Our kids are able to find websites that are not recommended for minors. All parents must be aware of these listed websites so that their child will not be a victim of digital injury. Unlike apps, websites make it much easier for underage children to gain quick access to explicit content. GKIS will provide a brief description of the websites, dangers attached to the websites, and methods to prevent digital injury.
Websites to Look Out For
Parler
In our previous blog article, Parler the Free Speech App was covered as a social network platform focusing on the freedom of speech protected under the first Amendment and user’s rights privileges. An increase of conservative users arrived on the platform in the wake of feeling censored on Twitter. In a battle between liberal and conservative views, big tech censorship has become a public outrage sending users to Parler.
As for children, GKIS stands by our previous decided outcome of Parler not being appropriate for minors due to extreme views and lack of censorship. According to Google Trends, the analysis of popularity for search with interest over time (IOT) ranges from 0 to 100. From January 10th to 16th 2021, Parler had a 78 IOT.[8] With a high population usage and the ability to not fact-check user’s posts, children using the app would likely be exposed to false and conspiracy-laden content.
Onlyfans
One of our most-read articles of 2020, Is Your Teen Selling Nudes on Onlyfans?, explained the risks that on Onlyfans kids and teens may easily access pornographic content. Onlyfans is a social media platform meant for users to access a creator’s content that may provide sexual content to subscribers for a monthly payment. From February 21st to 27th 2021, Google Trends reports that Onlyfans had a 99 IOT.[8] According to Onlyfans terms of service, the user must be 18+. Still, there are reports of minors bypassing the age verification without parent knowledge.[1]
GKIS cautions that minors should not have access to Onlyfans due to leaked information, stalking, life-threats, unemployment risks, and family separation. If you worry that your child could become a victim of sexual exploitation, you will get huge benefits from Dr. Bennett’s weekly parent and family coaching videos on the GetKidsInternetSafe App! Your first 30 days are free!
Toomics
In this comic book subscription service, users can receive Japanese and South Korean comics on horror, romance, and action genres. The service does provide a family mode to exclude inappropriate content. However, children can enable or disable the mode without password requirement.
GKIS recommends monitoring this service or, even better, blocking it from your children entirely. There is a vast amount of sexual content and nudity on this service, including comic book sex scenes, incest, and rape. According to the Google Trends report, from February 7th to 13th 2021, Toomics reports an 85 IOT based on search popularity.[8]
Reddit
In 2005, Reddit grew to be the most popular forum website on the internet. But how safe is it for children? The service provides subreddits of vast topics into smaller ones (e.g., from r/books into r/horror stories or r/Stephen King). Subreddits are organized by moderators who are individuals who manage the forum. As of February 27th 2021, Google Trend reports Reddit as an 87 IOT.[8]
Reddit may not look dangerous, but it does have a high volume of not safe for work (NSFW) material that may be easily accessible to children who lie about their age upon entry into the site. Reddit can be used for searching, browsing, and messaging anyone or anything which obviously holds a high risk of digital injury. For more information on the signs and risks of digital injury, be sure to check out Screen Time in the Mean Time A Parenting Guide to Get Kids and Teens Internet Safe.
The Chive
The Chive’s mission statement is “an outlet for attractive ladies from around the world to strut their stuff.” Although intended to be funny, much of the content on this site demonstrates misogynistic views and a strong prejudice against women.
Google trends reports, The Chive has a 95 IOT from February 21st to 27th 2021.[8] GKIS considers this a red light service due to its raunchy and sexist humor. A study by Brown and L’Engle (2009) reported a significant finding that adolescents exposed to sexual content in media are more likely to engage in sexual harassment two years after watching the activity.[3]
DeviantArt
DeviantArt is an online social community where members share their artwork for critique and to build a fanbase. According to their website, DeviantArt has 55 million users and has a score of 92 IOT from February 21st to 27th 2021.[8] DeviantArt earned a red light GKIS rating because reviews report extremely violent and bloody works of art. Parents also report content involving cursing, insulting, stealing art, fetishes, and nudity on community posts.[4]
4Chan
This highly controversial (and GKIS-rated red light) forum had made headlines because of anonymous users posting nude photographs of dozens of celebrities, including Emma Watson. 4Chan users often endorse sexist ideologies against female gamers like the cyberbullying of Jessi Slaughter and discuss neo-Nazi radicalism.[5] Unlike Reddit, users are not required to form an account. Due to its anonymity, kids can easily participate in R-rated posts undetected and unmonitored.[5]
If you haven’t selected a child-safe browser or set parental controls on devices, through your internet service provider, or through third-party apps and services, you’ll want to check out our Screen Safety Toolkit. We did the research for you with this comprehensive how-to safety resource guide.
Tumblr
In our GKIS article “The GKIS Sensible Parent’s Guide to Tumblr,” we rated this social media platform as a yellow-light app due to sexual images and inappropriate content often displayed on member accounts. With over 30 million users and a score of 83 IOT as of February 14th to 20th 2021, this microblogging social platform is still quite popular.[8]
High-risk content includes self-harm, sexual content, eating disorders, and drugs. There are also reports of sex offenders using the website to incite sexual conversations with children. We stand by our previous decision to recommend parents closely monitor their teen’s activities within the website.
Pornographic Websites (NSFW)
A popular website used for viewing pornographic content like photos, videos, and live streams is PornHub. To learn more about how porn impacts our kids and teens, read our GKIS article “Online Pornography’s Impact on Kids and Teens.” We previously reported that 13% of internet searches are found to access pornography. Due to increased access, that percentage has increased to 20% on the computer and mobile internet browsers.[6]
Fight The New Drug is a non-profit organization trying to reduce porn addiction and set regulations for the porn industry. In 2020, they reported that PornHub’s popular searches were “lesbian,” “teen,” “stepmom,” “mom,” “step-sister,” “hardcore,” “gangbang,” and “rough sex.”[7] Further, the average age for first exposure to hardcore pornography has been estimated to be 11 years old.[7]
GKIS highly recommends that parents add pornography websites onto their restricted website list in parental controls. The website Top Porn Sites can help you block them in child-safe browsers.
