Leni realized two years ago that she was on her smartphone far too much. She seldom left her room to chat with her parents, stopped going out on weekends and found she would sometimes spend 10 hours a day on TikTok and YouTube.
“I noticed that I had really neglected school and did not study nearly as much as I used to,” the now 18-year-old told DW. “I began monitoring the time I spent consuming media on my phone, putting my device away more often and no longer canceling plans to meet up with my friends in favor of just staying on my phone. Now, on average, I spend about five hours a day consuming media.”
Leni’s situation is daily life for a large proportion of teenagers growing up in Germany. According to recent OECD findings, 15-year-olds in Germany spend about 48 hours per week in front of a screen — an average of about seven hours per day. Compared with 36 other countries, Germany ranks fifth highest for screen time, just behind Poland and Estonia. Another study by German health insurance provider DAK showed that 1.5 million young people in Germany use social media to a problematic extent, and of these about a quarter, 350,000, are considered addicted.
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These startling statistics have spurred repeated calls for a social media ban for young people in Germany. It would follow the example of Australia, which in December was the first country to ban social media use for children under 16.
Leni thinks it’s a good idea. “It would protect children and young people a little bit more. I have noticed that there are things on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube which not regulated at all,” she said.
Expert commission calls for stronger controls for online platforms
Earlier this week, an independent expert commission released eagerly anticipated suggestions on how to better protect children and youth in the digital world.
“We are seeing how digital media radicalizes our democratic discourse and influences the development of children and young people. We see that screen time is increasing. And we see that children and teenagers often suffer from addiction,” said Nadine Schön, co-chair of the commission. “We want the platforms to be more accountable, so that they enable participation but also offer more protection than they have so far, for example with age verification.”
Key points from the commission’s 56 recommendations:
- Platforms and providers should be held more accountable for their content
- Safer default settings for minors, along with age-appropriate offerings
- Clear and simple ways to report problematic content
- Parental responsibility for digital education should be enshrined in law.
- Smartphone use to be banned in schools until seventh grade, when children are about 12-13 years old
Education Minister Prien, of the conservative Christian Democratic Union party (CDU), has also advocated for an age limit, preferably to be set by the European Union.
“The proposal of a legal minimum age of 13 years for the independent use of social media is the right way forward,” she said, also calling for effective age verification and phased safeguards for youth until the age of 18.
Disconnect between parents, children
Florian Buschmann also supports banning social media for under-13s. As a teenager, he was immersed far too deeply in the world of computer games. He played the online first-person shooter game Warface for up to 16 hours a day — as he feels now, “a prisoner of this virtual world.”
Following a student exchange in Romania where he played with dogs and took part in campfires, rock climbing and activities with other youth, it clicked. He realized that it was high time to finally break free from his media addiction.
Buschmann subsequently wrote a guidebook called “Ade Avatar” (“Goodbye Avatar”), so that others can follow his example and be freed from digital dependency. Now 25, he leads an initiative called “Offline Heroes” in which he and his team visit schools across Germany. So far this year, they’ve given 534 presentations; the latest event this week attracted 1,300 concerned parents.
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“Many have no idea how they should communicate with their child in this situation,” he told DW. At the same time, he added, it’s important for parents to set clear rules regarding media use.
“Many policy ideas come much too late. We are currently chasing social media, but we are already sliding into the next issue of artificial intelligence and deepfakes. Again, we must ask ourselves: ‘How long has it taken for us to be capable of taking action and to really do something?’”
Porn addiction, online debt on the rise
Andreas Pauly battles screen addiction every day. The social education worker manages a Cologne-based organization focused on preventing media addiction (“Mediensuchtprävention NRW e.V.”). He is currently training new “internet pilots,” teenagers who will be able to educate their friends and classmates about the responsible use and dangers of digital media.
“We observe two new increasing phenomena: On one hand there is pornography addiction; the other is uncontrolled consumption when it comes to shopping and spending,” he told DW. “Some 17-year-olds are already €10,000 [$11,400] in debt. This is also because payment platforms such as PayPal have no consideration for this.”
Leni also freelances for the organization, sharing her experiences. Pauly said the so-called “peer multipliers” connect better with children and teenagers who are addicted to media or heading that way. Their current campaign is called “One Day Off,” and challenges participants to stop using smartphones for 24 hours on July 7.
“Each year we organize a surfing camp, where after four days the kids always say: ‘This is totally cool without media, much less stressful, I can actually talk with people again,’” said Pauly. “We need more places for young people to experience things together. A colleague said recently that we need to make the real world more beautiful again, so they don’t flee into the virtual world.”
This article was originally written in German.
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