By Joey Melvin
For most of my 18-plus-year career in law enforcement, I’ve deliberately worked directly with young people, focusing my career on the school resource officer (SRO) position.
First assigned to a school district in 2010, I watched the meteoric rise of social media and recognized its positive and negative effects on children. I also discovered, to my dismay, that trying to keep pace with social media changes and enhancements has been like chasing Usain Bolt in a 40-yard dash. I was always playing catch-up.
However, there was never a question in my mind that understanding social media and its impact on youth would be a critical component of the effective performance of my job. I’ve come to see that a foundational method to keep our children safe in this digital world is the routine practice of content questioning and learning about good digital citizenship. This process starts with us — parents and educators.
I appreciate the discomfort that some adults might have in encouraging children to question them about digital/online sources and content and, conversely, in challenging them on the same. It wasn’t so long ago for many of us to use a card catalog or haul out the “Encyclopaedia Britannica” to begin research. Fast-forward to 2021, when resources are literally at our fingertips. Within seconds, a search can inform me when the Titanic was built or who invented the eraser. On the other hand, there are sites popularized on social media outlets that have introduced the concept of “alternative facts,” which might be more accurately pegged as dis- or misinformation.
In the past, we viewed newspapers, radio and television as sources of information. The limited number of media outlets served to support more accurate and reputable information-sharing, although deception and inaccuracies still occurred. The audience, as well as the tools, have grown exponentially. Information-sharing doesn’t require meaningful credentials these days, merely an email address to register multiple social media accounts or blogging sites. Even legitimate and fact-based news stories can be rewritten, altered and marketed to serve varied interests. Adults sometimes don’t realize when they have been duped. So then, imagine the vulnerability of our children.
A Stanford study on recognition of “fake news,” conducted across all demographics, said 80% of youth surveyed were unable to determine fake news over real news. “Deep fakes,” digitally altered videos used to change someone’s appearance, have made it even more difficult to determine fact or fiction. Deep fakes are typically used maliciously or to spread false information. I guarantee you’ve seen a deep-fake image that you have assumed is authentic. I know I have.
Now, couple these altered and emotion-inducing social media posts with humans, especially children, heavily dependent upon functioning with the feeling part of their brains. It is not that children are choosing to be emotional; that is not a choice … it’s biology. The “thinking” part of our brain that helps with rationalization and decision-making is not completely formed until we reach our 20s.
Children (and adults, too) are deliberately targeted by these platforms. We are social creatures, and the comfort of acceptance by others includes online platforms and tends to follow our own beliefs and biases. Confirmation bias is when our social feeds give us the information we already agree with or believe to be accurate, and so we dive right into the conversation or video. As a result, when we read or view information online, it can become our truth or truth bias.
Some outlets build on that bias to drive viewership and content clicks, in turn driving site profitability and ratings. Impartiality can become a casualty in that quest for clicks.
This is complex stuff, even for adults. So how can we educate and guide our young people to become more digitally aware?
It should start with frank discussions and questions. Children’s exposure to misinformation is plentiful and likely unquestioned within their social circles, so it rests on us to teach the importance of being good digital citizens.
Jay Martin, the director of curriculum and training for the nonprofit Digital Futures Initiative (dfinow.org) suggests steps to begin the process of more mindful digital consumption:
• Be digitally diligent. Just as when buying a car, home or boat, compare the purchase with others selling the same thing. Ask if sales personnel are on the up and up. Look at all sides, interior and exterior; do research; make sure it is worth the “purchase” before taking it in or sharing with others. Get the full 360 degrees of a story.
• Digitally deliberate. Click on social media with a purpose in mind. Turn off feed notifications, which contribute to anxiety and device addiction. Beware of algorithms and artificial-intelligence traps. Purposely click on opposing viewpoints to confuse the algorithms and AI for a more well-rounded social media feed. Be careful what you say around devices with social media platforms on them. Siri and Alexa are listening and feeding personal information to algorithm servers. You can turn off your device’s microphone.
• Slow the digital feed down. Count, consider, careful, check. Before making online choices, count to 10, 20 or 120 and take deep breaths. Consider options and consequences. Check for truth, falsehoods or unknowns. The key is to take time before choosing to send or post. Do what you can to take emotions out of responses to posts. This will make us happier and the world a better place.
• Change the cancel culture. Be more accepting, resilient and tolerant of other people’s posts and videos. Hollering, hate and hurt accomplish nothing; however, a healthy debate is good for democracy and resolving differences. A digital culture of kindness is what we all should seek.
• Show empathetic understanding: Think of people on opposite sides of a wall, which is red on one side and blue on the other. Each side is declaring the wall color they see as the correct color of the wall. Each side believes a person is stupid to think the color is different from their vantage point. Neither is right nor wrong, but they cannot see the other side of the wall. Our perception is not always right. We often need to change our position to see it differently, resulting in a different perspective of what occurred and leading to a more accurate perception. Be mindful of our biases and how they impact our emotions. If we listen, see and feel what another person is facing, we have developed an empathetic understanding of how they experience things.
Our digital citizenry education should begin as soon as a child is exposed to online technology. The pandemic has significantly expanded the utilization of technology at all ages and grade levels, making digital citizenship more urgent. In July, the Pew Research Center said that “fully 89% of parents of a child age 5 to 11 say their child watches videos on YouTube, as do 81% of those who have a child age 3 to 4, and 57% of those who have a child age 2 or younger.” I shudder at the sheer number of disturbing videos available to children once they learn to navigate those shark-infested waters.
Obstacles to the guidance of what our children see online can be significant but not insurmountable. The best overall method for parents is to model the digital citizenship they want to see reflected in their child. Telling your child to put down their phone, as you scroll through TikTok videos probably is not effective. There are resources to help educate and guide children toward healthy digital behavior and — guess what — they are online!
Changing our future society into responsible digital citizens will not be a sprint: We are starting our children on a marathon. As parents, friends and educators, we can cheer them on by modeling good digital citizenship and encouraging them to question what they read and hear online in the hope of seeing positive digital citizens cross the finish line.
Detective Joey Melvin is instructor and Region 3 director for the National Association of School Resource Officers and a detective/school resource officer with the Georgetown Police Department.
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