responsible for all this?

Good question. I have to admit that all the data mentioned so far are only correlations. Online time is increasing rapidly, while mental health is deteriorating at the same time. However, we cannot conclude with certainty that the smartphone is really the cause.

Are there no studies on this?

Yes, they do exist. In Denmark, for example, the test participants were divided into two groups by lot. One group did without Facebook for a week, the other did not. They then checked how the test subjects felt. And the group that was not on Facebook during the week felt less lonely, less unhappy and less depressed afterwards.

That's pretty impressive: just one week without social media has a measurable impact on our well-being. Nevertheless, it is clear that we still need more studies here. And a second point is important to me: many long-term studies show which came first - the negative changes in well-being or the increased use of digital media. Most of these studies show that the time spent on the internet increases first. Only then does the feeling of being unhappy come.

In Switzerland, 98 per cent of all young people use the Whatsapp messenger. Should you take away your child's mobile phone and cut them off from communicating with their friends?

I wouldn't go that far. In one of our latest studies, we found that the happiest children are those who spend just under an hour a day online. So not using the internet at all is unlikely to be the solution. With up to two hours online per day, there do not appear to be any significant negative effects. The negative effects mentioned only become apparent after three, four or more hours. So for me, it's not so much about the technical device or social media as such. It's about what you stop doing when you're online all the time. You do less sport, you no longer see your friends face to face. And we know from many, many studies that sport and spending time with friends have a strong positive impact on our mental health.

What about the sleep factor? You write that children even take their phones to bed with them.

The children sleep less today than they did in 2010. The phone is the last thing they see in the evening; it's the first thing they look at in the morning. All of this is definitely not a good recipe for healthy sleep.

Online times are soaring, while mental health is deteriorating at the same time.

Why not?

Firstly, because the screen emits blue light. This has an impact on our bodies: we produce less melatonin, the sleep hormone that signals to us that it is time to get tired. Secondly, the content we see on our smartphone is usually emotionally upsetting - and this also has a negative effect on sleep quality.

Specifically, what can parents do?

If the children attend primary school and don't yet have a mobile phone - wait as long as possible before buying one. At least that's the rule I follow as a mum myself. In the fifth and sixth grade, many parents buy their child a mobile phone because they are suddenly travelling to school by bus or train. They believe it will keep their child safer. But generations of children have managed their way to school without a mobile phone and I don't know why it should suddenly be any different. In any case, I will do without a mobile phone with my children for as long as I possibly can

And once the smartphone is there?

Then you should limit the amount of time it can be used. On average, I recommend two hours of screen time per day or less. By the way, I'm talking about children's free time here. Of course, a child can also use the internet for homework. I think that's perfectly fine. It's best to give them access to a laptop or desktop computer so that they aren't distracted by their mobile phone apps.

All of this is probably easier for parents in Switzerland than parents in the USA. In the United States, we are talking about an average of six to eight hours online per day. In Switzerland, it's only around three hours a day.

I would be careful about that. When you work with surveys, the values vary extremely - depending on how you ask the questions. That's why I think it's quite conceivable that the children don't differ that much in their behaviour. Perhaps they were just questioned differently. And even if there is something to the data, I assume that things will develop in a similar way in other countries as they have in the USA.

Switzerland also appears to be doing better in terms of other leisure activities: The time young people spend with friends and the time they spend doing sport have not changed significantly since 2010, according to the latest JAMES study.

I would also have to take a closer look at the relevant questionnaires to be able to judge that for sure. But that actually sounds very different from the developments I have observed in the USA.

Even a week without social media has a measurable impact on our well-being.

If you ask young people in Switzerland what they actually use their mobile phones for, the second most common answer is to see what time it is. Could you possibly reduce online time by giving your child a wristwatch for their birthday?

I find that interesting. Yes, maybe a wristwatch will help. But what I would definitely recommend is an alarm clock. Mobile phones have no place in the children's room at night. I give talks to parents all the time. And I say: If you only want to take one message home with you, then it's this - make sure that your child never takes their mobile phone to bed.

How do you want to control that?

For example, you can make it a family rule that applies to everyone. You buy a shared charging station and put it in the basement or somewhere else that is as far away from the bedrooms as possible. And the parents must abide by this rule just as much as the children. And not just for show: teenagers can smell hypocrisy from afar. You can also resort to a technical solution and install an app on the smartphone that ensures that the phone switches off overnight.

You should install a parental app on your teenager's mobile phone? Seriously?

Well, ideally you should have installed such an app on the very first smartphone you give your child. It should be included right from the start, which makes things easier. And of course the rules are different for a 13-year-old than for a 17-year-old. And of course it always depends on the individual child. If a boy or girl can no longer control their online behaviour themselves, then I think an app like this is a very sensible measure.

The mental health of girls has deteriorated significantly more than that of boys. They feel more lonely and marginalised, and their risk of suicide is also higher. Why is this?

We don't know exactly. Boys spend more of their online time playing computer games, girls more on social media. Perhaps there is a connection. We are currently investigating whether the internet as a whole has a more harmful effect on girls than on boys.

What do girls do differently from boys on social media?

Not only do they use them more often, they also behave more negatively. Boys still carry out their conflicts physically. Girls prefer verbal aggression - and social media is the perfect platform for this. Girls have always talked badly about others and ostracised them. But social media has made the consequences much worse. We know from our figures that girls are more than twice as likely to be victims of cyberbullying than boys.

Wait as long as possible before buying a mobile phone for your child.

What's more, if you're not invited to a birthday party, you can now watch your classmates having fun in real time via social media while you sit at home alone.

The selfie generation has even developed its own word for this: FOMO - fear of missing out. I actually think this is a recipe for feeling even lonelier.

What role does personality psychology play? It has long been known that girls often lose emotional stability during puberty, which is not the case for boys to the same extent.

This is certainly a relevant point. For girls, puberty is fundamentally a critical phase for the development of their mental health. And if, at the same time, we see that interpersonal contacts are increasingly shifting to the internet, then we can at least imagine that such changes have a particularly strong impact on girls.