| Not very long ago, the idea of parting children and younger teenagers from their smartphones would have seemed improbable. Parents have worried for years that the little black boxes in their kids’ hands are intensifying the existing pressures of adolescence, damaging attention spans, and exposing them to content meant for adults – but the general reaction used to be a helpless shrug. The research is mixed, with some experts viewing smartphones as a serious problem, and others saying that there is not enough evidence to support a ban. But whatever your view, the issue stands as a classic collective action problem: parents might prefer to get rid of the smartphone, or place strict limits on its use, but worry that enforcing that kind of rule if others don’t will mean their child is left out (and might therefore break it anyway). And so nothing changes. Until … it does. You can see it happening everywhere: the massive attention for Netflix’s miniseries Adolescence, the grassroots group Smartphone Free Childhood getting 124,000 parents of children in 13,000 schools to sign a pact to delay access until the end of year 9 (13-14 years old), polls showing strong support for banning social media for under 15s, and the development of a more robust evidence base on the status quo, like the Children’s Commissioner’s report. And while it might seem like the shift has been sudden, the truth is that this is a potential overnight success that has been years in the making. What’s changed? As smartphones have become commonplace and the amount of time that young people spend with screens has increased, so has concern among parents and kids themselves. The Children’s Commissioner’s report says that almost half of children spend more than two hours a day online, with almost a quarter spending more than four hours. More than two in five 16- and 17-year-olds think that their screentime is too high, but 50% of teenagers feel anxious when they don’t have their phones; a majority of parents now support a smartphone ban for under-16s, with 58% in favour last year. As the report suggests, the vast majority of schools have policies in place banning phones for at least part of the school day – and that might be seen as an indication that less is changing than it necessarily appears. The last government was reluctant to make bans a statutory requirement, arguing that headteachers were best placed to decide what would work in their schools, and Labour declined to support a private member’s bill making a ban law last month, leading to the proposals being watered down. Labour are now in a slightly complicated position: education secretary Bridget Phillipson has promised to review whether the guidance is working, but still says that no legal change is necessary. That position is supported by De Souza – who says that the most important thing is that parents get behind their school. But there are signs that the mood is changing. The Conservatives now back a legal change, with shadow education secretary Laura Trott calling the move a “no-brainer”. Last year, Daniel Kebede, general secretary of the National Education Union, said that even guidance for headteachers was “a distraction from the many problems facing education”. But in response to the new report, he said: “My personal view is I would support a statutory ban on mobile phones in schools.” How has that happened? Partly, the growing concern is a response to a growing problem: over the long term, more kids are spending longer on their phones, and so it’s natural that more parents are worried. But it’s also true that there evidence has pointed to almost ubiquitous use of smartphones by teenagers, and a lot of younger children, for at least five years – and the evidence of harm hasn’t really shifted. One reason that the response might have changed is a growing number of news stories that have garnered widespread attention, and given parents a sense that a shift might be possible. The campaigning of Ian Russell, whose daughter Molly took her own life in 2017 after viewing harmful content online, has been a key factor in putting pressure on successive governments; so too has the work of Esther Ghey, whose daughter Brianna was murdered. While plenty of petitions have got signatures online before, the emergence of Smartphone Free Childhood feels like a significant development, because it has gained the critical mass to accumulate those voices in one place, with a clear agenda. The group is one answer to De Souza’s call for parental action: they are asking parents to sign up to get rid of smartphones entirely until at least age 14. Could this be a tipping point? While Smartphone Free Childhood have signatories from parents in more than a third of British schools, the more important point is about securing solid majorities of support in specific places: there’s not much point in a handful of parents agreeing at your kid’s school if nobody else there is interested, after all. With that in mind, the move by headteachers of more than 30 primaries in St Albans to declare their schools smartphone-free may be a significant test case for wider adoption. Jonathan Haidt, the author of a widely discussed recent US book calling for new restrictions, The Anxious Generation, often talks about reaching a “global tipping point”, where a shift that once looks impossible now has momentum. In December, he described 2024 as “the year the phone-based childhood began to reverse”. Even if 58% of parents in the UK would like smartphones to be banned for their children, it is likely that a smaller proportion are heavily engaged in the subject. So how has the active minority had such an impact? One explanation is in research published a few years ago by the social scientist Damon Centola, who found in a series of experiments that a group of about 25% are suddenly able to build consensus around their view when even slightly smaller numbers fail. “Approaching that tipping point is slow going,” Centola said in 2018. “But once you get over it, you’ll see a really large-scale impact.” Is there anything that might slow the momentum? Absolutely. The biggest question over the moves towards smartphone bans, whether in schools or for children more generally, is the evidence base behind it. Jonathan Haidt’s book has been highly controversial, with other experts like Oxford academic psychologist Lucy Foulkes arguing that the link between smartphones and a reported rise in teenage mental health problems is more complicated than he suggests. A major study from the University of Birmingham published in February found that smartphone bans on their own do little to improve academic grades or children’s wellbeing. And Sonia Livingstone, who leads the LSE’s research centre for children’s digital rights, argues that the benefits and harms of smartphones are more finely balanced than the usual terms of the debate allow. Meanwhile, a statutory ban on phones in schools might have limited impact for the reasons that successive governments have cited: it wouldn’t make much practical difference in the many schools that already have them, and it can’t do much to make it easier for teachers to enforce. Even so, there is little doubt that the discourse has shifted profoundly. In the past, Haidt said last year, resigned parents argued that “You can’t put toothpaste back in a tube, can you?” Today, it may be the parents themselves who are the toothpaste. | 