Episode 173 with Dr. Victoria Dunckley
When Face-to-Screen Replaces Face-to-Face: Understanding the Impact of Screens on Kid's Health
SHOW NOTES:
Learn more about Dr. Victoria Dunckley HERE
DONATE HERE:
Your donations play an integral part in keeping The 1000 Hours Outside Podcast running. We appreciate your support!
SHOW TRANSCRIPT:
Ginny Yurich Here we go. Welcome to the 1000 Hours Outside podcast. My name is Ginny Yurich. I am the founder of 1000 Hours Outside, and I'm so excited to have author Victoria Dunckley here today to talk about her book, Reset Your Child's Brain and all sorts of other things. Thank you for being here.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Thank you, Ginny. I'm glad we finally made it.
Ginny Yurich Yes, we made it. Kim, John Payne is the one who suggested that I reach out to you. And so I really appreciate you taking the time. You are an award winning integrative psychiatrist. You have been on the Today Show, NBC Nightly News Investigation Discovery. Your program has helped so many people. So thank you for taking the time to be here. I read your book and I have got, I think, eight pages of notes here. It is a phenomenal book. It's called Reset Your Child's Brain, A four week plan to end meltdowns, raised grades and boost social skills by reversing the effects of electronic screen time. So before we dive into the meat of the book, can you just tell us a little bit about yourself and how you ended up having this passion?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Sure. So I've been practicing for a little over 20 years now. And when I first finished my training in my fellowship in child psychiatry, I was working with a lot of kids who were in the system, like foster care, residential treatment center care, and they all had a history of abuse or neglect or both. And so all those kids were very prone to being put into fight or flight very easily. So I noticed with those kids that they if they paid even a little bit of video games, they tended to get worse. And conversely, if we just removed video games altogether, that they started to get better. And these were very tough cases I was working with at the highest level of acuity in the state. And then I also had my private practice and I was seeing a lot of kids with tics, anxiety, ADHD, more run of the mill stuff. And those kids didn't necessarily have a history of trauma, but they looked the same like they were all kind of in a state of hyper arousal. And so I started to do the same intervention with them just remove all video games. And I started to notice that no matter what their diagnosis was, they got better. You know, even kids who'd been stuck, who hadn't responded to other treatments. And so I started to kind of formulate this concept that they were all this state of hyper arousal overstimulated, and that the frontal lobe was kind of shutting down. And also because I was seeing so many kids with tics and I noticed that the video games made their tics worse. I knew it was dopamine related because tics are dopamine related. And of course, all of the research shows that now. You know, I think even a lot of people know that now that screen time affects dopamine. But at that time, it wasn't really known. So that's kind of how I started everything. And then I you know, I just was having success in my practice. So I put a little email, of course, on my website. And then, you know, I just got responses from all over the world saying that their child had been misdiagnosed or told their child in medication and they didn't and all sorts of things that that's what prompted me to write the book.
Ginny Yurich Unbelievable. This was so eye opening to me. And I've been reading really for the past decade about screens in time outside and finding balance. And there were so many things in your book that I had never heard of and that were really eye opening to me. One of the lines is this concept of interactive versus passive screen consumption, and I think we've all bought into the passive screen. Consumption is bad, don't be lazy. But if the kids are interacting, if they're building something on Minecraft, this is more worthy of their time.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yes.
Ginny Yurich I mean, I had that misconception until I read your book this year.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yeah.
Ginny Yurich So this is such an important thing. The difference between so now I'm more prone to like, let's watch a movie together. Yes. Which is opposite of what I would have thought. And I think opposite kind of of what's preached is like we'll use screens as a tool for learning. So tell us about what's going on with passive versus interactive usage.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Okay. Yes, this is always my first talking point when I give a talk because it is like one of the biggest misconceptions. So basically, screen time acts like a stimulant and the interactive screen time is a more potent stimulant, so it is more engaging. That is why advertisers want the interactive component. And it's also kind of what depletes energy, you know, mental energy more quickly. That's what fractures attention, more all of those things. But what I noticed clinically was that when I was doing, you know, I started implementing these screen fasts. And if I left a little bit of passive screen time in, you know, like a few hours a week of watching a movie or a slow paced, you know, TV, then they were still able to reset. But if we'd left a little bit of interactive screen time in like, you know, say just once a week of video games, they didn't reset the same way. Wow. And then when I started really diving into the research as I was writing the book, you know, lo and behold, there was research. There is research on interactive screen time causing more issues with sleep. Nation, memory, mood, regulation, all of those things. But it is really interesting because even researchers say what you're saying, you know, they say, well, we don't know yet. And there could be this whole it could be completely different if they're actually learning it. But to me, it's the interactive component itself that's just regulating.
