Marketplace®

Daily business news and economic stories

Helping parents manage their children's screen time and online lives is an emerging market

Parents are trying everything from parental controls to screen-time coaches to keep on top of their children’s media experiences.

Download
As children enter the world of social media and internet access, parents are trying all sorts of things to help them engage with tech safely and healthily.
As children enter the world of social media and internet access, parents are trying all sorts of things to help them engage with tech safely and healthily.
Christopher Furlong/Getty Images

As of this year, a majority of kids under 12 years old have access to a tablet or smartphone, and a quarter of that group have their own smartphone. And as screens become increasingly pervasive in childhood and internet access widens for kids, parents are in largely uncharted territory when it comes to helping their children navigate the experience. To address that, some are turning to new methods, such as hiring screen time coaches, to figure it out.

Heather Kelly is a tech reporter at the Washington Post where she wrote about what these tech-managing experiments look like. She joined “Marketplace” host, Amy Scott, to talk about what parents are trying and what she’s hearing from people working in this emerging industry.

To hear their conversation, use the media player above.

Related Topics

Collections:

Latest Episodes

View All Shows
  • Marketplace Morning Report
    an hour ago
    6:50
  • Marketplace Tech
    6 hours ago
    8:28
  • Marketplace
    17 hours ago
    25:32
  • Make Me Smart
    2 days ago
    21:16
  • This Is Uncomfortable
    3 days ago
    4:41
  • Million Bazillion
    a month ago
    32:45