Raising cyber-children – safely

[Commentary] As a marriage and family therapist, I often hear from parents who don't understand technology nearly as well as their children. They're puzzled by how kids can text from an iPod Touch when it isn't a phone. They don't understand how a laptop can be used as a video studio. They are struggling to enforce rules in a land they don't inhabit. They plead that they are "hopeless with all that stuff," and seem to want me to give them permission to stay that way. But I can't give that permission because it's not in the interest of their kids. Advice about sleep training or separation anxiety is easy to find. But good information about whether or how to keep an 11-year-old off Facebook is far harder to come by. Dialogue is inhibited by the fear of sounding clueless and by our fragmentation onto diverse platforms and devices. We don't have family tradition or Dr. Spock to fall back on, or even to rebel against. All this has left parents particularly vulnerable to peer pressure where social media is concerned.