Ginny Yurich Mm hmm. Can you explain that? So you talk about the state of disregulation, and I guess as a parent, you can actually kind of see that, you know, where all of a sudden they're crying because you have to turn it off, that type of thing. What's happening internally?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley So if we think of it as a stimulant, so we don't give kids caffeine, for example, we know it's not good for them. We know it's really not good for kids who have attention issues. So it's basically the same thing. The minute they start engaging with the screen, it's it's highly stimulating. It's very engaging. They're locked in. You get all these a rush of dopamine, so it's unnaturally stimulating. So you get this rush of dopamine and you get this the activation of arousal. So you get this fight or flight system is activated, but at the same time, they're staying still. So it's kind of like this mismatch of energy from an evolutionary point of view. So when we get fight or flight, we're supposed to be able to discharge that energy by running away or fighting or freeze. But freeze doesn't discharge that energy. So instead the child is sitting there so they get this hyper arousal while they're staying still. So then when you stop it and also when you stop, it's very sudden. Right. The other thing that was informed my work was that at that time, 20 years ago, we still used a lot of short acting stimulants like Ritalin for ADHD. And you could see the same thing. You know, it would work really well when they were on it. And then as soon as it wore off, they were crying. And just like when a child comes off a video game or the phone or whatever. So we know that abrupt stimulant and then drop the brain's not meant to handle it. It should be smoother and more natural. So those are the kinds of things that are happening in the brain. It's everything from brain chemistry to the body clock. Electrical activity is increased, the stress hormones are higher. And we know also that interactive screen time causes more weight gain because it raises cortisol more. And then, of course, there's all the issues with the body clock. One of the interesting things that I realized as I was reading all the research is that when the body clock is thrown off, which is it's thrown off by not just screen time before bed, but screen time throughout the day. And even if you block the blue light, it's still melatonin is still suppressed. It's just not suppressed as much. So all these things that people do like, oh, just as long as you don't have screen time an hour before bedtime or as long as you block the blue light, it's okay. It's still just regulating. Well, but when you alter the body clock and you know, we're supposed to have this kind of nice sine wave for arousal, and then when you go to sleep, it's lower and then it comes back up. Everything's kind of getting flattened out because we're overstimulate during the day and then at night you're not going into that deep sleep. So then the next day you're tired and you seek more stimulation. Now when that happens, serotonin is depleted. So then we get this state where the child is depressed and anxious or agitated. And we know, you know, I don't mean to be doom and gloom, but we know, you know, there's a suicide crisis going on right now. And one of the things that happen when we look at, you know, postmortem studies of the brains of people who have committed suicide, their serotonin is very, very low in their nervous system. And the same thing with homicide. Very, very low. Both of those things are occurring right now. So I feel like all of those things are related to people, you know, young people over consuming screen time at unprecedented rates. And their brain chemistry is just completely out of whack.
Ginny Yurich Wow. But, you know, it's not doom and gloom because you offer a solution and a four week one and that things can change rapidly. And this is leading to a lot of misdiagnosis. So what are some of the things that are getting misdiagnosed?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Pretty much every psychiatric diagnosis can be misdiagnosed. And when I say misdiagnosed, it may be a true misdiagnosis or they may have that diagnosis, but it's made a lot worse. So ADHD, this is what you know, when I my son is and just finished kindergarten and I look, when I volunteered in his classroom, I was like, whoa, it looks like, you know, all these kids look like they have especially the boys look like they have ADHD. You know, they can't focus. They're very impulsive.
Ginny Yurich They're five.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley They're five, and they're slamming their bodies around. But if you're disruptive in the classroom, that easily can get misdiagnosed as ADHD. So that was a big one. TICs. We saw a big increase in tics during the pandemic, but tics were on the rise in before that. So that's a big one to even bipolar disorder, because some of these kids will have rages not just after they're they've gotten off a screen, but just in general. They have rages. And that can be, you know, a five year old or it can be a 15 year old. So those kids might get diagnosed as bipolar disorder. And then we're seeing kids be diagnosed with depression. Anxiety, obsessive compulsive disorder. There's a very strong link between screen time and obsessive compulsive symptoms.
Ginny Yurich Wow. It's a lot.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley And that used to be kind of a rare diagnosis, You know, in terms of anxiety disorders, OCD was relatively rare and now it's pretty common.
Ginny Yurich Wow. It's a lot. There's a lot going on. And you explain a whole lot of it in the book. One of the things I think that people tend to think is that video games can help improve attention. So talking about a five year old, you're talking about school, talking about attention. You know, people say, well, don't video games improve their attention. They can sit there for 3 hours and do a video game. What would you say to that parent or guardian?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley So when we see that, it's like saying, you know, a mouse is going to learn a maze faster if they're put on cocaine, You know, if you give the mouse cocaine, they're going to learn the maze faster. So just because someone can sit there and focus doesn't mean that what's going on is good for them. And what we see over time is that video games, clearly we know over time make attention worse. So basically, video games teaches you how to play a video game so they get better at playing a video game or doing something on a screen. So that kind of attention might you know, they might test higher than another child. And interestingly, a lot of the tests that look at attention, they're testing with using a computer screen. They're not testing in the real world, like how do you do a math problem or how do you sit there and try to read a book? You know, that they don't test that way because they can't track it.
