Guest speakers Justin Coulson, Tracey Farrell and Mark Williams.
Photo by
Lua Ikenasio
From Wednesday, December 10, Australian children under the age of 16 will no longer be able to create social media accounts.
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The widespread ban comes as part of new laws being introduced in response to increasing evidence that adolescent social media use can lead to decreased life satisfaction.
With the laws set to take effect in less than three months, The Phone Pledge’s latest parenting event came at an ideal time.
The ‘It Takes a Village: Raising Kids in a Digital World’ event brought together experts in neuroscience, psychology and mental health to discuss the impact of social media and technology on children.
The guest speakers included renowned psychologist Dr Justin Coulson, cognitive neuroscientist Dr Mark Williams and local mental health social worker Tracey Farrell.
During the evening, they discussed what the new laws would mean for Australian families and how effective they were likely to be.
Ms Farrell said that while parents would need to remain vigilant in protecting their children, the new laws were a positive step forward.
“I don’t think that we’re going to become less vigilant in the short or even the medium term, but long-term this is a really helpful step and I think it’s really important to recognise that progress,” she said.
“We know that to create societal change ... we need that macro level change, and we need meso level change for that middle ground zone community. So, doing what we’re doing tonight, as a community, is such a big part of this change.”
The new laws will make social media platforms legally responsible for monitoring the accounts being created on their sites.
At this stage, the only social media platforms confirmed to be part of the ban include Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, X and YouTube.
Rather than using government-issued IDs, platforms must also introduce age-assurance technology to verify age.
Platforms that fail to enforce the ban and to remove accounts belonging to users under-16 could face fines of up to $49.5 million.
Parents were urged to remain vigilant despite the introduction of the new laws.
Photo by
Lua Ikenasio
Dr Coulson said that while the new laws would draw a line in the sand, children would still be able to access gaming sites and other platforms that had social aspects.
“The kids are still going to be using devices and still going to be causing problems,” he said.
“Inside all the games like Roblox, there’s chats galore — most massive online games have a social dimension to them.
“I don’t think that this is even close to an answer, and any parent who thinks that they don’t have to be vigilant any more is going to be disappointed and shocked.”
All three experts agreed the new laws are a positive step, but stressed there was still more work to be done.
The speakers also recognised that for some children who may already be heavily active on social media, taking away their access may cause distress.
Parents were urged to support children in developing active, balanced lives away from screens by promoting hobbies, sport and a strong sense of community.
Most importantly, they emphasised the need for parents to model healthy technology habits themselves.
Dr Williams said adolescents mirrored their parents’ behaviour and so the change needed to happen on the parents’ end, too.
“We as adults need to adjust the way we’re doing things. Teenagers will do about 10 per cent of what you tell them to do, and they’ll do about 90 per cent of what you do,” he said.
“They follow us. They actually do want to be like us. If you’re on the devices all the time ... then they’re going to do that as well because that’s what teenagers do, and so we need to change as well.
“We need to start doing that now, so that by the time this legislation comes in, us and them will be off it because it’s not good for any of us.”
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