Hide it Pro
We would all love to believe that we can trust our kids not to search out, post, and collect inappropriate content online. But sadly, we just can’t. Kids and teens often delight in discovering and sharing titillating and forbidden content and hide it from parents. We cover how to check for apps that hide content in our Screen Safety Toolkit and Dr. B covers it in her coaching sessions on the GetKidsInternetSafe App. To get you started with safety, check all devices for Hide it Pro, a particularly popular hiding app.
Set up content restrictions on tablet and phone devices.
On iOS products, Apple has designated a method for parents to limit adult websites for their safety. Follow these steps:
Go to Settings > Screen Time
Tap Content & Privacy Restrictions and enter your Screen Time passcode
Tap Content Restrictions, then tap Web Content
Choose Limit Adult Websites, and Tap Never Allow: Add Website[9]
In this section, you can add each of the listed above websites to protect your child.
Google has designated parents’ methods to limit adult websites for their child’s safety on Android products. Follow these steps:
Open Settings
Tap Digital Wellbeing
Tap Parental controls > tap Get started
Select Parent
Tap Get Family Link and install Google Family Link for parents
Tap Open (review the information) > tap Get started
Use the on-screen instructions on both phones to finish connecting the two devices. Once it’s all set up, you can use the Family Link app to keep an eye on everything[10]
Thanks to CSUCI intern, Christian Sandoval for locating harmful websites that parents should restrict minors from interacting.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetKidsInternetSafe.
Onward to More Awesome Parenting,
Tracy S. Bennett, Ph. D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe
[3] Brown, J. D., & L’Engle, K. L. (2009). X-rated: Sexual attitudes and behaviors associated with U.s. early adolescents’ exposure to sexually explicit media. Communication Research, 36(1), 129–151.
Parents in my practice and GetKidsInternetSafe subscribers commonly ask me about the impact of pornography on kids. They comment on how different today’s world is from when we were young. Most people even assume that kids today are more promiscuous than we were. But here is what you may be surprised to learn: even though today’s teens demonstrate more acceptance of casual and what we used to consider deviant sexual practices (like oral sex, anal sex, same-gender sex, and polyamory), teens are more sexually responsible than previous generations. In fact, despite popular misconceptions that teens are hooking up casually, the truth is they are “talking” more than dating and having sex later and with fewer partners than previous generations. They are also more likely to use contraception, resulting in teen pregnancy rates being at an all-time low. That gives me hope that, because of American’s more casual attitude toward sex, we are doing a better job at sex education and supervision. To that end, I’ve included this section of my book, Screen Time in the Mean Time: A Parenting Guide to Get Kids and Teens Internet Safe, free for GKIS blog readers. Hang on to your hats parents, no matter how open-minded you are, you are likely to find some of this information concerning and IMPORTANT!
Online pornography is popular and easily available. We don’t know how popular it actually is though, because a large number of pornography websites are reticent to share traffic numbers. Best estimates are that 13% of web searches are for online pornography.[i] What we do know is that the number of viewers and time spent viewing is growing. A particularly popular single pornographic site, Pornhub’s 2018 Year in Review reported:
“Visits to Pornhub totaled 33.5 billion over the course of 2018, an increase of 5 billion visits over 2017. That equates to a daily average of 92 million visitors and at the time of this writing, Pornhub’s daily visits now exceed 100 million. To put that into perspective, that’s as if the combined populations of Canada, Poland and Australia all visited Pornhub every day! …When they’re not busy watching videos, Pornhub’s users enjoy socializing, with nearly 64 million private messages sent and 7.9 million video comments left. … More than 141 million people took the time to vote for their favorite videos, which incidentally is more people than voted in the last U.S. presidential election.… Once again, the United States continues to be the country with the highest daily traffic to Pornhub, followed by the United Kingdom, India, Japan, Canada, France, and Germany.”[ii]
Furthermore, today’s online pornography is nothing like the images from our fathers’ Playboy magazines. Most pornographic videos are scripted to display fantastical versions of the sexual desires and prowess of men.[iii] Most often, that means scenes with women as sexual objects who are seemingly delighted to be the willing and passive victim of demeaning verbal and physical aggression, often by one or more men at a time. Porn content is rich with violent and fetish acts that bear little resemblance to loving intimacy. As customers satiate to milder versions of pornographic activity, clever content developers produce increasingly risqué content to keep their customers browsing. The top seven Pornhub searches for 2018 were lesbian, hentai, milf, stepmom, Japanese, mom, and teen.
With popularity and ease of access through mobile screens and gaming consoles, many kids and teens intentionally seek and are being accidentally exposed to, inappropriate sexual images and videos. Based on a set of EU studies, Kierkegaard (2008) states that children have access to Internet pornography at the average age of eleven years old.[iv] Not only are kids and teens seeking sexual content for titillation, but many kids are also relying on online pornography as their primary source of sexual education.[v] Alarmingly, I am seeing more and more kids intentionally seeking pornographic content and creating and exchanging nude images and videos. How often are children viewing porn, and, when they do, what kinds of harm may result from that exposure?
Estimates from research studies vary widely, most suggesting that a minority of adolescents actually access online pornography.[vi] However, in one study conducted in 2008 with 562 undergraduates, 93% of boys and 62% of girls reported that they were exposed to pornography during adolescence.[vii] In my clinical experience, it is quite common due to unfiltered smartphone and tablet use among younger children. Studies show that kids tend to consider what they see online as attractive, normative, and risk-free and may go as far as emulating it.[viii][ix] The online worlds of MMORPGs increasingly feature virtual sexual assault and pornographic behaviors, and popular television series deliver increasingly violent content and explicit themes.
Who is most at risk for online pornography consumption?