Ginny Yurich Right.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley As easily.
Ginny Yurich It's a conundrum.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yeah, exactly. You know, parents could really do this research on their own, in their own home. You will see a huge difference in attention span and ability to sit there, focused, keep track of things, you know, like keeping track of their code or keeping track of where their school things are. All of those things improve. Those are all executive functioning things. And you see those improve really within a couple of weeks. Wow. When you take kids off screen, Wow. I feel like that's the best way for parents to really take it in and appreciate the impact on attention.
Ginny Yurich Mm hmm. Well, an executive function is a big thing that people are talking about. And you also say when you're talking about intent, attention, that if a child you see when a child reports finding non screen activities boring, that's a red flag. The brain has become used to these high levels of stimulation. So that's a really interesting part for parents to be aware of. But when you talk about executive function, can you just explain what that is and how attention is related to executive function?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yes. So attention is a component of executive functioning. So executive functioning is getting things done, prioritizing, working memory, being able to hold things in your head while you're doing something else, kind of big picture things like planning, getting homework done, things like that, being able to find things, being organized.
Ginny Yurich And so that's suffering. If the attention is suffering, then that executive functioning is also suffering, which is just important for making it through life.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Exactly.
Ginny Yurich The book talks a lot about light and really interesting information. Okay. I had never really thought about it. This is maybe a silly thing. Never thought about how our eyes interact differently with a two dimensional screen than they do in a three dimensional world. I would love to know a little bit more about the eyes. You know, you talk about that they're connected to our central nervous system. So from that one aspect, just that one piece of our eyes and our eye health and how that relates to our whole body, what's going on when we're on a two dimensional screen.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley So, I mean, one thing is that when it's two dimensional, you're not going near and far, you know, back and forth as you would if you were outside. So that there's something about being outside where you can gaze really far away. And there's the back and forth near and far, especially far. I think that is regulating to the nervous system and it different pathways are activated, but also just in terms of learning, it's completely different from learning on a two dimensional. And I would say the screen is even more two dimensional than like a page or something like that. You're still getting some three dimension if you're looking at a book. Right. So there's something about the 2D that doesn't activate the same pathways in the brain. So we know that, like, for example, if you're reading on a screen, you read more slowly and your comprehension is not as good. So if they test somebody, even adults who've read something electronically, they're not going to test the same and their performance isn't going to be as good and they don't do as much deep reading.
Ginny Yurich Wow.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley But then also, in terms of the eye muscles, you know, we're seeing all these kids who are nearsighted and it's because that near far thing, again, they're just not using all of their muscles like they should be. But in addition to that, we're seeing kids who are having more inflammation of the retina. So we're seeing like macular degeneration, which used to only happen in the elderly or at least late middle age. And we're seeing that now. And young people. And that's the number one cause of blindness is macular degeneration. So all of these things and it just, you know, it's just not natural. So we just have to get away from the things that are unnatural, overly intense. Our nervous system is not meant to handle it. Can it do it? Yes, but we're suffering the consequences.
Ginny Yurich It's good to know. I think as a parent or as a teacher, it's good to know these things because it just helps to increase your resolve. You know, to think about it in terms of the 2D 3D, I mean, that's just a good thing to be aware of that our eyes are meant, like you said, to look all around and our muscles are meant to be stimulated. And so screens are altering our normal eye movement and our normal eye development. You even talk about it influences the vestibular sense. So we're talking about balance because the eyes are just in this fixed position. The head is in a fixed position. Yes. So much of the time in childhood.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Exactly. I've been working with this O.T. over the past few years and it's just so interesting. But one of the first things she does as she gets kids on a trampoline and she has them high fiving and looking up, so she's like they have to you know, it has to look up. That's what stimulates the vestibular system. Exact opposite of looking at a screen when they're looking down like this. You know, just having their head bent like that is the opposite of what should be activated and being stimulated in childhood. And I think to track what's on the screen, you have to stay extremely still. So that's why, you know, kids really are very, very still. And some of the notes even say it's like it acts like a restraint. You know, nothing's happening. And we know sitting in general is bad. But I think when you're on the screen, you're even more still. And of course, that's horrible for kids.
