Is it Wise to Give Teens Smartphones?
For all of eternity, teenagers have craved independence & autonomy. A growing number of older teens are wishing we had given them less online independence when it comes to smartphones & social media.
Questions We Ask
Given all we know about social media, the teen mental health crisis, that parental controls do not mitigate all risks and are easy to work around: Is it wise to given teenagers smartphones?
The questions parents, pastors, youth leaders, teachers, and experts are asking have more to do with when, not if, to give smartphones and how to then exert maximum control over the devices. We are told to have a lot of conversations, use restrictions, set time limits and more. Look, if you have kids and the internet in your home, you should use some sort of filtering software, but the fact is, content moderation isn’t enough.
Happy is a man who finds wisdom and who acquires understanding Proverbs 3:13
I love talking with high school and college students about what life growing up with a smartphone is really like. What are they doing? Why? Do they actually enjoy it? Do they see inappropriate content? What would life be like without a smartphone?
What Teens Say
Most teenagers, especially girls, tell me smartphone time is social media time. Making phone calls, checking calendars, or utilizing a mapping app never comes up in conversation (you know, the things parents think they are buying a smartphone for). Some teens defend their Instagram or YouTube habit, but most admit all this time online isn’t very good for them. When I was a teenager I would get a Dr. Pepper and peanut M&Ms from the school vending machine every day between classes. I would have told you it wasn’t very good for me, but I liked it, it was cheap and accessible, and I was 16. Teenagers aren’t known for good impulse control after all. In many school buildings today, vending machines full of soda and candy are no longer the norm, not because teenagers stopped craving the products, but because adults banded together and had the unhealthy options removed.
What we put into our bodies, be it digital media or soda, affects who we are, not only on the individual level but on the societal level as well. Neil Postman wrote in Amusing Ourselves to Death,
The media of communication available to a culture are a dominant influence on the formation of the culture’s intellectual and social preoccupations.
If he was right, then the form of communication now dominant in society - brief videos, short messages, responses that require little more than the swipe of a finger or tap of a thumb are what is forming our teenagers intellectual and social lives.
Guard your heart above all else, for it is the source of life. Proverbs 4:23
A 15 year old, who got her smartphone at age 10 so she could “safely” stay home alone after school told me, “I wish there was a law that nobody could have social media and it went into effect for everyone all at the same time.”
How is it that something so ubiquitous among kids & teens is already viewed as a vice by high schoolers?
Another young lady, age 16, told me she spends around 7 hours a day on TikTok, SnapChat and Instagram. She was quiet and kind with a lost look in her eyes that I haven’t been able to shake. Lost in a sea of videos and images, with nothing stable to tether herself to. When I mentioned that a forthcoming school policy would make using phones during class time against the rules, she gave me a small smile. A few months later, after the ban had gone into effect, I checked in on her. She reported, “it’s a lot better in school now that we can’t use phones during class. I can pay attention a lot easier.”
Kids and teens are growing up in a world where the main form of media may soon come with a Surgeon General’s warning as being hazardous to your health. They live in a world where everywhere they look - schools, restaurants, sports teams, musicians, politicians, clubs, and even churches are asking them for “follows.” Adults are telling kids, directly and indirectly, to consume media with rapidity and consistency.
Can we really be surprised that kids are begging their parents for smartphones?
Lilly: A Fresh Perspective
Another young woman, Lilly, now a college freshman, spoke to me at length about growing up with a smartphone. She’s a follower of Jesus, involved in a Bible study at her family’s church and hopes to work as a Christian Counselor after graduating college. She was fortunate to go to a school that didn’t allow phones during the school day, and her mom was actively trying to protect her by using internet filters and parental controls. During her Senior year, Lilly began studying social media for a school project and ended up taking all of the apps off of her phone. Lilly, who got her phone at age 13 and social media by 14 told me, “It would be great for a child to just call/text and not have access to certain social media.” Four short years after getting social media, she is already cautioning parents and teenagers to avoid it. Lilly thinks parents are missing a lot of what’s actually happening online.
(To Lilly’s point, check out this article by a Facebook whistleblower documenting how sexual predators are coming for kids online. Or read
’s article calling for girls to not have social media due to the content that is being pushed to teenagers. Or consider how social media is designed to mimic the addictive properties of gambling.The one who walks with the wise will become wise, but a companion of fools will suffer harm. Proverbs 13:20
When I asked Lilly what she thought youth leaders can do she pointed out that they are quick to (rightly) tell teenagers to not gossip or slander one another but they don’t go far enough. “If they could continue to teach and give guidance about the truths about social media in a Biblical light that would be really helpful.” Instead, Lilly tells me that teenagers believe social media is bad for other people, but not for themselves. “It’s like the speck in some else’s eye,” she told me referencing Jesus’s parable in Matthew.
When I asked Lilly if was glad she had social media as a teenager, she said, “I wish I hadn’t had social media. It would have made my middle and high school years completely different.” Lilly went on to point out that in twenty years SnapChat will probably be a thing of the past, but when she’s a mom, she doesn’t want her future sons or daughters to have a smartphone in high school.
Getting Around Filters
When I asked Lilly if she ever got past parental controls she admitted that she did and referenced that it was at a certain point where she was pushing boundaries and being slightly rebellious. You know, she was acting like a teenager. How did she get around the parental controls? “I don’t know. I just figured it out.”
Lilly told me that when it comes to teenagers having smartphones and social media, “you feel like an outcast if you don’t and you will have a mental health crisis, if you do.”
I asked Lilly what she would say to teenagers whose parents say no to social media and smartphones. Her reply: “Follow the rules of your parents and the Bible. It’s for your safety and protection, because they love you.”
For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding. Proverbs 2:6
The Future
Lilly is a delightful young woman and I am excited to see what the Lord has for her over the next few years of college. Yes, she grew up with social media and a smartphone and by all accounts appears to be doing okay. Lilly didn’t become a statistic, for which I am thankful. She also took the step to remove social media from her phone as she learned more about its harmful effects.
When I listen to these teenagers lament the struggles that come from smartphones and social media, when I hear them say they crave these devices but wish all of them would go away, when I look at their sweet faces and realize they are still children who need adults to put up boundaries and guardrails, I have to ask again: Is it wise to give smartphones to teenagers?
Dear Christian Parent, our kids aren’t going to like all the decisions we make in the moment. But that’s okay, we shouldn’t need the immediate gratification of teenagers to be the marker of being a good parent. When I tell my 13 year old no to a smartphone, I might also buy him some M&Ms and a Dr. Pepper. I’m not a perfect parent, so I’ll give him an inch every now and again, but I’m not going to let him take a mile. Judging by the older teens I talk to, my son will thank me and my husband for the decisions we are making. It might take a few years, but he’ll get there. Probably by the time he’s twenty.