Humans aren’t just social — we’re ultrasocial, wired like bees and ants for deep connection. So what happens when smartphones take over childhood, tablets replace textbooks and AI companies infiltrate our kids’ lives? Social psychologist Jonathan Haidt lays out three principles of technoskepticism — and explains why, two years after sounding the alarm in “The Anxious Generation,” he’s more concerned (and hopeful) than ever before. (Recorded at TED2026 on April 15, 2026)
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@franimal86
June 4, 2026 at 11:24 am
As a millennial, I’m a lil late to this
@YashforFIFA
June 4, 2026 at 11:26 am
Carlo Ancelotti lookalike, anyone?
@Masada1911
June 4, 2026 at 11:30 am
Having tech and screen free kids is going to be a major new status symbol.
@joestarwars5606
June 4, 2026 at 11:34 am
This idea of limiting access to the internet for American children are just going to make them fall behind in rapidly advancing online world. This is part of the reason why China will be eating our lunch for the next century because over concerned parents are babying their children too much in America. Don’t punish the child and limit their knowledge go after the corporations that are hurting your children oh wait I forgot we live in a country where corporations have more right than citizens.
@LedgerAndLace
June 4, 2026 at 11:34 am
The thing I notice is the remarkable lack of empathy demonstrated online and now, even in the real world. Basic manners are just baffling to some people. THANK YOU, Jonathan! Australia has the right idea!
@pulsator1278
June 4, 2026 at 12:02 pm
Tech leaders who are on record as putting screen-time limits on their children:
• Steve Jobs (Apple)
• Bill Gates (Microsoft)
• Mark Zuckerberg (Meta)
• Susan Wojcicki (YouTube)
• Jony Ive (Ex-Apple)
• Sundar Pichai (Alphabet, Google)
• Chris Anderson (Ex-WIRED, 3D Robotics)
• Evan Spiegel (Snap Inc.)
@daledevernon56
June 4, 2026 at 12:02 pm
What we really have is a couple of generations of irresponsible parents who buy these devices for their young children pay for the Wi-Fi and cellular data and then don’t implement any parental controls because they don’t want to deal with the tantrum but fortunately for them they found a scapegoat in the form of big tech.
@berzerkerification4409
June 4, 2026 at 12:40 pm
I completely agree. Everyone wants to talk about the negatives that social media does on adolescents, which it can do, but no one wants to talk about what it can do to someone’s ability TO parent a child.
@robertowilloughby5656
June 4, 2026 at 12:03 pm
Reclaim lifehood from tech
@Hawk259
June 4, 2026 at 12:31 pm
Geriatric millennial here 👋🏽
Such scary times. Thank you so much for your work!!!
@omarsweed6187
June 4, 2026 at 12:35 pm
Let’s not pretend like humans have been historically better social buddies. There’s a reason AI and the internet has been so popular, just the idea of “having options” has helped a lot. Humans are largely intolerable in their natural environment.
@tlg5021
June 4, 2026 at 12:40 pm
Adults are also affected!
@sam-m5y2w
June 4, 2026 at 1:02 pm
watching this while playing minecraft (I’m 14 btw) 😳, great speech by the way
@macarthy
June 4, 2026 at 2:27 pm
Teaching anything rewires a brain
@macarthy
June 4, 2026 at 2:38 pm
Australia is an awful example it’s a failure – so after what 6 months you have evidence? And this USA mom you talk about – look at Japan and watch how kids are allowed to walk to school at 4/5 etc becuase they have safe societies and public transport not like the USA
@thursdayblack
June 4, 2026 at 2:55 pm
The problem isn’t that we don’t know this. The problem is we (the parents) know this, but can’t do much about it. We work, run the household and sleep. We sleep, barely, to survive work. Which we do, barely, to keep a household (of less and less children). And when we’re running the household, we’re exhausted so there are no resources left over for constant confrontations over tech. This is not a knowledge problem, this is a resource problem. We’re spending all our energy just getting through life.
@lighthousephoto7143
June 4, 2026 at 2:57 pm
Social media is constantly being tweaked to be more addictive. There’s automatic A/B testing and human experts working 24/7 to increase what the industry cynically calls “stickiness”. If there can be a “war on drugs”, why not go to war against the most ubiquitous, addicting and damaging thing for children.