Ginny Yurich Right? And it's just the numbers are shocking. I started writing about our family getting outside, and one of the statistics I had read was that kids were outside for 4 to 7 minutes on average, but on screens for 4 to 7 hours on average on a daily basis. So the numbers are shocking and there's just such a lack of balance. They're sitting for so long. Eyes are interacting with 2D for such a long time. And then you talk about and this is really interesting and makes sense that our brains are designed to respond to visual things. And so the brightness, the color, the contrast of fast paced and you talk about what's called the orienting response, that our orienting response in our brain gets hijacked. Can you explain what the orienting response is?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yeah. So from a evolutionary point of view, we're attracted to things that helped us survive. So, you know, back in the hunter gatherer days, if something moved, it might be something that we could hunt. So you're attracted to something that's moving quickly. Same with bright color. So things that are visually stimulating we're attracted to in terms of finding food and also in terms of mating. So we're attracted to just, you know, visually stimulating, colorful things. So the engineers and everyone who's creating everything from the way you interact with your phone to the games, to social media, they know all these things about the brain and they hijack them to keep the eyes on the screen. They call it sticky eyeballs, so they want the person on the screen for as long as possible and they want them to come back. So they're little. You know, if you're off the screen too long, they're like, what can we do now? What can we do now to get it back on? So all of those things are hijacked on purpose to keep us there. So it's very it's not realistic, especially for a child when we say, well, they have to learn how to regulate their use. If you think about how the brain is being hijacked, it's like nearly impossible. I mean, it's impossible for adults, even me. Oh, I'm so, so, so, so aware. And I don't feel good when I'm on my screen a lot. Like I still struggle, you know, because it's meant to be addicting.
Ginny Yurich Right? You say in here to try and have no interactive screen device until 12 and after that only sparingly. I think it's good. I think it's really good to have those markers there so that at least people are aware. One of the things that was in here that I hadn't heard about and it was super interesting, was the left brain, right brain piece of it. And you right, because screen time is information packed, it tends to overstimulate the left and under stimulate the right, which makes us feel more fragmented and less connected. True. Right. So yeah. So then you talk about, well, if you've been in that spot where you've been overstimulated on your left side of the brain, what are some right brained things that you can do to help get back on track?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley That's a great question. I forgot that I had written about that. So right brain things are like connection. So bonding is right. Brain music, physical activity, things that are a holistic movement, dancing, you know, all of those things are right brain thinking in terms of concepts versus information. Abstract. Think. Meditation. All of those things activate the right side. And also when you activate the right side, it integrates the whole brain, not just the right side. So the right side is kind of like the holistic brain part, whereas the left side is more just like, yeah, like information, like the processing, processing, processing.
Ginny Yurich You know, it just gives you extra motivation to find those right brain things. I mean, you even talk about exposure to nature, and sunlight is one of the ways being actively involved in a three dimensional environment. I love just this list. It's on page 267 for whoever wants to pick up the book and write these and put them on a note card, human interaction being cared for, caring for other people, feeling competent, using all of your senses. This is going to help balance out what's happening in our world with this heavy use of screens and some kid, some situations depending on what stage of life the kid may be, have to use the screens for their schoolwork or something like that. And so to know that these right brain activities can help to balance things out is such a valuable tool. What do you say to parents who complain or ask about screens and schoolwork?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yeah, it's a big problem. I always say, you know, I always ask the school or the teacher, what can you get rid of so that sometimes there's extra screen time going on that's used as a reward or reinforcer. I'll always ask if there is paper alternatives that the child can be doing or a hands on alternatives. You can ask if homework can be done on paper and not have to be turned in. So one of the things that that I always stress is that light at night is linked to depression and even suicidality. So it doesn't make sense for us to be forcing kids to use their computer at night to turn in their homework. Now, granted, they're doing a lot of other things, too, so it takes them four times longer than it needs to. But it's just not fair for us to be asking them to try to be efficient with their time and just get it done and not get distracted by all these other things. Because again, you know, it's just not a fair fight. So, you know, I always tell parents, especially if their child is depressed or anxious to try to get rid of the homework. And I've even had parents at this school says, no, we can't do it. The parent just as well, I'm not doing it. Then if they don't get it done at school, it's not getting done. And I've seen that actually work and I've actually seen kids grades go up when they do that. So we really to me, you know, we need to prioritize mental health first and then everything else follows.
Ginny Yurich Oh, yes, You had such an important statement in here. I hope I bolded it at the beginning and I can easily find it. You say when we're concerned about our child's future career, which we all are, because the world is changing so rapidly. You say always put mental health first. I always put health first. Yes, the health comes first.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley It does. It says you can't have a successful child who doesn't have a sense of well-being, who wasn't feeling well. They're not going to perform well. And of course, nobody really you know, everybody wants their child to be healthy and happy first. But we get so sucked into the pressure and the edtech companies know that they know those vulnerabilities. And parents, they specifically target what your child's going to be left behind. If they don't know this. They're not completely tech savvy. They're not they're going to be left behind if they don't learn these skills now and putting in hours a day, learning it now, they're going to be left behind. So parents freak out about that. But the child who will be left behind is the child who can't function, who can't focus, who can't get things done, who doesn't feel well, who can't, who has trouble making eye contact, who has trouble having face to face conversation. Those are the kids who are going to be left behind. Also there, another thing that parents hear is if they don't learn early that they're going to be behind. But we know that's not true. We know that that technology is meant to be user friendly, dummy proof. We know that animals can use an iPad like it's it's not difficult.
