Saturday, February 25, 2012

What's Missing From Your Daughter's Social Calendar?

Probably real face to face communication is the type of social contact that is most missing from your daughter's social life. Most preteens girls are media multitasking-emailing, texting, playing video games and watching a video all at the same time. A recent study found the more a preteen girl did media multitasking the more likely she was to have poor emotional and social health. Some symptoms of this type of poor health include difficulty sleeping, low social confidence, not feeling normal and having friends that parents view as a poor social influence. The best way to offset these symptoms was increased face to face conversations with friends, parents or siblings.

Face to face communication teaches a girl how to read facial expression, body language and tone, so an authentic social exchange was experienced. The more real face time, the more likely a girl was to enjoy strong social and emotional health. The increased in person communication seemed to offset large amounts of media multitasking.

It is important to recognize these findings, since the preteen years are the foundation for ongoing social and emotional development. We all should put down our media devices and spend some real in person time together. We also shouldn't gender discriminate-our sons could benefit as well.

Stay healthy & well,
Lisa

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