The typical adolescent online pornography user is a boy who is more pubertally advanced, a sensation-seeker, and has weak or troubled family relations.[x] Boys are more likely to be exposed at an earlier age, to see more images, to see more extreme images (e.g., rape, child pornography), and to view pornography more often; while girls reported more involuntary exposure.[xi]Statistics demonstrate that female viewing is going up every year. Pornhub’s 2018 Year in Review report stated, “2018 saw the proportion of female visitors to Pornhub grow to 29%, an increase of 3 percentage points over 2017.”[xii] Depression and rule-breaking are also risk factors.[xiii][xiv]
What affects does viewing pornography have on kids?
Research demonstrates that pornography use among children, teens, or adults has been associated with:
Cynical attitudes about intimacy, fidelity, and love[xv]
Desensitization and habituation with explicit content, meaning the user’s appetite changes over time from less extreme to more extreme forms of pornography to get the same intensity of enjoyment. This also validates deviant sex practices and potentially lowers inhibitions to engage in inappropriate sexual interactions online and offline[xvii]
Attitudes supporting violence against women[xviii]
More permissive sexual attitudes, especially in regard to the place of sex in relationships[xix][xx][xxi]
Greater experience with casual sexual behavior[xxii][xxiii]
More sexual aggression, both in terms of perpetration and victimization[xxv]
Three times more sexually aggressive behavior when exposed to nonviolent porn[xxvi]
Twenty-four times more sexually aggressive behavior when exposed to violent porn[xxvii]
A clinically impairing addiction, called Hypersexual Disorder.
Causal research would require purposely exposing children to pornographic content. Because that is not safe or ethical, all research studies about child exposure to online pornography are correlational. We cannot conclusively say whether online pornography causes certain attitudes or behaviors. Obviously, the correlation findings quoted above are concerning. Blocking kids from online pornography is common sense. Not only is viewing pornography an issue, but more active sexual role playing online also makes kids vulnerable to sexual predators. These attitudes and behaviors are impactful in the short term and may also lead to problematic life-long trauma and intimacy issues.[xxviii]
If this information is useful to you, please share it with friends and family. Too many of us bury our heads to the reality of online pornography and child access. There’s so much to know! If you are looking for a one-source guide to screen risk, benefit, and the parenting strategies that can strengthen your parent-child relationship while keeping them safer, pick up a copy of Screen Time in the Mean Time on Amazon. And for a step-by-step guide to setting up your home for enrichment and screen safety, you won’t want to miss my Connected Family Course. Parents tell me all the time how much they’ve appreciated having the information for prevention rather than hearing it AFTER they end up in my psychology office. Education matters!
I’m the mom psychologist who helps you GetKidsInternetSafe.
[iii]Brown, J., & L’Engle, K. (2009). “X-Rated: Sexual Attitudes & Behaviors Associated with U.S. Early Adolescents’ Exposure to Sexually Explicit Media.” Communication Research36, 129, 133.
[iv]Kierkegaard, S. (2008). Cybering, online grooming & age-play. Computer Law & Security Report, 24(1), 41–55.
[v]Kanuga, M. & Rosenfeld, W. (2004). “Adolescent Sexuality & the Internet: The Good, the Bad, & the URL.” Journal of Pediatrics & Adolescent Gynecology17, 117, 120
[vi]Peter, J., & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[vii]Sabina, Chiara, et al. “The Nature and Dynamics of Internet Pornography Exposure for Youth.” CyberPsychology & Behavior, vol. 11, no. 6, 2008, pp. 691–693., doi:10.1089/cpb.2007.0179.
[viii]Rich, M. (2005). “Sex Screen: The Dilemma of Media Exposure & Sexual Behavior.” Pediatrics116, 329, 330.
[ix]Zillmann, D. (2000). “Influence of Unrestrained Access to Erotica on Adolescents’ & Young Adults’ Dispositions Towards Sexuality.”Journal of Adolescent Health27, 41, 42.
[x]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research,DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xi]Sabina, Chiara, et al. “The Nature and Dynamics of Internet Pornography Exposure for Youth.” CyberPsychology & Behavior, vol. 11, no. 6, 2008, pp. 691–693., doi:10.1089/cpb.2007.0179.
[xiii]Wolak, J., Mitchell, K., & Finkelhor. D. (2007). “Unwanted & Wanted Exposure to Online Pornography in a National Sample of Youth Internet Users.” Pediatrics119.2: 247-57. Web.
[xiv]Ybarra, M., et al. (2011). “X-Rated Material & Perpetration of Sexually Aggressive Behavior Among Children & Adolescents: Is There a Link?” Aggressive Behavior37, 1, 3, 7.
[xv]Zillmann, D. (2000). “Influence of Unrestrained Access to Erotica on Adolescents’ & Young Adults’ Dispositions Towards Sexuality.”Journal of Adolescent Health27, 41, 42.
[xvi]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xvii]Zillmann, D. (2000). “Influence of Unrestrained Access to Erotica on Adolescents’ & Young Adults’ Dispositions Towards Sexuality.”Journal of Adolescent Health27, 41, 42.
[xviii]Hald, Gert, Martin, et al. (2009). “Pornography & Attitudes Supporting Violence Against Women: Revisiting the Relationship in Nonexperimental Studies.” Aggressive Behavior35, 1, 3, 5.
[xix]Peter, J., Valkenburg, P., & Schouten, A. (2006). Characteristics & motives of adolescents talking with strangers on the Internet. Cyberpsychology & Behavior, 9, 526–530.
[xx]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xxi]Zillmann, D. (2000). “Influence of Unrestrained Access to Erotica on Adolescents’ & Young Adults’ Dispositions Towards Sexuality.”Journal of Adolescent Health27, 41, 42.
[xxii]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xxiii]Zillmann, D. (2000). “Influence of Unrestrained Access to Erotica on Adolescents’ & Young Adults’ Dispositions Towards Sexuality.”Journal of Adolescent Health27, 41, 42.