Ginny Yurich Right. Right.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley So in school where the school says, well, they need to learn how to, you know, to use it well, their school wants them to learn how to use these things because they're assessing them on the devices. So they're collecting the data they need to, you know, teach to the test or whatever. But don't worry about a child being behind on learning how to use a smartphone or an iPad or something, because they're going to learn it in 5 minutes. So, you know, don't worry about that. And we also know that in terms of wages, that reading and math scores are predictive of wages, but technology use is not predictive except for the extremely high end maybe programing or something like that, that might be predictive. But in terms of technology skills in general, it's not predictive. Only reading and math skills are predictive. And that's those are skills that are much harder to learn.
Ginny Yurich And it's interesting, I think as a parent, our oldest is 15, just turned 15 and for the past five or six years, maybe even a little bit longer, there was a really big push on coding. And I felt as a parent, you know, I should be making sure he's learning how to code and should I be doing these different programs for coding. And he didn't he wasn't interested. So didn't. Really do that. And now what they're saying is that the computers are going to do the code itself. Yeah. Sometimes we get pushed into these things that won't matter in the end. And like, what you're saying is that a healthy person, someone who has good executive functioning skills, can adapt to the changing markets, and that that's what's going to help them with their careers more than any of these other things that we're sort of sold. And I liked what you even talked about, cursive writing. Mm hmm. Cursive writing is helping with the stimulation of the brain and hand-eye coordination and printing and all of these tactile analog. Maybe people would use that word analog. Things happen, our kids. So we just we've got to get back to that.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley There's a whole world of research on the hand brain connection and how printing and specifically cursive. But, you know, most schools don't even teach that anymore. But just printing in general, we know that there's something about the muscles in the hand and printing, and that's another 3D thing that stimulates more of the brain and more of the brain lights up. And also you remember the material better and more deeply. You make more connections when you're taking notes by hand. So there's also a, you know, a push for kids who have difficulty with handwriting, especially boys. There's a big push to put them on a laptop as soon as possible so that they don't struggle. And that's the opposite of what we should be doing. They should keep working on it. They will get better at it. It's just practice, right? Or these, you know, the concept of being a visual learner, Well, we're all visual learners, so that doesn't mean that we ignore the auditory. The auditory is really the skill that needs to be strengthened in terms of focus. So there's all these buzz, you know, these terms that are thrown out all the time in education that are really misconceptions and they're driven by the ad tech industry.
Ginny Yurich So interesting, I bring this up quite a bit. So people listening might be like, stop saying this. But there is there is this teacher, John Taylor Gatto, who was a New York State teacher of the year, you know, in decades past. And he's written some different books about education. But one of the things he says is that it only takes 50 hours to reach functional literacy. So by that, he means at the right age and stage, it will take 50 hours for a child to learn everything they need to learn about reading, writing, writing and math in order to be able to learn anything that they ever want to learn.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Interesting.
Ginny Yurich And so it's one of those things that none of us are going to just spend 50 hours on our child's education. But it is eye opening to say, look, if they're not getting it in 7 hours of instruction in a school, they have 35 hours of instructional time in a week. I would agree with you, Skip the homework. And people do not like that. They don't like and you have to be rude about it, you know? Yeah, people don't love that. But I would tend to agree with you that kids need that time to romp around and to play and to get bored and to do all of those things that help them as a whole child. It's like we have covered the seat work piece that's covered, you know, the exact time going toward that. But there's not as much time going toward all of these other things that you are talking about, the utilization of all of the centers, the community aspect, and that's coming out with the social skills. So you talk about how if we have poor social skills, we're going to have a hard time getting ahead in life. And that screen time creates a false experience of ease and success. So can we talk about the relationship between screen time and social skills and community and what's going on with that?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yes. One thing is that when you're in a state of hyper arousal, it's harder to make eye contact because if you're in that fight or flight state. Eye contact is a threat. So you can see it in kids. I mean, in young people in general, they have a harder time making and maintaining eye contact that you see, especially right after someone's been on a screen for a long time. They really have trouble making eye contact. And you can see that in kids very easily. So that's one thing. Another thing is just face to face conversations like we know that face to face conversation predicts reading, writing and speaking skills. So when people are just, you know, having conversations behind a screen or on a headphone headset or whatever, they're not developing those same skills. So you see, especially for shy kids or kids who are, you know, men who are on the spectrum or something like that, they get better at those things by practicing. And before adolescence was a time of awkwardness, and we were just forced to interact and feel awkward. And then you get through it, you know, it's not fine, but we get through it. But now they're not forced to put in those hours and hours and hours of socializing, so they're not really getting better at it. So I have some kids who are super smart and they're on the spectrum and they're having trouble getting jobs. Even though their skills might be there. They're having trouble getting jobs because of those social skill deficits.
