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Bluey Offers Parenting Training Plus So Much More

May 10, 2023 by Keith Ferries

With streaming platforms, we have more options for viewing television than ever before. Binge-watching television has become the norm. But how do we know what is good for our kids to watch? Bluey is a show for all ages, even adults. It first came out in Australia in 2018. Then Disney picked it up and aired it in the United States in 2019. Bluey revolves around a husband and father (Bandit), his wife (Chilli), and their two daughters (Bluey and Bingo). There are elements to the program that help with parenting and problem-solving, which we at GetKidsInternetSafe support. Our GetKidsInternetSafe courses are designed to help families connect with cooperative dialogue about screen safety. For families with young kids, our Connected Family Course helps open the lines of communication and set up your home with optimum screen safety. For tweens and teens, we recommend our Social Media Readiness Course. The Readiness Course offers information to help teens better problem-solve independently and recognize the red flags of digital injury. Today’s GKIS article covers the benefits of Bluey and the drama that surrounds the program on social media.

Bluey Portrays Engaged, Playful Parents

Dads on television are too often portrayed to be oafish, heavy-set men who act foolish. We can all think of lazy father characters married to an attractive wives they take for granted but win her over with bumbling charm. Bluey represents fatherhood in a more accurate, positive light. Bandit, the father in Bluey, can occasionally be goofy. But generally, he is a loving, caring father and husband.

Chilli is a loving wife and mother. She is also shown in an independent manner. She is unafraid to ask for some time when she needs a break and is seen going out to play field hockey with a friend. She is strong and loving to her family.

The first child of Bandit and Chili is the title character Bluey. Often children’s shows have the children trying to connive their parents. A refreshing part of the show is Bluey is not trying to get away with anything. She is an energetic child that enjoys playing and using her imagination. Like many children, she has her moments, but with the guidance of her parents, she understands her mistakes.

Bingo is the youngest of the Family. She, like many, looks up to her older sibling but is often involved in the activities. She is not a pest or an antagonist, she feels down sometimes because she may not be able to keep up, but the family often acknowledges her voice.

The Bluey set typically involves kids having playtime using their imagination and involving their parents. We often see them playing make-believe where they may be at a pizzeria or playing with their mom pretending to drive a car. The parents are caring, loving, and look out for each other. This positive portrayal of playtime as an opportunity for coaching and learning is excellent parent and child training. Like the ground-breaking work of Mr. Rogers, Bluey offers useful instruction in the form of family entertainment.

With the pressures of modern life, parenting can be challenging. Although technology makes us more efficient, it also adds a lot of distractions that can get in the way of healthy family relationships. In her book Screen Time in the Mean Time, Dr. Bennett reports that psychology research demonstrates that there has been a 25% decrease in child empathy. She states that parental distraction and outsourcing parenting to screen time may be major contributors to this unwanted change. She elaborates that empathy is not innate, meaning we aren’t born with it. Instead, devoted parents model empathy for their children and instruct them verbally as their kids follow along with them day to day. She proposes that Bluey models the teaching of empathy between parent and child through imaginary play. That benefits not only the kids watching Bluey but their parents too!

Bluey Tackles Challenging Topics

Like Mr. Rogers, Bluey often brings in complex and challenging topics such as coping with death and loss, working through troubling feelings, and much more.

For example, the Bluey episode Whale Watching implies the parents drank too much at a party the night before. The parents try to avoid playing with their kids but ultimately realize how vital their engagement is, resulting in them pushing through their discomfort.

In another episode titled Stumpfest, Chilli teaches Bluey how parents also need space and adults need time with friends. The kids think the dad was mean when digging up a stump with his friends. Taking away something Bluey and her friends wanted to keep and use for themselves. Chilli explains to Bluey that Bandit’s yardwork with his friends was his playtime and bonding with his pals.

Another Bluey episode, Born Yesterday, shows Bandit acting like he was just introduced to the world. The kids enjoy showing him his new surroundings and how to perform in social settings. This episode helps viewers see how much we take social norms for granted and how to explain norms to the younger generation. It also encourages us to slow down, think simply, and enjoy the little things.

Other topics that have been addressed in Bluey include

Depression
Fear of abandonment
Divorce
Taking care of your parents
Death
Work Ethic

Teaching essential concepts like these to kids can be challenging. A great product GKIS offers to help bring the family together is our Screen Safety Essentials Course. Our Essentials Course promotes screen safety and a cooperative and positive parent-child alliance.

