« No social media under the age of fifteen, only in group 8 the first smartphone, » the cabinet advises parents

Children under the age of fifteen should no longer use social media, and children should only get a smartphone from group 8 from group 8. That is the advice to parents that outgoing State Secretary Vincent Karremans (Prevention, VVD) presented this Tuesday afternoon: « I am worried. Social media and smartphones are not just fun. »

The advice is in the guideline Healthy screen use. Karremans deliberately does not opt ​​for a ban, he explained: « That is not at all not to be maintained. It is difficult to see at any kitchen table whether children really do not do that. A ban is a paper reality. There is no support for it either. »

That there will be advice is because parents themselves ask for that, he said. Parents are struggling with questions such as « When do I give my children a smartphone? » « Many parents do not know how to deal with it and then look at the government. » After the summer, the Ministry of the Interior starts a public campaign to bring the guidelines to the attention.

Furthermore, the advice states that parents have to limit their own screen times and put their phone away when they are in conversation with their child because they are important role models. There should also be no active screens while eating and in the bedroom. Parents should also talk more often with children about what they do online and what experiences they have.

In his explanation of the negative consequences of social media and smartphone use: sleeping problems, mental problems, myopia, sometimes anxiety disorders, Karremans pointed out in his explanation: « children who are scrolling until well into the night, going to sleep poorly and get bad figures at school the next day. »

Step by step

According to Karremans, who will soon switch to Economic Affairs to become a minister, group 8 of primary school is a good age to gain the first experiences with smartphones that they will need in the rest of their lives. From the first year they can use chat apps such as WhatsApp and Signal, from the age of fifteen social media such as Snapchat, Tiktok and Instagram. In this way they are step -by -step ‘getting rid of’ in online society.

Karremans has been put under pressure by the Lower House to do something for some time. For example, the room called him up in March Setting a minimum age For social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Tiktok and Snapchat. A month later, the ChristenUnie and NSC served An initiative memorandum In about online children’s rights. In it they argue, among other things, a rural age standard for the first smartphone, for example fifteen years. D66 recently followed with An initiative memorandum He also calls for smartphones to prohibit school breaks and school yards.

Worried parents

In 2024 it was the schools that first wanted to put a brake on smartphone use. They introduced a smartphone ban in the classroom. Later that year Thousands of parents followed thousands of parents who grow up at the organization’s smartphone -free -freeing not to give their children a telephone until the age of fourteen. At the end of May, doctors and other experts followed, who in a letter of fire crank Up to age borders for smartphones and social media.

About nine in ten students in secondary education are (almost) active on social media daily, showed previous research from the Trimbos Institute. Problematic game behavior is more common in boys (3 percent) than in girls (1.3 percent). For social media this is the other way around: for boys this is problematic in 3.3 percent, 6.2 percent for girls. Problematic behavior means that gaming or social media led to problems at school or for health, and that young people found it difficult to stop themselves.

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