Ginny Yurich Well, you write that real life is so much more difficult than these screens. And so it is such a good point that. I think in some ways we try and shield our kids from awkward, hard things. But when that's embedded in life, then, right, that helps you in the long run and it really adds up. There was, you know, throughout our childhoods, so much of that time that was there and now there's so much less You wrote and I thought this was such an interesting thing. The book really helps to reframe a lot of these things that I think many of us think, like the interactive versus passive. You know, all of these things that we're thinking or the EdTech piece, right? Our kids are going to get left behind. There's all of these pieces of information swirling around that I think the majority of people might think. And one of them is I have to let my child be on the screen or their social life is going to suffer.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Mm hmm. Oh, that's a huge one. So first, if I tried to do the research, I try to just focus on those four weeks and say, okay, there is just four weeks, they're going to survive. So what happens, though, is because they're shifted out of that hyper arousal state, their ability to engage is so much more natural and they engage with ease more. There's just more of a flow. They're smiling more everything. So you can see that there are social skills improve right away. And of course, you really want to start with the family, the family unit and the parent child relationship. That's what's protective. So if they're socializing more with their parents because they're off the screen, that's a good thing. Not that they shouldn't have friends, especially, you know, in adolescence, but there's too much focus on the peer group being their tribe and not the family being the tribe. You know, a hundred years ago, the family was a tribe until they were young adults in their twenties. Now we see these kids who the peer group is their tribe, and then they still are in the home. And so their, you know, their failure to launch and living in their mom's basement, we know that they'll mature more if they're off the screen. So the other thing that happens, though, it's really interesting is that, you know, a lot of kids say they feel relief from not especially with social media for not having to like, constantly be checking and liking and whatever they're doing and they can feel their anxiety levels dissipate and the pressure. So a lot of kids comment on that. And sometimes even kids will say, Mom, can you just say that my phone's taken right now so that I don't have to do this? You know, after they after they noticed the difference in themselves, but also following the screen fast. Depending on what happens, you know, because a lot of parents see such a big difference that they're like, okay, we're just going to get rid of at least video games or at least social media or at least YouTube or whatever. So they'll still get rid of stuff. And then then you kind of see what friends who are the two friends because they're good friends, will be like, okay, well, this that's what that what's going on with them and we're just going to work around it. So, you know, different families, a different friend groups handle it in different ways, but people get creative and they figure out how to communicate just like we did, you know?
Ginny Yurich Well, we use a call I've talked a few times about when you would call a friend. You would really be calling the family. You be calling a family phone that you don't know who was going to answer. And you would have to have maybe a couple seconds or maybe a minute or two of awkward conversation with someone's brother, you know, and then before you got to talk to that person and that whole piece of life is just completely gone. But kind of fun to bring that back. I think that's.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Such a good point. Yeah.
Ginny Yurich And I like your point about be the parent that allows yourself to be the one that's blamed, I guess that gives your kids the out. We've had that situation before where someone is texting and it's too much. So we will say, well, just tell them you're not allowed to be texted past that certain amount of time. It's your family rule or you're not allowed to be texting more than X amount of times a day. And it gives the child a relief. And they want that. They so badly want to be able to get out of the situation. But it's hard to show this, blame it on the parent. My mom says I can't do that and it really helps. And the statement here is I've never seen a child social life suffer from directing screen time. If anything, the opposite happens. Never seen it.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Never seen it.
Ginny Yurich You've worked for decades with family after family after family and never once seen a child's social life suffer from restricting screen time. It's a huge statement. This book is just filled with practical, eye opening information.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Sometimes that especially teenagers will say, well, tell the parent, I don't know what's going on. And now I'm the only one that doesn't have a smartphone, for example, or something like that. But we know that's not true. So sometimes that you know, that the teen is trying to work the parent and wear them down, but in actuality, they're still socializing. They're still going to things. They're still, you know, their social life is not suffering. And I just a friend of mine is a middle school teacher and she was just saying the same thing. She said the parents always come to them and say, well, I don't want my my child to be the only one, doesn't have a smartphone. And she's like, they're not trust me. So and so and so and so and so and so. Like there's a kind of a growing push to to not for kids that don't have a smartphone. So I think what I'm hoping is happening is that it's becoming more acceptable. All to really delay, delay, delay giving the smartphone. But yes, in actuality, I have not seen that ever.