@worldbrotherhoodglobal
June 4, 2026 at 3:30 pm
The ultimate irony of the digital age is that the Silicon Valley elites who design these attention-harvesting algorithms strictly shield their own children from them. Technoskepticism isn’t just an attitude; it’s a necessary defense mechanism against corporate behavioral engineering.
@harrypearle9781
June 4, 2026 at 5:53 pm
IDEA CONTESTS to find better SCREEN CONTROL?
=========================================
Rambling on and on about less Screening may not wake people up… TNX
@ashleyfrieze
June 4, 2026 at 6:09 pm
This is a load of unsubstantiated bollocks
@lawrencefrost9063
June 4, 2026 at 6:33 pm
Ah perfect, I was just listening to his book The Righteous Mind today.
@alexnelson7258
June 4, 2026 at 7:26 pm
I’m a huge fan of Haidt and his work, and very little surprises me anymore with this kind of thing, but my flabbers are absolutely ghasted that someone took their AI girlfriend to not just a couple’s therapist, but to a FAMOUS couple’s therapist
@SativaSamurai1
June 4, 2026 at 7:28 pm
This will never fly in America because no politician is going to give up the lobbying checks they receive from tech companies. There’s too much money to be made on selling children’s data.
@slyde83
June 4, 2026 at 7:38 pm
I have to give a talk in 2 weeks about parenting: balancing tech and media in the home. I’ve been an IT specialist for 25 years and have seen and worked with kids during the transition when iPhones and iPads and Android devices became mainstream. In education, I see it everyday. Devices control our kids and not the other way around. Hopefully we can find balance by making well though out decisions instead of knee jerk ones.
@gabrielmaroto18
June 4, 2026 at 10:07 pm
Sending this video to my nephew we got an argument about him playing call of duty with his eight year-old daughter.
@CenturyWisdom-q5w
June 5, 2026 at 12:27 am
Haidt’s plea to rescue childhood from screens is heartbreaking but empowering. It hurts seeing tech trade kids’ need for true connection for lonely scrolling. I’m inspired to fight for a future rooted in human empathy, not soulless machines
@akkshayangre
June 5, 2026 at 12:40 am
Thank you so much for super insightful conversation❤
@wouterdirven7880
June 5, 2026 at 5:39 am
I agree that social media and especially short‑form video are deeply harmful for kids and teens. But I don’t think “back to books, no devices” is a real solution in a society that is already fully digital.
youtube
We live on our own little islands, working long hours to afford a material lifestyle that leaves us too tired to actually live together. So of course kids and parents reach for screens. That’s not just a parenting failure, it’s a system failure.
For me the real question is: are we willing, collectively, to want less stuff, work less, and invest more time and energy in community and relationships? And are we willing to force companies and institutions to trust people more and control them less, so work and life become more humane?
Instead of only looking for new tech fixes, we should look back to the root causes our economic model, our values, and how little space is left for real human connection and start changing that.
@Sentim趕稿中
June 5, 2026 at 8:52 am
This talk need more praise
@BrianMcInnis87
June 5, 2026 at 9:43 am
Technology’s been rewiring our brains since we started using sticks and stones. This is not news.
@musabmn
June 5, 2026 at 10:32 am
Social media is the closest thing to virtual reality. Just remember to log in now and again, play the game and log out.
@SouthShoreAquatics
June 5, 2026 at 2:51 pm
I’m thirty. Worked in restaurants and had a childhood before smartphones. I thought I was anxious but interacting with my younger peers, I feel for them
@mommyof4grlz
June 5, 2026 at 8:33 pm
Brain rot isn’t new. That’s what I and the people around me all figured the internet would eventually cause. I rhigh school in 1997 having written an essay about the problems the internet was going to cause. I’d say I’m proud of the foresight I’d be lying. when I think about the fact that professionals weren’t sounding the alarms in the when the internet was first coming into homes. It is scary to me how many professionals jumped on the bandwagons and promoted the use of devices. Is there seriously a need for extensive research why is it not a given based on what we already know… that is the saddest part to me because either I must question the professional abilities or wonder hiw much is money mongering when i heard we “need years of testing”…None of this had to happen.