The Director of Digital Learning at Downe House School Jane Basnett on why an under 16 phone ban may be the best way to safeguard young people
Perhaps Australia has got it right? The country’s recent decision to ban phones for under 16s feels, increasingly, like the right move. For years as a teacher, I have championed the idea that we should be supporting young people in managing their social media use – the idea being to educate rather than restrict.
Although I still believe in the power of education to create change for the better, I have more recently veered towards accepting that that it may not be enough to protect our young people. The algorithms are simply too powerful. If adults struggle to resist the pull of endless phone scrolling, what chance do teenagers have? In short, I believe that 16 and over is the right age to own a phone.
By this point, our young people have had the chance to discover passions beyond the screen. They have likely begun to develop deeper focus, a growing engagement with books, ideas and culture, and will have developed awareness that social media is often a curated façade. Most importantly, they have started to form a stronger sense of self – in terms of who they are, what they value, and how they want to spend their time. That level of confidence, I believe, is the foundation teenagers need before stepping into the hyper-connected world of social media.
The media often resorts to clickbait tactics to generate interest and drive traffic – relying on portrayals of the very worst of society and social media. The recent Netflix drama Adolescence managed to avoid this. Instead, it appears to have set out with a clear agenda to raise awareness of the issues facing young people today. While its storyline may not reflect every teenager’s experience, the drama was rooted in actual cases from the UK, lending authenticity and emotional weight.
That said, in steering away from sensationalism, the show also largely overlooked the more positive aspects of social media. And we shouldn’t forget that they do exist. Social media can be a creative outlet – a place to connect with others, to learn, explore identity and even find community. It’s not all darkness and danger; there is light in the digital world too.
“If fully grown adults struggle to resist the pull of endless phone scrolling, what chance do teenagers have?”
Ultimately, the media often gets the dangers right, but the balance wrong. What is needed is a more intelligent, layered portrayal – one that acknowledges both the risks and the agency of young people, and which invites adults to engage. To its credit, Adolescence prompted parents to pay attention. What it hasn’t quite achieved is an acknowledgement around the positive potential of social media. However, an important conversation has begun.
What is needed now to realise that positive potential is a return to basic but essential tenets: education, wellbeing and collaboration. Education, so that young people understand the digital world they are growing up in. Platforms could incorporate regular reflective prompts to help young people to manage social media pressure. Wellbeing, so that platforms are held accountable and focus on design for health, not just engagement, and with younger users’ perspective at the forefront. On that basis, developers should perhaps scrap the ‘like’ button, get rid of the endless scroll features, and remove algorithmic promotion of harmful content.
Downe House School downehouse.net
Further reading; Phone free childhood
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