[xxiv]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xxv]Peter, J. & Valkenburg, P. (2016): Adolescents & Pornography: A Review of 20 Years of Research, The Journal of Sex Research, DOI: 10.1080/00224499.2016.1143441
[xxvi]Ybarra, M., et al. (2011). “X-Rated Material & Perpetration of Sexually Aggressive Behavior Among Children & Adolescents: Is There a Link?” Aggressive Behavior37, 1, 3, 7.
[xxvii]Ybarra, M., et al. (2011). “X-Rated Material & Perpetration of Sexually Aggressive Behavior Among Children & Adolescents: Is There a Link?” Aggressive Behavior37, 1, 3, 7.
[xxviii]Villani, S. (2001). “Impact of Media on Children & Adolescents: A 10-Year Review of the Research.”Journal of the American Academy of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry40, 392, 399.
Americans LOVE online browsing. YouTube is the second largest search engine, with 1.9 billion registered users watching 5 billion videos daily![1] As online discovery grows, so does child disconnection from real life. Sometimes, just watching a task get accomplished on video feels as good, if not better than doing the task itself. Numbing out online allows us to escape the hard work of trying and failing. It also replaces the opportunity for learning to cope with boredom. Online, one can escape the first twinge of anxiety with a click of the mouse. In real life, you must endure the moment and work it through. It’s no wonder so many of us choose the less threatening online version of reality over offline experiences.
Ways We Live Vicariously Online:
In Dr. Bennett’s book, Screen Time in the Mean Time, she agrees that discovery online and learning from how-to videos is a great benefit of technology. But she also believes that kids need “buckets of face-to-face interaction and three-dimensional play experiences to grow the neurological wiring necessary for skill mastery. Too much screen time takes the place of critical learning experiences.” Although watching a how-to video may spark curiosity and experimentation, it can also offer satisfaction without really working for it.[2]
Social Media & JOMO
Social media is one way people live vicariously online (in their imagination while watching others).[3] Each post is carefully staged. We pause the live moment until we get just the right shot. No messy reveals of the moment before when you were sweating to climb the cliff overlooking the sunset or annoyed with your companion for talking too much about politics. Only our best accomplishments are highlighted.
Even better, look at Tiffany with her handsome new boyfriend on the sailboat. We no longer have to worry about how she’s handling her eating disorder or that the trip maxed out her credit card. She’s happy! End of story. Honest real life is messy…and stressful. Who wants to deal with that?
Our brains can keep track of, at most, 150 friendships while maintaining a sense of a meaningful connection. This is called Dunbar’s number. A maximum number of meaningful connections is true for our offline as well as our online lives. Yes, we are acquainted with our 1,247 Instagram “friends.” But are we truly connected?
A recent GKIS article, The FOMO EFFECT: How Fun Friend Posts Can Lead to Clinical Anxiety, described how social media sparks fears of missing out (FOMO). However, Jason Fried, co-founder and president of 37signals, has coined the phrase joy of missing out (JOMO). JOMO is a trend in response to FOMO.[3] Challenging your kids to exercise JOMO may help them avoid the lure of too much vicarious living on social media platforms.
Television & Movies
We also use TV and movies to allow us to live vicariously through the characters on screen. Viewers can get so consumed that they associate the character’s achievements and growth with their own. With on-demand content, we can binge-watch a series, immersing ourselves in ways that can feel profound. It’s as if we are personally experiencing the characters, settings, and plots.
Studies have found that:
79% of viewers reported enjoying television more when they watched multiple episodes at a time.
Approximately 61% of Netflix users watch from 2-6 episodes in one sitting.
56% of binge-watchers prefer to binge alone.
On average, people watch at least 7 hours of television daily. That’s one hour short of a full-time day at work![4]
Negative Effects of Binge-Watching
You are 23% more likely to become obese and 14% more likely to develop diabetes from watching only 2 hours of TV every day.
Those who watch more TV are more likely to experience anxiety or depression.[4]
After the age of 25, you lose 22 minutes of life for every hour of television watched.[5]
Like a television-video game hybrid, programmers have picked up on these immersive phenomena, creating tv and movie series where you can impact the direction of the plot by choosing the decision you want the character to make next. This is called interactive TV.
Netflix recently experimented with it by allowing users to vote for one of five pre-recorded endings. Big tech and entertainment are betting that this will be the next mass medium with huge appeal.[6]
Gaming
Everyone knows someone who stays up all night gaming instead of getting the sleep their body desperately craves. In her book, Dr. Bennett cites peer-reviewed studies that demonstrate how immersive gaming floods dopamine into the pleasure center of the brain.
One doesn’t have to risk peril in real life; just strap on your weapons and save the world with your virtual character. Complete with novel landscapes, skilled partners, and novel rewards, the gaming life provides mastery and socialization that is almost effortless to achieve. Again, real-life struggles are so much more work. Gaming is so compelling, it leads to clinical addiction among some players, requiring professional detox and rehabilitation in inpatient hospitals.
YouTube
YouTube is the most popular social media platform used today. We have access to experts on everything … and nothing. By watching endless streams of videos, we can live vicariously through different genders, ages, and ethnicities.[7] Replacing real-life mastery of tasks, we watch the edited version that leaves out the messy failures endured before the perfection is captured and downloaded for our consumption.
It has been suggested that many people who view how-to videos gain such satisfaction, they choose not to attempt it in real life after all. That means that watching a how-to video squelches real-life practice of the skill. Rather than aiding you to complete the project, it replaces your desire to start.
Celebrity Worship Syndrome
Celebrities have managed to become the idols of many little girls and boys around the world. With society watching and reporting their every move our children come to believe this extravagant behavior is normal. In this way, we are raising a generation of vicarious livers. Children that would prefer to be cast for a reality television show than grow up to be the president.[8] Celebrity Worship Syndromeis when the individual becomes obsessed with the life of a celebrity.[9]
Travel
Why spend the money and endure the stress when you can enjoy the experience of traveling all over the world on Snapchat? WeTravel, a company that allows users to travel the world virtually, claims that it will temporarily satisfy your craving to travel by showcasing people’s travels around the world.[10]
Pornography
Watching online pornography can be a cheap replacement for intimacy acquired through romantic human relations. Too much use can decrease dating confidence.[11] Porn is a source of pleasure that will not turn them down, break their heart, make them feel incompetent, or worse, embarrassed.
