Every generation of parents has worried about the technologies shaping their children’s lives. Radio, television, video games, the Internet and smartphones have each prompted debates about what young people might be losing as new forms of media become part of everyday life.
Today, artificial intelligence and social media platforms are adding new dimensions to those concerns. Parents are being asked to navigate a world of deepfakes, misinformation, algorithmic recommendation, and AI chatbots, often while still learning how these technologies work themselves.
It’s understandable that many feel overwhelmed, anxious, and unsure.
But one of the most important things parents can do is to resist the temptation to approach their children’s digital lives primarily through fear. Our children don’t need us to be technology experts. They need us to be curious, engaged and willing to listen.
Beyond the screen time debate
For years, much of the public conversation about children and technology has revolved around a deceptively simple question: how much screen time is too much?
It’s an appealing measure because it’s easy to understand and relatively easy to enforce. But it’s also a remarkably blunt instrument.
An hour spent video calling a grandparent, creating a digital artwork, collaborating on homework, or learning a new skill is fundamentally different from an hour spent scrolling through engagement-bait content or playing ‘clicker’ style games that offer superficial rewards. Yet conventional screen time measures treat these activities as equivalent.
As the above examples suggest, the more meaningful questions concern what children are doing online, how they feel about those experiences, who they’re interacting with, and what other activities might be displaced by their technology use.
Notably, we also shouldn’t dismiss entertainment as an important pursuit in its own right, as screen-based online content often provides children and young people a great deal of joy and fun and this should be celebrated rather than maligned.
This doesn’t mean time spent online is irrelevant. Balancing device use with sleep, physical activity, face-to-face relationships matters with regard to healthy adolescent development. But treating every minute on a device as second-rate risks overlooking the enormous diversity of children’s digital experiences.
Social media: More than connection and entertainment
Social media has changed enormously since the early days of Facebook, YouTube, or …cough… MySpace. Today’s platforms have evolved to continuously select, rank and recommend content, often using behavioural data to predict what will capture our attention.
For young people, these platforms can provide friendship, belonging, entertainment, creativity, political expression and access to information. For some, particularly those who feel isolated in their immediate surroundings, online communities can be an important source of identity and support.
But the same systems can expose young people to harmful material, unrealistic social comparisons, bullying, misinformation, and commercial manipulation.
The challenge isn’t simply that young people use social media. It’s that the environments they inhabit are shaped by companies whose commercial and political incentives don’t always align with their best interests.
Australia’s social media minimum-age restrictions have brought these tensions into sharp focus. While the policy may be intended to protect children, restricting access to platforms doesn’t necessarily address the underlying design features that make those environments risky. Nor does it eliminate young people’s desire to connect, participate, and explore online.
Indeed, an unintended consequence of restrictive approaches is that young people who continue using platforms may become less willing to discuss their experiences with adults, particularly if doing so means admitting they’ve broken a rule.
This is where parents have a particularly important role.
A child who encounters something disturbing or challenging online should feel comfortable approaching a parent, not frightened that the conversation will end with their phone being confiscated.
Rules and boundaries remain important, but they work best when accompanied by trust, explanation, and ongoing conversations.
Growing up alongside artificial intelligence
New artificial intelligence (AI) technologies introduce another set of opportunities and challenges.
Children and teenagers can now use AI to explore ideas, practise languages, receive feedback on writing, experiment with coding, and develop creative projects. These capabilities will increasingly shape education, employment, and everyday life.
Rather than simply discouraging AI use, we should help young people develop the skills to engage with it critically and creatively.
That includes understanding that AI systems can produce convincing but incorrect information, reproduce biases, invent sources and generate realistic images, audio and video that misrepresent reality.
It means recognising that conversational AI can create a misleading impression of understanding, empathy or friendship. And in a world being reshaped in profound ways by the consequences of climate change, and challenges to democracy, it also means understanding the environmental consequences of AI and who owns and shapes its development.
Research involving colleagues from QUT’s GenAI Lab and the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child has explored a particularly interesting problem known as AI sycophancy: the tendency of some chatbots to agree with users, flatter them, or reinforce their views rather than challenge questionable assumptions.
Through a playful, interactive chatbot experience, researchers worked with children to explore why an AI that always agrees with you isn’t necessarily giving you good advice.
It’s a powerful reminder that AI literacy isn’t just about learning to write better prompts. It’s about developing judgement, asking questions and knowing when to seek another perspective. These are capabilities children will need throughout their lives, whatever careers they eventually pursue.
Parenting through conversation, not surveillance
So what can parents actually do?
Start by taking an interest in children’s digital worlds without immediately judging them. Ask which creators they enjoy, what games they’re playing, what they find funny, what they’ve learned, and what frustrates them.
Explore technologies together. Ask an AI chatbot a question and examine its answer. Compare how different platforms recommend content. Discuss whether a convincing-looking image is authentic and how you might check.
Make privacy part of everyday conversations. Children should understand that apps and platforms collect information about them, that not everything shared online remains private, and that AI tools aren’t necessarily appropriate places to disclose sensitive personal information.
Set boundaries collaboratively, and explain the reasons behind them. A family conversation about protecting sleep, balancing activities, or managing notifications is more constructive than an arbitrary daily screen time allowance.
And remember that children learn from watching adults. Our own relationships with smartphones, social media, and technology provide powerful examples.
Most importantly, create opportunities for children to talk about difficult online experiences without embarrassment or fear of punishment.
Raising capable digital citizens
Technology will continue to change, often faster than parents, schools or policymakers can respond.
We cannot realistically protect children from every harmful experience by attempting to control their access to technology. Nor should we overlook the opportunities digital participation provides for learning, creativity, friendship and future employment.
Of course, responsibility cannot rest with parents alone. Technology companies must be held accountable for the environments they create, and governments have an important role in establishing meaningful protections. Regulations like Australia’s Digital Duty of Care move us in this direction in positive ways.
But within families, the most enduring protection we can offer is a relationship built on trust, curiosity and open communication.
The goal isn’t to raise children who are afraid of technology, or who use it uncritically. It’s to raise young people who can question it, shape it and participate confidently in the digital world.
Authors
Professor Daniel Angus
Professor Daniel Angus is Director of the QUT Digital Media Research Centre and a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADM+S). His research examines digital platforms, algorithms, artificial intelligence, and their impacts on society, with a particular focus on platform accountability, online cultures, digital participation, and the role of technology in everyday life. Connect with Daniel.
Professor Michael Dezuanni
Professor Michael Dezuanni leads the Creating Better Digital Futures program within the QUT Digital Media Research Centre and is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child. His research focuses on children’s digital cultures, digital media literacy and education, exploring how children and young people engage with social media, gaming, and artificial intelligence, and how families and educators can support safe, creative, and meaningful digital participation. Connect with Michael.
About the QUT Digital Media Research Centre
The QUT Digital Media Research Centre (DMRC) is a world-leading research centre investigating the social, cultural, and political impacts of digital media and emerging technologies. Bringing together researchers from humanities, social science, and technology disciplines, the Centre examines how digital platforms, artificial intelligence, and automated systems are reshaping everyday life, from childhood and education to democracy and public communication. The DMRC plays a leading role in major national research initiatives, including the ARC Centre of Excellence for Automated Decision-Making and Society (ADM+S) and the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child, advancing research into responsible technology, children’s digital experiences, online safety, and the creation of more inclusive digital futures. Find out more about the Digital Media Research Centre (DMRC).