Online Conspiracy Theories About Bluey

Typical of the internet, there is social media drama surrounding Bluey. For example, there is online speculation about hidden adult topics within the show. TikToker conspiracy theories about Bluey include speculation that Bluey is a rainbow baby. A rainbow baby is a child born after a miscarriage. There is also speculation that one of the grandparent characters has Alzheimer’s disease and Bingo has celiac disease. An episode was temporarily banned because Bandit passed gas in Bluey’s face, referred to as a fluffy in the show. This episode got pushback, but the real lesson was about being honest and not trying to be sneaky. After viewers and parents realized this, the episode was placed back into the show’s streaming library.

If you find it difficult to play with your kids or integrate challenging topics into play, get your friends together and schedule an online parenting workshop with Dr. Bennett.

Thanks to CSUCI intern Keith Ferries for researching and writing this family-friendly article.

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

Photo Credits

[1] August de Richelieu https://www.pexels.com/@augsst-de-richelieu/

[2] Cottonbro Studio https://www.pexels.com/photo/girl-in-red-dress-playing-a-wooden-blocks-3662667/

[3] RODNAE Productions https://www.pexels.com/photo/young-family-talking-to-their-parents-6148875/

Do You Watch How-To Videos Instead of Starting Projects? The Vicarious Living Epidemic

May 12, 2019 by Dr. Tracy Bennett

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 Syndrome is 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.

Onward to More Awesome Parenting,

Tracy S. Bennett, Ph.D.
Mom, Clinical Psychologist, CSUCI Adjunct Faculty
GetKidsInternetSafe.com

Works Cited

[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

Photo Credits

Photo by Diego Gavilanezon Unsplash

Photo by Sergey Zolkinon Unsplash

Photo by freestocks.orgon Unsplash

Photo by Victoria Heathon Unsplash

Photo by Kym Ellison Unsplash

7 Important Research Findings About TV That Every Parent Needs to Know About

August 20, 2014 by Dr. Tracy Bennett

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Parents often tell me that they struggle to regulate their children’s screen media use because it’s simply overwhelming. Research and regulations regarding children and television viewing have been firmly in place for many years. It makes sense that this well-traveled path is a good place to start with parenting in the digital age. Once you tackle and implement TV-watching rules, you have developed critical skills necessary to effectively tackle other screen media. Today’s article is designed to help you build mastery and confidence in actively parenting your family’s TV-viewing choices.

How often does your child watch television? If you answered that question with any response other than “never,” you must consider TV as your co-parent. Does that make you shiver? Well it should considering the proliferation of sex, violence, and just plain meanness that is included in even children’s television programming. The truth is, if your child is watching TV (or any screen media for that matter), then they are being affected and parented by what they are watching. The following research findings provide the pros and cons of child TV watching and will help you in your quest to becoming an even more awesome parent.

Parent guidance is necessary to lead kids to the best choices of TV programs.

Children’s programming is designed to attract viewers rather than provide education. As a result, broadcasters guided by profit aren’t great co-parents.

It doesn’t take long flipping through channels to recognize the amount of inappropriate programming available on even daytime TV. Programming channel availability on your television is a great first step to awesome parenting, followed by co-viewing and active guidance. Our family happens to have a kid TV as well as an adult TV. My husband and I deliberately selected the channels (and games) available on the kid TV for quality academic and prosocial content. The kids are only allowed access to the adult TV with permission or for family co-viewing.

Kids learn more when they are interested in the theme of the program and tend to prefer programs with social-emotional themes over programs with academic focus (Calvert, 289). When you are making parenting decisions about channel availability, I suggest you seek your children’s opinions and actively negotiate to reach a happy and productive outcome. And as always, this is a living agreement. In other words, you will need to revisit and renegotiate as your children get older and gain a larger variety of abilities and interests.

Regulation has made a difference in availability and quality of children’s television.

In 1990 the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) enacted the Children’s Television Act (CTA). CTA was designed to give parents better information, more clearly define core educational programming, and increase the amount of children’s television programming. Since CTA was implemented, access to quality children’s television programming in the US has improved with genuinely positive result (Calvert, 324). This regulation was developed due to a grass roots movement by concerned parents like us! This is a hopeful precedent considering the work we still need to do as the Internet continues to encroach unregulated into our children’s lives.

