The Princess of Wales has warned that excessive screen time can harm family life in a new essay published today by the Royal Foundation’s Centre for Early Childhood.
The essay titled, ‘The Power of Human Connection in a Distracted World’, is written in collaboration with Boston-based Professor Robert Waldinger of Harvard University.
The piece highlights two core points: warm, loving, and meaningful relationships are the single greatest investment we can make for health, happiness and longevity; and modern life, rising loneliness, and fragmented attention are undermining our ability to form those connections, putting at risk the social and emotional development of babies and young children.
Spending too much time online is said to be a factor contributing to the ‘epidemic of disconnection’, which in turn can disrupt family life.
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‘Our smartphones, tablets, and computers have become sources of constant distraction, fragmenting our focus and preventing us from giving others the undivided attention that relationships require,’ the essay reads.
‘We sit together in the same room while our minds are scattered across dozens of apps, notifications, and feeds. We’re physically present but mentally absent, unable to fully engage with the people right in front of us.’
The essay went on to explain the importance of a happy and nurturing family life on a child’s current and future happiness, relationships, and success.
Technology, they said, is threatening those safe environments. ‘But just as science is confirming the lifelong importance of connections, we exist in a world that is more distracted than ever,’ she wrote.
The Princess of Wales (seen in Lincolnshire earlier this month) has said that too much screen time can harm family life in a new essay titled ‘The Power of Human Connection in a Distracted World’
‘We’re raising a generation that may be more ‘connected’ than any in history while simultaneously being more isolated, more lonely, and less equipped to form the warm, meaningful relationships that research tells us are the foundation of a healthy life.’
To overcome the ‘epidemic of disconnection’, Kate warned readers to make a ‘conscious effort’ to be present for the people they care about, creating safe spaces for genuine connections, whether that be family dinners or making eye contact.
The essay concluded, ‘Look the people you care about in the eye and be fully there – because that is where love begins.
‘For babies and children who are raised in attentive and loving environments are better able to develop the social and emotional skills that will allow them to grow into adults capable of building loving partnerships, families, communities. This is our children’s greatest inheritance.’
It comes after Prince William revealed that none of his children are allowed have mobile phones as he spoke about the importance of sitting down at the table for family meals.
The Prince of Wales said he and his wife Kate had imposed a ‘strict’ ban on the devices for Prince George, 12, Princess Charlotte, 10, and Prince Louis, seven.
William, 43, added that he wants to ‘do what’s best for my children’ in an appearance on actor Eugene Levy’s Apple TV+ travel series The Reluctant Traveler.
When Levy asked if the Waleses and their children eat together, the Prince said, ‘Yes absolutely, yes definitely. So, we sit and chat, it’s really important. None of our children have any phones, which we’re very strict about.’
Pictured: Prince William and Kate with Louis, George and Charlotte at Buckingham Palace on June 14
It comes amid the growing Smartphone Free Childhood movement in which parents commit to only give their child a smartphone aged 14, with no social media until 16.
Among those leading calls to ban smartphones in schools in recent months have been Esther Ghey, the mother of murdered transgender teenager Brianna Ghey.
Jack Thorne, creator of Netflix hit Adolescence, has also backed the campaign amid calls for better legislation to help parents navigate dangers of the online world.
In February, Barnet Council in London became the UK’s first to ban smartphones from all its schools, in a rule affecting more than 60,000 pupils since this month.
While Barnet was the first local authority to include secondary schools in a phone ban, other councils across England including Ealing, St Albans, Cambridgeshire, Petersfield and Hampshire have also prohibited phone use in primary schools.
Meanwhile, a Dutch social movement called The Offline Club is burgeoning, which organises UK community events where attendees lock their phones away.
Joe Ryrie, co-founder and director of Smartphone Free Childhood, told the Daily Mail, ‘We don’t know if William and Kate have signed the Smartphone Free Childhood Parent Pact, but they’re clearly on board with the idea that childhood is too short to scroll away on a smartphone.
‘Managing phones and social media is one of the toughest challenges facing parents today – whether you’re a future king or a knackered parent at the school gates.
‘But more and more families are realising that kids are happier and healthier without a smartphone before 14. And as more parents choose to delay together, it’s becoming easier for everyone – royal or otherwise.’
The Online Safety Act came into effect this year, providing a new set of laws that protect children and adults online.
The Act has given providers new duties to implement systems and processes to reduce the risk that their services are used for illegal activity, and to take down illegal content when it does appear.
Specific protections have been designed for children. Platforms are required to prevent children from accessing harmful and age-inappropriate content, and provide parents and children with clear and accessible ways to report problems online when they do arise.
During William’s interview with Levy, he spoke about how the children take part in a range of activities without the distraction of mobile phones.
The Prince said, ‘So, Louis loves the trampoline, so he’s obsessed with trampolining and actually Charlotte does a lot as well.
‘As far as I can tell they just end up jumping up and down on the trampoline, beating each other up, most of the time. Apparently, there is an art to it.
‘Charlotte does her netball as well and her ballet and so keeping them busy with sports and being outdoors is really important.’
Kate advocates children spending time in the natural world and helped create the family-friendly Back To Nature play garden that was exhibited at the Chelsea Flower Show in 2019.
And William spoke last month about making sure his children grow up learning to play an instrument as he believes music is ‘crucial’, with Charlotte reportedly following in her mother’s footsteps and learning the piano, George is thought to play the guitar and Louis has drum lessons.
The Prince told Levy, ‘They’re trying to learn musical instruments. I’m not sure how successful we’re being with that. George loves his football and his hockey…’
George also appears to have a love of history, with his father saying the young Prince is the person to ask about facts when Levy joked the Windsors would not have to go on the family history show Who Do You Think You Are?
William tells the actor, during the episode called Living The Royal Life In The UK, ‘I think I probably need some history lessons, Eugene. So, I could do with that.
‘Actually, George my son is way better in history than I am and I have to check with him now on my dates.’
William also spoke about how he was trying to avoid the ‘mistakes’ his parents made.
The Prince said his childhood ‘feeling of safety, security, love’ was cut short when his mother Princess Diana and father King Charles III separated when he was a young boy.
He told Levy, ‘Getting the balance of work and family life right is really important.
‘Because for me, the most important thing in my life is family, and everything is about the future and about if you don’t start the children off now with a happy, healthy, stable home, I feel you’re setting them up for a bit of a hard time and a fall.’
When Levy, star of the series Schitt’s Creek, suggested to William a ‘normal homelife’ started with his mother, the prince replied, ‘Yes definitely, I think it’s really important that that atmosphere is created at home.
‘You have to have that warmth, that feeling of safety, security, love. That all has to be there, and that was certainly part of my childhood.
‘My parents got divorced at eight, so that lasted a short period of time.
‘But, you take that and you learn from it and you try and make sure you don’t do the same mistakes as your parents.
‘I think we all try and do that and I just want to do what’s best for my children, but I know that the drama and the stress when you’re small really affects you when you’re older.’
