Tik-tok, Instagram, YouTube … you name the platform, companies know your children are watching it. And so do the social media influencers those companies pay to spark retail trends. Kids will want it — and that's normal, says a Philadelphia counselor — but parents who give in to their children and their social media trends are doing them a disservice.
Whether it’s a popular gigantic water flask or expensive skin care that no 11-year-old needs, kids have been going bonkers over retail trends for decades. But the fact that most of it happens on the internet — and to an increasingly younger audience — is an emerging trend in itself.
“What fundamentally needs to occur is that children's identity needs to become separate from what they're wearing, or the possessions that they have, and what their peers think of them,” says Jill Lamar, a counselor with Philadelphia mental health company Thriveworks.
Lamar says the bullying that often ensues makes it a problem — especially because of unmonitored smart phone use and social media.
According to a recent Gallup poll, more than half of U.S. teenagers ages 13 to 19 spend at least four hours a day on social media. Lamar says unrestricted, unmonitored access to cell phones is a major problem.
“I don't think really young kids should have any access to phones, unless it's a flip phone. So the parent can get in touch with their child, and the child can get in touch with their parents.”
Lamar says it’s no wonder kids are easy targets for online influencers paid by major brands. She says it’s time for parents to clamp down.
“It's a dereliction of duty for parents not to take this really seriously and recognize that they have a role — they have to make time to do these things. They have to make time to think through, okay, what is our identity supposed to look like? How have I not provided the best example of that?” Lamar said.
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Lamar says excessive usage especially at an early age can lead to depression, anxiety, bullying and in some cases suicidal ideations.
“Kids tend to come home from school and immediately retreat to their rooms and close the door. So parents really have no idea what's going on if they don't have those parental controls on the phones. And so they can't even confront their children about what it is they're watching or consuming.”
She suggests using parental controls, limiting their time, and in some cases, no smart phone at all.
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