From Competition to Inspiration
Mastery can only be achieved through anxious anticipation, mustering the courage to try, and multiple failures along the way. Each step in the journey strengthens emotional resilience, character, confidence, and competence. Missing out on real-life learning opportunities can lead to real emotional impairment. None of us want that for ourselves or for those we love.
One technique for altering one’s mindset when viewing photos of others’ accomplishments is replacing the competitive lens with one of inspiration.[12] Teaching your children to be inspired by others’ successes will help them steer clear of vicarious living. Ultimately, engaging and successfully mastering a skill provides you with much more satisfaction and self-efficacy than observing the successes of others.
How to Encourage Real-Life Mastery
Decide if what you wish you could do, is something you can do. By encouraging your child to dream with enthusiasm and encouragement, they’ll build the scaffolding of confidence that will lead to real effort.[13]
Commit to a specific end goal. Help your kids bridge the gap between dreaming and reality by encouraging them to identify a goal and start to research it!
Tackle it. By reminding your child that failure and poor results along the way are part of the learning, they can start to chunk the task into several benchmark goals. Remind them that mastery is only meaningful if you overcame the struggle to get there.
Encourage them to recognize their worth and importance. Ensuring your child that they don’t have to earn their worth is an important part of helping them build a healthy sense of self.[14]
Remind them to celebrate their achievements (and those of others) along the way. Celebrating benchmark goals will give them the joy of learning that drives follow-thru. Keeping a gratitude journal is a great way to spark celebration.
Demand an occasional disconnect. By following the guidelines and suggestions from our GKIS courses, you can create a lifestyle that carves creative space and time for real-life experiences. Dr. B’s weekly parenting and family coaching are quick lessons on how to tweak family living to increase screen safety and closer family relationships.
JOMO. Most important of all, teach your kids the many joys of missing out! Show them how to break free of the activities that social media says they should do. Instead, spend time doing truly satisfying tasks in real-time, in the real world.
Thank you to Sara Doyle, GKIS intern, for researching and writing this article. In the end, those who never give up on their goals will succeed as much as the talented.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetKidsInternetSafe.
[1] http://www.businessofapps.com/data/youtube-statistics/
[2] NPR. “Hidden Brain. Close Enough: The Lure Of Living Through Others.” Shankar Vedantam, Laura Kwerel, Tara Boyle, and Jennifer Schmidt, 2019.
[3] SoundCloud. “Living Vicariously Through Social Media…” Phil Svitek.
[4] CogniFit. “Binge watching: Complete guide to its effects on the brain and body.” Anna Bohren, 2018.
[5] Personal Excellence. “Are You Living Vicariously Through Movie, Drama, or Game Characters?” Celestine Chua.
[6] https://www.latimes.com/business/hollywood/la-fi-ct-netflix-black-mirror-20181228-story.html
[7] “I’m Living Vicariously Through YouTubers” Lily Brundin, 2016.
[8] HuffPost. “Americans Have An Unhealthy Obsession With Celebrities.” Jo Plazza, 2012.
[9] Psychology Today. “Celebrity Worship Syndrome.” Mark D. Griffiths Ph.D., 2013.
[10] “Traveling Vicariously Through Snapchat.” Azzura Ricci.
[11] “Is Living Vicariously Through Others Dangerous?” Nicola Kirkpatrick, 2018.
[12] Riskology. “Are You Living, or Living Vicariously?” Tyler Tervooren, 2019.
[13] Nerd Fitness. “How to Live Vicariously Through Yourself.” n.
[14] Lifehack. “3 Ways to Stop Living Vicariously Through Technology.” Derek Ralsto
We attach to those we spend the most time with. It only makes sense that the more time spent online, the more we develop our virtual selves and prefer online relationships. For some heavy screen users, attachment to online characters are taking precedence over in-real-life and virtual people. Exclusively virtual connections are most commonly in Asia, but they are starting to be seen in America as well. Find out if you know anybody who’s a stranded single, suffers from celibacy syndrome, or practices objectophilia!
Stranded Singles
Stranded Singles is a term coined by Professor Masahiro Yamada, a sociologist at Chuo University in Tokyo. It refers to the larger number of young Japanese adults who live at home with their parents and have diminished interest in engaging in real life romantic or sexual relationships.[3] Studies have shown that an increasing number of Japanese women, 16-24 years old, are “not interested in or despise sexual contact.”[4]
Trends in Japan May Be Just the Beginning
A 2015 study of 18 to 34 year old’s in Japan found:
~70% of unmarried men and 60% of unmarried women are single.
~44.2% of women and 42% of men admitted their virgin status.
30% of the men and 26% of the women were not looking for a relationship.[2]
75% of single women and 70% of single men had no sexual experience by the time they were 20 years old.[3]
Celibacy Syndrome
Celibacy Syndrome means “a departure from human affection.”[4] High rates of celibacy syndrome has been posited to be a main contributor for decreasing marriage rates in Japan. Changing gender roles, like Japanese women becoming more confident in their independence and success, may also be a contributor.