Children as young as a year old can learn to avoid dangerous things from simply watching actors on TV.

In a 2003 study by Mumme and Fernald, 32 12-month olds were recruited from a middle-class, predominantly white community. Four objects that they’d never played with before (a letter holder, a ball with weird bumps, a garden hose adapter, and a plastic valve) were shown on a TV screen along with an actor emotionally responding to those objects (neutral, happy, or fearful) with a simple verbal description (“look at it”). The infants’ parents sat next to them reading a magazine. When later given the objects to play with, it was discovered that the infants avoided the objects to which the actor responded fearfully. They approached the neutral and positive objects the same. Surprisingly, 10-month olds were not affected by what they’d seen on TV. Just two months of development seems to make a huge difference.

Even if your children are passively viewing adult TV shows, they are being affected by the show’s emotional content. Just because your child is young or viewing alongside a parent, doesn’t mean they’re not being negatively affected by inappropriate content.

Preschool children who watch educational TV are often better prepared for school (Wright, 1347) and even better students in high school (Anderson).

It’s not necessary to cut out TV completely to be an awesome parent. In fact, there are some great programs out there that will benefit your children’s overall academic success!

Children who watch prosocial TV programs demonstrate more kindness towards peers and animals.

Not only will quality television make your kids more successful at school, but also with others!

When you’re making TV program selections, remember that age makes a difference in child choice of TV programs and the ability to understand complex plots.

Younger children choose and watch more educational and informational television programs whereas older children prefer entertainment programming. Because broadcasters know this, there is less educational content targeted at older kids. In regard to quality of viewing, older children learn more from all types of programming (Calvert, 318). As cognitive abilities develop, kids are increasingly able to identify factors relevant to the central plot, recognize order as the story scheme, draw inferences about the feelings and motivations of the characters, and recognize cause-effect relationships within the program.

Just as you stock your child’s reading shelf with kid’s books rather than adult novels, it’s important to shelf age-appropriate TV programs. Websites like https://www.commonsensemedia.org can be helpful when evaluating program content.

When parents discuss and support the lessons kids learned from TV viewing, kids are more likely to apply lessons in real life.

In regard to the kinds of lessons kids learn from TV, kids most often report learning social-emotional lessons, then information, physical well-being, and cognitive skills lessons (Calvert, 303).

Although our kids have a kid TV at their disposal, we still regulate viewing time and choice. The babies particularly clamor for “movie night,” because it’s their favorite thing to share a series or TV with us co-viewing. My husband and I like to reinforce the academic and social lessons weaved within what we’ve watched in later discussions. Not only is it a gift to provide enriching programming to your child, but it is particularly valuable to share your thoughts, values, and zany humor with them during family quality time. Our movie nights and later discussions help us really get to know our kids. When we see the kids amped up about certain themes and topics, we often head to the bookstore or library for books that they’ll be more likely to read. Win-win!

At this moment I’m flying to South Carolina with my 20 year-old to move her in for the fall semester. Believe me as I sit here with tears in my eyes marveling at the woman she has become, it’s important to soak in every precious parenting opportunity while you can. Some day sooner than you’d like, they’ll be spreading their wings in pursuit of their own wide open spaces.

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

Anderson, D.R., Huston, A.C., Schmitt, K.L., Linebarger, D.L. , and Wright, J.C. “Early childhood television viewing and adolescent behavior”. Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development 66 (2001) (1, Serial No. 264). Web.

Calvert, Sandra L., and Jennifer A. Kotler. “Lessons from Children’s Television: The Impact of the Children’s Television Act on Children’s Learning.” Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology 24.3 (2003): 275-335. Web.

Mumme, Donna L., and Anne Fernald. “The Infant as Onlooker: Learning From Emotional Reactions Observed in a Television Scenario.” Child Development 74.1 (2003): 221-37. Web.

Wright, J.C., Huston, A.C., Murphy, K.C., St. Peters, M., Pinon, M. Scantlin, R.M., and Kotler, J.A. “The relations of early television viewing to school readiness and vocabulary of children from low-income families: The early window project.” Child Development 72 (5) (2001): 1347–1366. Web.

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