Ginny Yurich You know.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley A child be ostracized or, you know, maybe they may be they might get teased or something like that. But it's not like you're imagining and secretly not you know, the kids are very dramatic about it, but it's not doesn't actually happen.
Ginny Yurich And I can think you could think of your role as a parent as being one that permeates. So if you make the decision in your house that when people come over, when friends come over, we put our phones in a basket or when we go on vacation, I actually just talked to this guy who runs this adventure center in Moab, Utah, and he says when their family goes on vacation, he says, we don't bring our phones. And so, you know, the kids are teens and they're in their early twenties. So they have to tell their friends, you're not going to hear from me for four, six days. We're going to be out of town. But that's setting a precedent and it's allowing other people to envision what I could do my life that way. And it's giving kids those experiences. So I think you can be the parent that influences actually in a pretty meaningful way. I think, depending on how you set up your life in your family and just, you know, a child's social life never suffers from screen limitation. And since we're talking about parenting, this is a really big one. And we have done this. A lot of people use screens as a reward and they say this is the only thing, this is the only motivator that works. How do you respond to that?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Yes, And I even did that, you know, when I was, you know, 20 years ago, when I first started working with these kids, I was like, oh, this is like a huge motivator. We can get them to do anything. This kid is really difficult. We can get them to, you know, do their homework or whatever. And then I started realizing it was backfiring. It does work again because it's such a stimulating, dopamine releasing thing. But pretty much everybody who works in this space, either with tech addiction or just screen management in general, and we've all kind of come to this same conclusion to not use it as a reinforcer. Because one thing, one of the things that happens is then they're fixated on on that instead of doing things internally. So you really want, you know, if you read the self-driven child, they talk about internal motivation and not having everything be rewarded. So if you do use a reward, it should be something like we're going to do this together or it's going to be a special outing or a special dinner or something like that rather than screen time.
Ginny Yurich Mm hmm. That's good. Really good advice. Can we wrap up with this thought about unstructured play? And one of the big things is that Dr. Peter Gray talks about this, that we're really just losing time. That's one of the biggest things that's happening for our kids, because so much of the day and you write about it in your book, you say children are in school mostly sitting for seven plus hours a day, and then they are typically given anywhere from a half hour to 3 hours of homework each night. That is an exceptional amount of time. 10 hours of a day is like we don't work for 10 hours our workday. Right. And usually you get a lunch break. You know, we're expecting these kids to do this 10 hours of work when, like I said, that John Taylor Gatto, when he talks about that 50 hours. He says there is ample evidence to show that this is not needed, this amount of time, that kids need a lot of time for themselves. So what's happening? And people use unstructured, although you self structured, I like that word to you. They're structuring their own play. There really is some structure to it. But what is happening for kids when they're allowed to have time for structuring their own play?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley So that is when we see kids really tap into their creativity. You know, there's a lot of brain work going on when the child has unstructured play, it is really hard to carve out time. I mean, everything's just so busy there. And the other thing that parents feel pressure about is to put them in all these activities. And, you know, they need to learn piano. They need to while sports, of course, I feel like they should be doing. But there's a lot of learning, you know, a second language. There's so much pressure to like be doing all these other things too, which are all good things, but it makes their schedule so busy that the child doesn't have that unstructured play. And that is where a lot of the learning like solidifies. New connections are made. They learn problem solving, they're creating something. Forget about creating something on Minecraft. If they're creating a, you know, a building using stuff in the living room that is much more creative and brain building than anything they can do on a screen. And also it helps with regulation. So you can see kids kind of, you know, they're very stressed out and anxious and agitated, and then you see them, everything kind of smoothes out and they calm down as they've been playing for a while. So I think that is really important. It's it's so hard to carve out now, but I think the homework piece is huge. I think there's so much research on homework not make. You know, any difference or if anything, it makes things more stressful. I used to write prescriptions for no no homework all the time for my patients in my practice.
Ginny Yurich In your book? Yes. You have a doctor's note. With that? Yes. So good. I love that.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley And a lot of times, you know, if you if you just ask the pediatrician to say, could you just write my, you know, my child to know about this? And a lot of the pediatricians will be like, sure, why not? You know, let's see what happens. So even if you don't even if a child doesn't have, like, formal accommodations, you can always ask and always ask again and again and again if they say no, because a lot of times they have a knee jerk response and say no. But then if you keep talking about it and kind of explaining your reasoning and saying, well, can we just try it, you know, do it as a trial, and as long as they're scores aren't dropping or their learning isn't suffering, that why not? Mm hmm. So could be a learning experience for the teachers, too.
