From The Orange County Register
By Amy Bentley / Contributing Writer
Rites of passage often include such lavish social events as sweet-16 parties, bar mitzvahs, quinceañeras and gatherings to celebrate high school graduation.
Today, however, the entryway to adulthood is sometimes marked by a purchase: your child’s first smartphone.
On the plus side, parents can use smartphones as electronic leashes to track down their children, and kids can use educational apps to help with homework. A smartphone also provides unlimited access to the web – the good and the bad. Dangers such as cyberbullies and online predators make some parents press the hold button on smartphone access.
But at some point, most parents will have to face the question of when to get their child a smartphone. The issue typically arises during elementary school, when other kids start carrying phones to school.
But there are many factors to consider before you jump on the smartphone bandwagon, said Stacy Deeble-Reynolds, coordinator of prevention programs for the Orange County Department of Education’s Center for Healthy Kids & Schools. The child’s maturity level is key when considering smartphone access, she said, adding that in most cases, 12 or 13 is the earliest appropriate age.
Dr. Heather Huszti, chief of Pediatric Psychology at Children’s Hospital of Orange County, said 12 is typically the age when kids become more influenced by their peers. As smartphones enter playgrounds, she suggests considering using a phone as a way to teach kids responsibility and promote independence.
“It’s not a right,” she said. “It’s an opportunity to use it to teach. Ask your child, ‘Do you really want this? Work for it.’”
In a 2013 report on teens and technology, the Pew Research Center found that 68 percent of 12- to 13-year-olds owned a cellphone; 23 percent had a smartphone. For kids ages 12-17, 37 percent had smartphones, up from 23 percent in 2011, Pew found.
The average age of kids getting their first mobile phone keeps dropping. It was 16 a decade ago and about 12 in 2009, according to Pew.
Pew’s research also found that smartphones and mobile devices are enabling kids to spend hours online. Ninety-two percent of teens ages 13-17 go online daily, and 24 percent go online “almost constantly,” facilitated by the widespread availability and convenience of smartphones, according to Pew’s April 2015 report, Teens, Social Media & Technology Overview 2015.
Pros and cons
On the positive side, kids may be able use smartphones at school as educational-support tools, Deeble-Reynolds said.
“It’s a more engaging way a lot of times for kids to learn. Students learn in a way that makes them comfortable, and smartphones are intuitive tools for young people,” she said.
The downsides include exposure to inappropriate content, child predators and online bullying, she said.
“The children need to be not so naïve that they completely dismiss it. Be careful about a 7-year-old befriending Cutegirl15 on Instagram,” Deeble-Reynolds said, using a hypothetical example.
In addition, she said, online activities are permanent, and kids who are too young or immature to fully grasp this notion could leave a negative digital footprint that could hurt them later when they apply for college or a scholarship.
And too much smartphone use can lead to a sedentary lifestyle. “This means less time in nature and less time face-to-face socializing,” she said.