Pot Noodle Love
Pot Noodle Love refers to the increasingly common instant sexual gratification from casual sex, virtual relationships, anime, and online pornography.[4] Shocking statistics have recently revealed that, between the ages of 20 and 29, 30% of single females and 15% of single males have fallen in love with a character in a game or meme.[3]
Terms to Get Familiar With:
“Moe”- Refers to individuals who fall in love with fictional computer characters. This type of relationship allows the user to control the emotions and traits of their virtual partner. Content creators make these virtual characters to be appealing to both males and females.[3]
“Herbivores”- Refers to a male that does not find sex or relationships important.[4]
Objectophilia
Otherwise known as object sexuality, objectophilarefers to people who feel romantic, emotional, or sexual feelings toward an inanimate object(s).[5]
Real Life Examples:
Married to video game character – A 27-year-old man in Tokyo named Sal 9000 married Nene Anegasaki, a video game character from the Nintendo DS game Love Plus. Sal prefers his virtual girlfriend to real-life relationships, admitting that he is attracted, in part, because she doesn’t get mad at him for not replying immediately.[5]
Two Loves – In 2004, Erika Eiffel fell in love with her “soul mate,”the Eiffel Tower. She insists their marriage is as real as any real-life relationship.[6]
Two object relationships over a lifetime – At 12 years old, Joachim fell in love with his organ. Their relationship was described as “an emotionally and physically very complex and deep relationship.” The relationship lasted years, satisfying his need for an emotional connection. Currently, Joachim is in a long-term relationship with a steam locomotive.[6]
Married to a Hologram – For years, Akihiko Kondo felt ignored and shunned by women in real life.His luck changedwhen he fell in love with Hatsune Miku, a world-famous artist and hologram plays packed stadiums in Japan.[7]
Why Would Anyone Be an Objectophile?
Social Isolation –caused by living in a remote location, constant screen use, or impoverished motivation or social skills may lead a young adult.[1]
Control & Self Protection–when a relationship is one-sided, being socially inept doesn’t matter. Loving an object that cannot actively engage with you is one way to remain in control and avoid conflict altogether.[1]
Animism –a belief that objects and buildings have a sentient or spiritual existence.[1]
Digisexuals
Digisexuality is defined as a fundamental sexual identity that comes through using screen technology. It consists of two waves of “sexual technology:”[8]
“First Wave”- fully in affect.
Digital pornography
Live camera pornography
Live sex chats
“Direct communication technologies” are not designed with the intention of being used for sexual interaction but are commonly used for that purpose.[8]
Skype or Snapchat
“Second Wave”- evolving with technology.
Sex robots
Virtual reality sex[8]
Robots!
Many of us have seen TV shows and movies with extremely human-like robots. For instance, in the movie Her(2014) the main character falls in love with his digital assistant. Studies have found:
27% of 18 to 24-year- olds would consider dating a robot.[3][4]
Among the British population, men were three times more likely to form a relationship with a robot than a human woman.[3]
40% of 18 to 34-year-olds are worried that robots will eventually take their jobs.[3]
59% of all online traffic is generated by bots, including dating sites and social media sites.[6]
Experts have estimated that in approximately a decade, realistic sex robots will be common all over the world.[5] There are realistic sex robots on the market already. News reports show footage of men dressing their female robot and taking her to dinner. Due to artificial intelligence, the robots can respond to questions, carry conversations, and remember the responses the pleased you the most. Their pupils will even dilate and their skin warms and lubricates! The argument isn’t that robots are replacing humans, but rather people are preferring robots to humans.
Thanks to Sara Doyle, GKIS intern, for teaching us the new terminology for new types of love. Wondering how to protect your child from becoming an objectiphile?
[1] Hindustan Times. “Decoding Objectophilia: 5 reasons why people fall in love with objects.” Abhinav Verma, 2017.
[2] The Japan Times. “In sexless Japan, almost half of single young men and women are virgins: survey.” Mizuho Aoki, 2016.
[3] The Guardian. “For Japan’s ‘stranded singles’, virtual love beats the real thing.” Tracy McVeigh, 2016.
[4] The Observer Japan. “Why have young people in Japan stopped having sex?”
Abigail Haworth, 2013.
[5] “10 People Who Fell in Love with Inanimate Objects.” Sean D., 2014.
[6] Psychology Today. “Intimate and Inanimate.” Mark D. Griffiths Ph.D., 2013.
[7] The New York Times. “Do You Take This Robot …” Alex Williams, 2019.
[8] Sexual & Relationship Therapy. “The rise of digisexuality: therapeutic challenges and possibilities.” McArthur, Neil, Twist, Markie L. C., 2017.
[9] Sandford: SPICE. “Japanese Education.” Lucien Ellington, 2005.
Raising kids in the digital age is tough. Not only are kids going through baffling developmental stages and life crises, so are their parents. Plus, each family member has a unique personality, belief system, and behavioral history that lead to varying “fits” between members at varying times. Throw that in a blender and you have a family. To make it more complicated, divorce peaks during trying times, upending everything even more. Divorce conflict, shared custody, and blended family issues can lead to exploitative and manipulative opportunities, especially with powerful mobile devices in-hand. My clients have benefitted from both using our free CONNECTED FAMILY SCREEN AGREEMENT. This digital contract gives both households sensible rules and strategies so kids have consistency and cooperative guidance. To align on parenting strategies and get more confident with setting rules and adopting parental controls, our weekly parent and family coaching videos delivered on the GETKIDSINTERNETSAFE APP is for you. Quick 5-minute videos a week allow you to tweak screen safety and positive parenting in your home in doable chunks. Demonstrating that you are consistently addressing screen safety looks great in court! Another option to help your tweens and teens directly build knowledge and psychological wellness with our SOCIAL MEDIA READINESS COURSE FOR TWEENS & TEENS. It’s like driver’s training but for the Internet.
In my twenty-six+ years as a clinical psychologist with a specialty in family transitions, I have run across practically every family situation you can imagine. Not only can divorce strain parent-child alliances, but fear can muddy parent judgment as they jockey to win child favor and aim to achieve parenting perfection in less-than-perfect times. With everybody distracted by their own emotional processes, consistency, and communication too often slip leaving kids vulnerable for risk.
Here are three fictional family stories that resemble actual situations to illustrate the complex factors that divorced families face.
