An old public service announcement that once aired before late-night newscasts posed a simple question to parents: "It's 10 p.m. Do you know where your children are?"
A similar prompt for safety-minded 21st century parents might go something like this: "It's 10 p.m. Do you know what your children are watching online?"
Some parents may have long given up on answering that question, even if they grasp that online videos can expose teens to inappropriate content, including bullying, self-harm, disordered eating, and porn.
Yet there's no easy way to track or monitor teens' viewing habits, and they can access videos pretty much anywhere — from YouTube to TikTok to parent-approved streaming platforms like Disney+. Even using software to detect certain types of content on their devices doesn't prevent them from watching questionable or off-limits videos on a friend's phone.
The American Psychological Association hopes to help people navigate this challenging dynamic with a new set of guidelines for healthy teen video viewing.
The recommendations offer parents guidance on warning signs related to harmful viewing habits while highlighting key areas of concern, like content that encourages violent or risky behavior, the negative role that influencers can play, and the dangers of AI-generated video material.
Dr. Mitch Prinstein, co-author of the guidelines and chief science officer of the APA, emphasizes that the burden of preventing harm to teens shouldn't fall to parents alone. That's why the guidelines also recommend policies for both politicians and online video-watching platforms to consider.
In the meantime, here are key strategies for parents who want to help their teen develop healthy video-viewing habits but can't wait on policymakers and platforms to improve content standards:
1. Co-watch video content with them.
Prinstein says it's ideal if parents can watch videos with their child, when possible. This content can and should be wide-ranging, inclusive of TV and movies watched together as a family, videos by their favorite influencer, their top TV show, and short-form posts on platforms like TikTok and YouTube.
This might seem overwhelming, but parents needn't commit to a comprehensive weekly or daily co-viewing habit with their teen. Rather, watch what you can with them, and be sure to ask questions about what aspects of the video they like or don't like.
Open-ended conversations about video content can help teens better understand what they're watching. Plus, it offers an opportunity for parents to talk about their own values, preferably without being judgmental or hectoring.
Instead, parents should feel free to point out that a beloved movie from their own childhood doesn't necessarily hold up to modern ideas about beliefs like gender equality.
Prinstein says that when parents watch objectionable video content with their kids but don't talk about problematic scenes or themes, it can signal approval of those ideas to the teen. "It's good to say something, speak up, and say, 'That might have been funny in the '80s, but we do not agree with that today,'" Prinstein says.
2. Get familiar with your teen's interests and favorite influencers.
Prinstein recommends periodically asking your teen what they're viewing online. This is particularly important if you hear about a popular show, like the animated YouTube series Skibidi Toiliet, or a concerning trend, like "looksmaxxing," which can promote potentially dangerous body care practices.
If your teen is a fan, try to engage them with questions about what makes it interesting or funny. If they don't know about certain video content, parents can still be curious about their teens' opinions on the topics at hand.
Since influencers can play an outsize role in teens' lives, Prinstein urges parents to closely monitor who they're following. This can be as simple as jotting down the names of the influencers they like, and then searching for more information about those individuals online.
Parents should consider limiting a teen's access to an influencer's content when it promotes unhealthy behavior. At the same time, parents can also encourage teens to engage with influencers who champion positive behavior and attitudes, like standing up to bullying and posting body-positive content.
3. Identify firm boundaries.
The guidelines do not recommend limiting video viewing to a certain number of minutes or hours each day. Instead, they suggest looking for signs of distracted behavior, loneliness, and excessive viewing that can interfere with a teen's sleep, among other negative effects.
Prinstein also says this interference doesn't have to be extreme to warrant creating new boundaries. If video viewing keeps a teen from performing their chores, for example, that's reason enough to consider reducing their access to content and devices.
Parents should also stay mindful of teens' exposure to advertising on video-watching platforms, where they may see products that aren't appropriate or safe for them. Similarly, the rise of content generated by artificial intelligence is likely to steer teens toward harmful video content in ways that parents may not understand, particularly if they're viewing explicit deepfake videos.
Parents can talk to their teens about non-obvious video content that may still be dangerous, and set boundaries related to engaging with that material, such as forbidding the use of software that creates deepfakes.
Prinstein says that parents navigating these challenges in their own household should reach out to other parents of teens. Together, they can both commiserate and think about ways to create standards in their own communities while even possibly pressuring politicians and tech companies to make important changes.
"We're all in this together," Prinstein says. "We are all struggling with this in very similar ways, and we should not feel like we have to take care of this all by ourselves."
