Before It’s Too Late: How Having The ‘Tech Talk’ Can Save Your Teen’s Future
In every generation, parents realize there’s an essential conversation they need to have with their teens. For decades, that was “The Talk” — the one about the birds and the bees, relationships, protection, and boundaries. Today, though, we’re faced with an equally awkward discussion: “The Tech Talk.” And to parents reading this, you’re not alone. Many of us are struggling with how to approach this conversation, but it’s a conversation every parent today must face.
As technology seeps into every facet of our lives, one of the most important relationships our children will have is with technology. It’s shaping their mental health, beliefs, friendships, brain development, and even their aspirations. A 2023 survey from Morning Consult states that “becoming an influencer” is now the top career choice for American teens, a sign of just how deeply social media personalities are idolized. It is now clear that a young person’s relationship with internet platforms will have a severe impact on their future.
American teens spend an average of 7–9 hours a day on screens, excluding school-related activities. In many cases, more time out of the day is spent on their phones than any other activity, including sleep. Now imagine your child partaking in any other activity for that many hours on a daily basis. What questions and concerns would you have? What are they exposed to? What are the benefits and risks? In the case of internet platforms, the benefits are widely known largely due to limitlessly funded marketing campaigns. But the costs are hidden. For more than three years, I’ve researched these costs with the help of experts from a variety of fields. What I learned terrified me.
Just some of the consequences of this revolution include mental health issues like a surge of anxiety and depression, surveillance capitalism that collects data and uses it to manipulate young minds for profit, and a rewiring of vulnerable brains by algorithms. The integration of AI into these platforms is pouring gasoline on the fire, making them exponentially more powerful. The most disturbing mechanism I learned of is that of “nudging.” This may start with a single click. But as more data is collected, these clicks can lead to more and more serious and permanent decisions that shape value and belief systems. The best metaphor to understand the impact of “nudging” is to imagine a ship that is sailing across the Atlantic. If that ship changes course by a single degree, it will end up in an entirely different destination. The ship is your child. The destination is their future.
This unprecedented experiment continues to persist regardless of what political party is in office, and it’s compromising the health and security of an entire generation. As parents, we cannot afford to wait for the government to pass legislation, only for a new threat to emerge using the same techniques. By the time Mark Zuckerberg was apologizing for the documented harm to teen girls from Instagram, TikTok algorithms were already “nudging” an anti-American agenda with weighted algorithms. Until the costs of these platforms work their way into the canon of public knowledge, as citizens and consumers, we will continue to be at risk. We teach our children to look both ways before crossing the street, and now we must teach them what goes on behind their screens.
This is easier said than done. Parents everywhere are struggling with how to talk to their kids about the digital revolution, especially as they deal with it themselves. That’s why we made the documentary The Cost of Convenience. It’s an ice-breaker, designed to stimulate conversation and make “the talk” a bit easier. We cannot control the speed of technological growth and the variety of platforms and threats that populate the internet. We can, however, educate ourselves and our loved ones on the fundamentals that are driving the digital world. At least, we can for now.
Watch the film and have the conversation. As a public service, we have released the film directly on our site, for free.