Safety, Parental Alienation, & Home Privacy
Sally and Joe were married for fourteen years. They have two daughters, 13-year-old Maggie and 10-year-old Jacqueline. The marriage dissolved when Joe was discovered having an affair with Pamela. Sally shared too much information with the girls during her heartbreak, blaming Pamela for the breakup and begging Joe to make the marriage work even after discovery. Pamela and Joe married six months after the divorce was final and were granted shared custody of Maggie and Jacqueline as well as Pamela’s son and daughter.
Sally didn’t trust Joe and Pamela to take good enough care of the girls. She constantly worried about Joe not checking the girls’ homework, believed Joe and Pam drank too much, thought Pamela favored her own children and became particularly angry if Joe socialized with old friends. The girls felt protective of their mom and felt guilty leaving her during dad’s custodial time. They also wondered if mom’s fears were true and they were being unfairly treated and not adequately attended to.
Sally bought both girls mobile phones outfitted with the social media they wanted and encouraged them to call, text, and send images frequently with the hopes of gathering evidence she could use in family law court. She also posted accusatory memes about Joe and Pamela on her Facebook. If Joe set limits with the mobile phones, Sally argued the restriction prevented the girls from seeking appropriate help in an emergency situation, which further demonstrated to the girls that Joe was not protecting them.
In her cloud of grief, fear, and anger, Sally was committing parental alienation. Parental alienation is a pattern of psychological abuse toward a child by creating fear, disrespect, or hostility toward the other parent with the ultimate goal of parent-child estrangement. Parental alienation has been demonstrated to be detrimental to child mental and physical health and parent-child attachment. When caught in the destructive dynamic, family members are nearly incapable of post-traumatic growth, spinning helplessly for sometimes years in the eye of the storm.
Illegal Surveillance
John is a twelve-year-old who’s divorced parents have conflicting views on-screen use. John’s father allows him to use his phone and
other screen devices as much as he likes with no filtering or monitoring. His mother, on the other hand, does not allow him to use ANY screen devices. What John does not know is that his father secretly installed spyware on his mother’s devices during their divorce in order to gain information against her and has a history of domestic violence and pornography addiction. John’s mother has a restraining order against her ex-husband. She does not feel safe having mobile devices in her house that her ex-husband has purchased in case of spyware. She also worries about the online content her son has access to for fear of him becoming addicted like his father. John prefers to be at his father’s house because of the more permissive screen access and accuses his mom of being too uptight and paranoid. His dad laughs with him and agrees.
Consequating Dangerous Child Behavior
Dave and Laura have been divorced for two months and have two sons, 16-year-old Chad and 14-year-old Ian. After the divorce, both boys were living with their mother with weekends and certain holidays spent with their father. Chad has AD/HD and an anxiety disorder; Ian is in independent study due to oppositionality and defiance.
After suspecting Chad was using drugs, Dave demanded to see Chad’s phone. When Chad refused, Dave grabbed the phone and found photos of Chad smoking marijuana at a house party. A screaming conflict resulted. Chad stormed out the house and walked several miles back to his mother’s house where she then called Child Protective Services. Dave insisted that Laura take Chad’s screen devices away as a form of punishment. Laura disagreed thinking it would isolate Chad from his friends at a time he needed them most and bought Chad a new phone with no filtering or monitoring. Chad has chosen to live full time with Laura and refuses to talk to Dave. Ian feels caught in the middle.
Co-Parenting Strategies
Co-parenting can be difficult in all family types, but shared custody poses particularly ripe opportunities for exploitation and manipulation during a time when parents need to be particularly astute about the prevention of digital injury due to unchecked screen use. To launch a healthy and safe relationship with screen media, kids need warm, encouraging guidance from their parents.
Parents who set standards and praise without being overly critical have well-adjusted kids. Theorists call this authoritative parenting. Evidence demonstrates it is better than uninvolved, permissive, (overly accepting), or authoritarian (overly controlling) parenting styles.
Authoritative parents are proactive rather than reactive. They set the stage for success and respond calmly rather than ignoring or being overly punishing in response to destructive child behaviors. Children from authoritative home environments not only achieve more in school, but they also demonstrate a stronger willingness to seek out and master challenges for personal satisfaction.
In the stories above, the parents let their divorce conflicts interfere with their parenting judgment and slipped into authoritarian or permissive styles. While authoritarian parenting promotes a form of structure for the child, the harshness and rigidity can lead to parent and child aggression and can cause the child to have low self-esteem and minimized self-worth (Paul, 2011).
On the other hand, permissive parents are kind and accepting but don’t implement safety measures or uphold rules. Thus, children can become entitled, depressed, or anxious (Paul, 2011). Even parents who were once authoritative will sometimes escalate their tendencies in order to counterbalance the strategies used in the other custodial home. This leaves kids ping-ponging between sometimes hostile perspectives and varying rules for conduct. They will often choose the more permissive parent due to their inability to recognize the long-term implications of their behaviors.
In response to these challenges, family law courts often refer or order parents to use educational resources like co-parenting classes, schedule sessions with supportive professionals like child psychologists, therapeutic and legal mediators; or even order minor’s counsel to represent the children’s best interests. Parents may also be ordered into individual or reunification therapy which can lead to positive change.
When working with co-parents, I strive to empathize with the very real challenges of single parents and working through issues that make kids hard to handle. I remind them the situation is usually temporary. In most circumstances, grudges heal and parents recognize that parenting must take priority over vindictiveness. Kids will eventually see manipulation, often resulting in delayed insight. Nobody wins. Patience, empathy, grace, and kindness help kids heal. Sometimes we all need lots of nudges and gentle reminders, whether it comes from family, friends, lawyers, judges, or mental health professionals. Kids come first.
Thank you to Ventura family law lawyer extraordinaire Joel Bryant for the valuable information he contributed to this GKIS article and to CSUCI intern Allie Mattina for her research. To best understand the complex developmental factors of family life and learn effective screen safety strategies, check out Screen Time in the Mean Time: A Parenting Guide to Get Kids and Teens Internet Safe. Full of developmental brain facts and helpful tips and information, setting structure and sensible teaching conversations is a great start to family safety and stability.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetKidsInternetSafe.
