Sometimes things happen in life that make you stop and take stock of who your “real” friends are. Like when I feel anxious and I call my friends to give me some moral support. If I need a hand with a ride somewhere for the kids, I call on my local parent crew. If I want to vent about the latest parenting issue, I might post on Facebook and get some reactions from my contacts around the world.
Robin Dunbar, a University of Oxford anthropologist and psychologist, studied social networks and brains, and proposed that people can typically handle a certain sized social network, ranging from five people you would consider “confidants” to about 150 that may be in your “social group”. Subsets of “friends” and “close friends” exist in between.
But how do social media networks change that picture? I have 777 Twitter followers and 4300 Facebook friends, and some of those are connected to my work on Screenagers. My daughter Tessa counts about 1000 among her followers on Instagram. There are apps you can get to boost your Instagram follower numbers and increase your Facebook “likes”. So, just how important are these numbers? And how significant are these connections?
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Learn more about our Screen-Free Sleep campaign at the website!
Our movie made for parents and educators of younger kids
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
Register your interest in bringing our new movie to your school or community
Learn more about showing our movies in your school or community!
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Learn more about our Screen-Free Sleep campaign at the website!
Our movie made for parents and educators of younger kids
Join Screenagers filmmaker Delaney Ruston MD for our latest Podcast
Register your interest in bringing our new movie to your school or community
As we’re about to celebrate 10 years of Screenagers, we want to hear what’s been most helpful and what you’d like to see next.
Please click here to share your thoughts with us in our community survey. It only takes 5–10 minutes, and everyone who completes it will be entered to win one of five $50 Amazon vouchers.
Sometimes things happen in life that make you stop and take stock of who your “real” friends are. Like when I feel anxious and I call my friends to give me some moral support. If I need a hand with a ride somewhere for the kids, I call on my local parent crew. If I want to vent about the latest parenting issue, I might post on Facebook and get some reactions from my contacts around the world.
Robin Dunbar, a University of Oxford anthropologist and psychologist, studied social networks and brains, and proposed that people can typically handle a certain sized social network, ranging from five people you would consider “confidants” to about 150 that may be in your “social group”. Subsets of “friends” and “close friends” exist in between.
But how do social media networks change that picture? I have 777 Twitter followers and 4300 Facebook friends, and some of those are connected to my work on Screenagers. My daughter Tessa counts about 1000 among her followers on Instagram. There are apps you can get to boost your Instagram follower numbers and increase your Facebook “likes”. So, just how important are these numbers? And how significant are these connections?
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Sometimes things happen in life that make you stop and take stock of who your “real” friends are. Like when I feel anxious and I call my friends to give me some moral support. If I need a hand with a ride somewhere for the kids, I call on my local parent crew. If I want to vent about the latest parenting issue, I might post on Facebook and get some reactions from my contacts around the world.
Robin Dunbar, a University of Oxford anthropologist and psychologist, studied social networks and brains, and proposed that people can typically handle a certain sized social network, ranging from five people you would consider “confidants” to about 150 that may be in your “social group”. Subsets of “friends” and “close friends” exist in between.
But how do social media networks change that picture? I have 777 Twitter followers and 4300 Facebook friends, and some of those are connected to my work on Screenagers. My daughter Tessa counts about 1000 among her followers on Instagram. There are apps you can get to boost your Instagram follower numbers and increase your Facebook “likes”. So, just how important are these numbers? And how significant are these connections?
Meta's $17.1 billion settlement requires new safety measures for under-18 users, including a two-hour daily limit and blocking Instagram and Facebook overnight. I'm frustrated it took this long, and that an overnight block can falsely reassure parents when what we really need is a national push for screen-free sleep. I'm glad it happened. And with AI, we have to move much faster.
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The first of more than a thousand school district lawsuits against TikTok, Snapchat, Meta, and YouTube has settled, with a small Kentucky district awarded $27 million. Discovery records made public showed the companies designed to reach kids during the school day, from in-class alerts to keeping notifications on against safety teams' advice, while research finds students spend about 1.5 hours of a 6.5-hour school day on their phones.
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The first of 1,200+ school district lawsuits against social media companies just settled, with Meta, YouTube, Snap, and TikTok all paying out rather than face a jury. Meta points to its Teen Accounts feature as proof of safety, but a study by former Meta safety lead Arturo Bejar found only 8 of 47 advertised features actually work as described.
READ MORE >for more like this, DR. DELANEY RUSTON'S NEW BOOK, PARENTING IN THE SCREEN AGE, IS THE DEFINITIVE GUIDE FOR TODAY’S PARENTS. WITH INSIGHTS ON SCREEN TIME FROM RESEARCHERS, INPUT FROM KIDS & TEENS, THIS BOOK IS PACKED WITH SOLUTIONS FOR HOW TO START AND SUSTAIN PRODUCTIVE FAMILY TALKS ABOUT TECHNOLOGY AND IT’S IMPACT ON OUR MENTAL WELLBEING.