Ginny Yurich Mm hmm. Yeah. And the doctors? Well, it's interesting. Going back to what you talked about at the beginning, you're saying in the book this discharges pent up energy. That's what you're saying. It's like you do see that with a child. Once they have time, they sort of meld into their environment, They become calmer, they're happier, they're discharging that pent up energy. And I never thought about how if you're playing a video game and I read Anglo Kids by Dr. Nicholas Cartier, is that the video games are meant to spike your blood pressure to really high levels. It's like 180 over 120. And if it doesn't get there within a couple minutes, the designers are going back to the drawing board. So it's a meant to make you in this state of fight or flight. But then, like you said, you can't discharge it. And so this unstructured play, it's giving kids a chance to let that go and to reset. So they really have to have the time for it. I liked how you said I mean, this is it's such a great book, Victoria, and I'm so glad that Kim Jong un told me about it. You wrote right in here. All parents, without exception, must deal with the doubts and skepticism of others. That's a big statement.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley It's true.
Ginny Yurich Yeah, because what you're saying is, in a lot of ways we are called we are once we know this information as a parent, as a guardian, as a teacher, it is our responsibility to create a world that puts our children's health first. And when you know these things, you do sometimes stand out or people feel judged because of your decisions. Maybe were delaying video games, were delaying the smartphone. But you just lay it right out there. You say, look, we all have to deal with that. And so, yeah, I like that you touch on the science, you touch on all of the information that we talked about, but then you also touch on the practical parenting and you just say it like it is, like you're going to have to deal with it. And I would imagine that you have had so many people that have come to your practice, so many responses to your course, so many responses to the book where parents have said, I did stick out. It was awkward, but I'm so glad I did it, right?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Absolutely. And even, you know, kids who some families, if they kept their kids pretty screen free until they were adults and then later on, they adult children will say, you know, I thought I felt like it was hard during that time, but I'm so glad that you did that, Mom. I mean, that says it all. And I think sometimes parents will say like, oh, you know, we're the only ones that don't do this. And my kids friends say that I'm the psycho mom. And I say, like, that's just that. Take it as a compliment. Like, you're just doing what you know is right. And, you know, sometimes other parent, they might feel criticized by other parents. I haven't even really seen that. But I think parents do talk about that. But that's because it's creating anxiety in the other parents, Right? They're saying, oh, my gosh, what am I doing to my kid? So then they might react negatively to you like you must be the wrong one. Otherwise I'm doing something that's not good for my kid. So try to remember that too, that if you do hear negativity, that that's where that's coming from. That can be helpful. But I do think there is, you know, a growing number of parents who are looking at this. And I think that awareness now of screen time effects in general, at least what I'm seeing in my son's school, like, there are definitely parents who are aware and who try to act, who are introducing these things early. And so I think it's much easier to find those people now. Right. But you just you do have to talk to other parents. But if you can't find those people, you still just keep learning and reading and then you'll feel you'll know that you're you're doing the right thing.
Ginny Yurich It does it does help with your resolve to pick up a book like yours that has so much robust information and so much encouragement, so many great stories of families that have changed things just by getting rid of the phrases. Electronic screen syndrome was stepping away from this disregulation. I got more out of the book than I was expecting, and I think that now that's a good type of book to read, you know, when you like, because, you know, we have a limited amount of books that we can read in our life. And I got so much out of this. When it's reset your child's brain, a four week plan to end meltdowns, raise grades and boost social skills by reversing the effects of electronic screen time. I think it's one every parent and educator should read. There's so much great information in there from 2015. So things have even changed a lot since then. But there is robust information in here. And Victoria, you have an email course that people could sign up for at Dr. Dunckley dot com slash video games. Then you have your website which is reset your child's brain. Dot com so just a lot of information. Author and screen time expert and psychiatrist. So just fantastic things to help families in these tricky times and they are tricky because they're unprecedented and no one's gone through them before and you've done a phenomenal job of helping with that. So we always end our podcast with the same question. And that question is what is a favorite memory from your childhood that was outside?
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Ooh, I think we used to have this creek that was in a park and we would, you know, during those days we could just go play by ourselves, but we would all gather there and, you know, jump in the water and just frolic. And it was very free and fun. And I miss those days.
Ginny Yurich Yeah. It's amazing what sticks out to a child. Doesn't have to be something elaborate. Just a little bit of freedom, a little bit of space to play. So, Victoria, I really appreciate your time. I truly I mean, I have I take notes on all the books that I read, but this this is a stack for me because I got so much out of it. And having read many books prior, I just want to formally say that this book is meaty and it's encouraging and it's eye opening, and it's just one that even if you feel like you shouldn't read it, like you should read it, because this is information that parents need to know. So thank you for the book and thank you for taking this time to be with us.
Dr. Victoria Dunckley Thank you, Ginny. That was really good feedback to hear, to like about all the things that you pulled out. It's it's good for me to hear that as well.
Ginny Yurich Yeah. Thank you.
