Definitely not limited to 13 year olds. I've notice this myself the last couple of years, and it seems to have coincided with an increase in my usage of Reddit and HN apps (ie. feed-based news apps with comments).
I'm finding that sitting down to read a good book no longer seems appealing to me, and I almost have to trick myself into doing it. I also am a lot pickier in terms of whether a book is good enough to hold my attention. Ditto for long-form magazine articles.
Interestingly enough this also seems to bleed over into other media. Movies seem too long to focus on without using my phone while watching during slow scenes, and same with TV shows. In fact, across Netflix, Hulu Plus and Amazon Prime Instant, I am struggling to find any shows that seem interesting enough to warrant spending the time to even watch the first episode. Yet I find I enjoy trailers for movies and shows way more than I used to. I'll bet some of that is due to the short couple minute format and quick cuts which keep my brain occupied.
I'm making an effort to cut back, but even being aware of the problems doesn't make that easy. I almost wish I'd lose my phone for a day so I wouldn't have an option.
I had to make a really conscious effort to not use my phone at times of low attention, and now actually revel in the time I get when I used to get my phone out and just browse stuff (stood in queues, while waiting for anything for any length of time, etc), and enjoy actually daydreaming or thinking about things. I find it a bit sad that this is a novelty!
Not all of my time is wasted on Reddit/HN. I actually have quite a few high-quality subs I subscribe to, and in general I learn quite a bit each day on both places from the comments. Sure there is room to cut back, but there is definitely some strong "signal in the noise."
I have felt a lack of creative energy these past few years, so I wonder if that would start to come back, but I genuinely can't picture what I'd do without those things in my life. It is very sad when I think about it, but I wonder if there is a happy middle-ground vs. going all out with a dumb phone.
I wouldn't say all of my time was wasted (and HN is the only remaining regular thing I look at, but I tend to read an article or two and comments and then be done, rather than repeatedly looking through it for something), but the vast majority was. Maybe better filtering was needed for me, and I've achieved that in other areas by subscribing to a couple of worthwhile email lists (of relevant interest areas) where I get maybe 1 email a week that takes maybe half an hour to filter and that's that.
Most of the spare time I've reclaimed is being used usefully - I'm learning Python at the moment, so I'm finding I'm doing bits an pieces here and there with that, and also I've actually made time to go back to practicing and enjoying playing the guitar, which I've done for a long time. I'm starting to feel more musically creative as well, which is definitely a change from the past few years - I had thought that it was all gone, so perhaps we're experiencing something similar?
Very well said. Apps and social media and clickbait-sites are digital Skinner boxes, its creators (dopamine) dealers. As a general rule, if you can't put something away for a week (or even better, an unspecified amount of time), you're addicted; and addictions are never a good thing.
They do ask when they can have phones. In their wildest dreams they would text and call their friends all day long, so thankfully the brain warping stuff has not entered the picture yet. They know it's a long ways off, but they are curious and want to get a sense of the time frame. For now we stall and talk about the risks and responsibilities with them while we gather data such as referenced in the OP.
Unfortunately Android's controls are pathetic, at least in v4 which we had. One of the kids got into the play store and downloaded a bunch of princess and pet type games one day. No harm done but the whole situation raised great lessons for everyone.
Raising kids is hard work...and they don’t turn out as you like...they go their own way...good for them!
What you wrote could have been also written by a parent 20, 50 or 100 years ago.
Yes, of course, no-one's life is without influence and advertisers have always sought to claim your attention for their own needs. But now you have the process being personalised for each user, and weaponised because accurate stats on effects can be captured quickly and iterated on straight away. Everyone's personal weak spot can be identified, analysed and taken advantage of - and in a very short timescale. That was most definitely NOT the case in the past; behaviour of advertising and attention capture was at best aggregated across a large fraction of the population at a time, sometimes the entire population at once.
I've got 4 step kids, who are 11, 13, 16 and 18. All aside from the eldest have smartphones, (they have each had them when they have gone to secondary school), and it's a constant problem - probably the thing where I have the biggest disagreements with them (I have an excellent relationship with all four of them, and they're all good, intelligent kids).
It's like a disease, and it's insidious. They are completely unaware that they are being manipulated by the software that they use every day, and are addicted to their phones, being connected and the Fear of Missing Out (FOMO). I have spent many an hour trying to tell them that nearly everything they use isn't agnostic about its behaviour, but that it tries to manipulate them into spending as much time as possible in the app/site and so on.
I've really cut down on the amount I use my phone over the last year or so, and it has paid huge dividends. About 18 months ago I stopped using Facebook, and any other social media. I feel massively better for doing so, but it took me a long time to break the habits; and I'm a 46 year old with a brain that developed without such patterns as the norm, and I'm told I have 'immense self control'. So how on earth is a kid who doesn't know any different supposed to be able to do anything different?
I'm sure I'll get shot down by some (or downvoted), but I think there's a huge difference between technology itself and the way that it's being used to manipulate. There are always the arguements that 'you don't understand the modern way' - that being connected and always on is the norm... or that I'm a hypocrite as I use computers at work.... or that it's OK, and it means throwing away the ability to look at Wikipedia... but the truth of the matter is that most of the time spent isn't enriching yourself, it's flicking through instagram posts like a cat pawing at a washing machine.
I'm particularly concerned about the 13 year old, as she appears to be going backwards in terms of reading age and ability, and her attention span is dismal. She used to like reading, and now she complains that any book we suggest is 'too difficult' and the stories are 'too long and complicated'. And we're not talking 'A Deepness in the Sky' here. Particularly tragic as she was extremely creative (far more so than the other three), but seems to be getting less so as time goes on. Don't get me wrong, she's not stupid, but she seems to be diverging from the path she could be on as time goes on, but spends hours looking at junk on her phone.
Meal times are always device free, which works well. There's (now) one place in the house to charge your phone, and if it's on charge, you stop using it until it is charged.
For about the last 6 months we have had Sunday nights as completely 'device free' - from 5pm, every computer, ipad, phone, etc., gets turned in, and no-one goes on anything (yes, me included) - no TV or anything. And it works brilliantly well; there is nearly always some resistance at first (and the first month or so was difficult), and some moaning, but everyone acknowledges that we've had some of the best times as a family when we've been completely without any distractions; sometimes we will play games, sometimes we will have discussions, sometimes we will read, or do something individually or in small groups, but it's a complete change from the usual time where most of the people in the household are disconnected in some way, or distracted.
The eldest is at University, and is obviously an adult, but when she's home she plays by the same rules, and has also (in the last discussion had on the subject) admitted that when she got a phone (6 years ago), it was a completely different landscape; it wasn't weaponised against the user as it seems to be now. She said in no uncertain terms that it's not suitable for her youngest brother in the way it used to be, which was interesting, but she still doesn't agree that being device free an evening a week is a good idea.
Anyway, one of my biggest worries as a (step-)parent is that I will not have done enough to protect my kids' minds against the tobacco of our age, particularly when I've been reading about how bad the problem potentially could be. I sincerely hope I'm exaggerating the risks, but I doubt it.