As generations pass and children change, one thing is holding youth back from enjoying their glory years: handheld technology. 

The accessibility of the internet and advanced technologies such as tablets, phones, and computers have dented the authentic experience of childhood and adolescence. 

The companionship between Generation Alpha and technology is one for the worse. Children with these handheld devices are often addicted to them like that of a drug addict. Most times, instead of using their imagination or trying to learn the world’s ways, these kids choose to use their iPads. This addiction and lack of imagination show a lack of intelligence and motivation in most children. This can affect their social skills, reading abilities, and awareness. 

For example, if a parent chooses to routinely put a screen in front of a child instead of a book, where will they learn basic reading skills outside of school? This also goes for their social skills and awareness. If a child chooses to routinely sit on a screen and scroll for hours on end, this can cause prolonged periods of zoning out, which ruins their awareness. For this same reason, kids also lose the ability to socialize and create relationships.

The impact is becoming clear in sports. For instance, the new youth is now prone to subpar coachability skills because of their shortened attention span, which is essential to becoming better athletes. 

Kristen Gostomski of YouthSportsTrainer.com stated, “The ability to focus—is important while listening to instructions from a coach as well as during structured drills and games. It’s also important to have the drive needed to practice skills independently. Lack of focus eventually leads to a decline in skills and performance.” Do we want the next generation of athletes to have no drive or love toward their sport?

In addition, educators have noted that it’s more challenging to teach this new generation of children because of their addiction to technology.

When in a classroom, students have to apply their brains to the subject being taught to gain knowledge. Still, without certain technologies to fulfill stimulation needs, students will become very uninterested in the topic being taught. This creates a large gap of interest that teachers need to achieve to make students enjoy learning.

Another issue with youth using technology constantly is a loss of innocence.

If youth are handed a device during their early days of development and use it unhealthily frequently, they are bound to find explicit content on the internet that is too mature for them. According to CommonSenseMedia.org, not only have 73% of teens seen explicit content but 54% report being exposed to this content before the age of 13!

Exposure to this content can cause both a long-lasting addiction to the media shown to the child and an early sexist ideology on women, per Unicef.org

Despite all these adverse effects, it is essential to understand that when used correctly, these handheld technology devices can be useful. When used in moderation, educational games and “YouTube” channels can teach children essential life skills that may not be taught in a classroom. However, it’s easy for youth to overuse technology and get addicted.

One question many ask is, “Why are the parents allowing this?” A lot of elderly people blame the parents for the youth’s addiction. Parents in recent years, most notably millennials, have relied on putting their children in front of a screen so they can decompress and take a break from their duties. Although the parents must take breaks from their hard work, it’s not OK to rely on this for a parent’s downtime and a child’s only source of entertainment. Over 90% of millennial parents have given their children a major technology device, per YPulse.com. Interestingly, it’s just as common for these parents to give their children a VR headset as to provide them with no device.

These stats prove that we need to move this new generation in a new direction, a generation not so dependent on technology for stimulation. If not, then the near future might be dependent on “iPad Adults.”

Do we (Gen Z) want to raise another batch of technology addicts?

Is there any choice?