The first time I experienced the hookup culture was my first week of college. I was living in the dorms and everybody felt liberated, taking advantage of having no parents around, partying, drinking, smoking, and having sex. I remember watching freshman in their evening outfits make their walks of shame back to the dorms early in the morning. A friend told me how she woke up in an apartment she didn’t recognize. She was scared and left the apartment frantically. I felt sorry for her. I was shocked and confused about how my friends were treating sex so casually.
Hookup Culture
Hooking up is a term used by college students that has a wide variety of meanings. Some people use it to mean kissing, whereas others say it means sex. It turns out that college students themselves don’t really know what it means exactly (Currier, 2013). A survey by McHugh and colleagues (2012) found that 48% of male and 33% of female college students reported that hooking up means having sex.
Sociologist Lisa Wade wrote a book called American Hookup: The New Culture of Sex on Campus. Wade spent five years investigating hookup culture in universities. She explains that a hookup is “a meaningless, spontaneous act of either kissing or having sex with someone to win the approval of friends, bragging rights, and/or improve a college student’s status quo” (Vedantam, 2017).
Hooking up seems to be taking over traditional dating. In a recent survey, 58% of students surveyed from 19 universities reported that they had hooked up with someone by their senior year of college (Monto et al., 2014). Hooking up is particular popular at universities, because students are exploring their identities and having fun outside of their parents’ rules with no rush to get married; no shame, no consequences. Hookup culture fits like a puzzle piece for the college lifestyle. It may sound harmless, but I believe that hooking up can be detrimental.
Your Tween’s Love Life
Dr. Bennett’s article “Hey Dad, Your Twelve Year Old Daughter Has a Nude Out” revealed that the hookup culture often starts as early as middle school. She found that high school boys were grooming middle school girls on social media instant messaging and text to send the nude images of themselves. These nude images were then shared and posted without consent among unknown others locally and on the web. For the local teens, they were valued, collected, traded, and redistributed multiple times over years like Pokemon cards.
Although many young people argue that hooking up is a fun and a harmless way to learn about intimacy and relationships, there are downsides to casual sex. For instance, some teens find causal sex distressing and may feel embarrassed or weak for wanting a more meaningful connection with their partner (Vedantam, 2017).
It has been argued that men generally have an easier time with hooking up than women (McHugh, 2012). As a result, girls will work hard to “fit in” and please the cultural ideal of emotionless hookups, even though they secretly feel ashamed, unfulfilled, conflicted, and embarrassed. After all, sex is often an exercise in bonding and attachment, triggering the release of the neurotransmitter oxytocin, which is responsible for feelings of love, attachment, and even symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder. Trying to not bond while having sex with somebody can be very difficult for some people. Whether to hookup or not is a very personal and meaningful decision for college students. But for our tweens and teens, it can be physically and emotionally dangerous.
How can parents help?
Be a good listener and teach your teen your family’s values and beliefs about sex. Start early.
Bring up the topic often. Provide accurate sex education. Listen to your child. Get an idea about what they think. Don’t assume they have absorbed family values from thin air. Family values and sex education is best provided by the people whom love them the most, their parents.
Teach how intimacy differs from sex.
Unfortunately, many kids learn about sex from viewing Internet porn. Don’t let this artificial portrayal of sex go uncorrected. Having sex in order to carve a reputation or live up to demeaning portrayal of a meaningless physical act can be emotionally destructive, especially to a teenager. Teach your child that sex is a profoundly intimate act between mature, caring partners. That means it is best to wait and experience it with somebody you love and trust when you are mature enough to handle the complexities in the relationships that will follow. Intimacy requires a lot of maturity and communication.
Explain how social media differs from reality.
Social media is everywhere whether you like it or not. We love it, because it helps us connect with others during our overtasked lives. Connecting with peers is critical for healthy adolescent development. Explain how social media glamorizes and misrepresents a person’s actual life. Collaborate on how to avoid typical pitfalls. GKIS articles help with that!
Build your teen up by letting them know they are far more than a sexy image.
Self-esteem starts with how we treat ourselves. Keep a lookout for self-deprecating comments in your household (like “I’m so fat”). Kids learn these bad habits, which can be psychologically detrimental over the long term. Be generous with authentic compliments and encouragement. Remind them that every relationship has impact on one’s quality of life. That means taking the time to choose peers who treat us well and help us strive to be the best we can be. Include your teen’s friends in family activities so they feel supported in their friendships and so you maintain influence.
I’m the mom psychologist who will help you GetKidsInternetSafe.
Onward to More Awesome Parenting,
Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty GetKidsInternetSafe.com
Works Cited
Currier, D. M. (2013). Strategic ambiguity: Protecting emphasized femininity and hegemonic masculinity in the hookup culture. Gender & Society, 27(5), 704-727. doi:10.1177/0891243213493960
McHugh, M. C., Pearlson, B., & Poet, A. (2012). Who needs to understand hook up culture?: Understanding hookup culture: What’s really happening on college campuses. Sex Roles, 67(5-6), 363-365. doi:10.1007/s11199-012- 0172-0
Monto, M. A., & Carey, A. G. (2014). A new standard of sexual behavior? Are claims associated with the ‘hookup culture’ supported by general social survey data?. Journal Of Sex Research, 51(6), 605-615. doi:10.1080/00224499.2014.906031
Vedantam, Shankar. (Host). (2017, February 14). Hookup Culture: The Unspoken Rules Of Sex On College Campuses [Radio broadcast episode]. http://www.npr.org/2017/02/14/514578429/hookup-culture-the- unspoken-rules-of-sex-on-college-campuses.
Photo Credits
Young Couple Undressing Each Other by PhotoMediaGroup, BY Shutterstock, Inc.
Thanks to CSUCI intern, Christian Sandoval for locating harmful websites that parents should restrict minors from interacting.
