Nearly two-thirds of parents and guardians (61.6%) are concerned about their children’s usage of mobile phones and social media, a new survey from Uswitch.com.

The survey interviewed over 600 parents and guardians in the UK with children ages six to 16, and comes amid the UK government announcing an outright ban to mobile phone usage by pupils across English schools.

The ban would include breaks and class time alike, and has brought about a string of controversy from the teacher’s union who have said education secretary Gillian Keegan’s plan are “unenforceable” and sweeping real challenges under the rug.

But how do parents and guardians feel about their children’s phone usage?

Almost half of parents in the survey (48%) said that their child’s academic performance could be impacted by mobile phone usage.

In contrast, over half of the respondents (55%) said that they’d feel concerned about their child’s safety during school hours if they did not carry a mobile phone with them.

Most parents and guardians admitted to being concerned about their child’s use of mobile phones and social media, with a larger percentage being more concerned over this (19.8%) than about their child’s safety during school if they lacked regular pone access (17.3%).

Why Are Parents Concerned About Social Media? 

Uswitch delved further into some data on the most removed content on social media to determine why parents may be concerned about their children’s use of the platforms.

Most social media sites, like Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, have minimum age restrictions, typically not allowing users under the age of 13 from using their platforms. However, these rules can be easily flouted — TikTok was fined by the UK and the EU for handling children’s data and making it easy for them to join the platform despite being underage.

Recent research from the Advertising Standards Authority shows that 93% of UK children aged 11-17 have social media accounts, and that 86% of 11-12 year olds have accounts as well, despite being under-age.

It is easy to see why then, parents would be concerned, considering the content their children may come across on social media.

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TikTok saw the most content removed per 100,000 users in 2022, with a staggering 37,798 videos removed. The most common reason for removing the content was due to ‘Minor safety’, meaning any content potentially harmful to minors.

Facebook saw the second highest volume of content removed, followed by Instagram. The platforms, both owned by parent-company Meta, removed mainly ‘Adult Nudity & Sexual Activity’ content.

Besides this content, parents have shown concern about cyberbullying, content glorifying eating disorders and self harm, as well as content encouraging radicalisation, conspiracy theories, or hateful rhetoric. Grooming and coercion is also a concern amongst parents and government.

These concerns lead to the creation of the Online Safety Bill which was championed early on by parents who had lost children to online harms and were concerned for their children’s mental and physical wellbeing online. With the Online Safety Bill’s passing, failure to remove harmful content for children could result in prison sentences or major fines, but this does not guarantee children will not see harmful content on social media.

What Can Parents Do? 

Max Beckett, expert at Uswitch.com mobiles has therefore shared his top tips for keeping children safe while using mobile phones:

1. Resecting social media age restrictions can be key to keeping children safe online. According to Ofcom research, up to two-thirds of children between the ages of eight and 12 had help from their parents when setting up social media accounts.

2. Taking an interest in what your child is doing on their phone — the apps they are using and how much they are using them, can be key in protecting your child from cyberbullying, and also other negative effects on their sleep schedule or attention span.

3. Limiting phone usage and screen time can help children build healthy habits. Barring phones from the dinner table or when its time to do homework can help children priorities their time and engage with the real world.

4. Parental control apps and software can also be key in restricting harmful or age-appropriate content for younger children.