Parenting in the social media age

Nolwazi Mnikwa

Relationships

TECHNOLOGY has strongly evolved in recent years and it appears to have brought with it its fair share of advantages and disadvantages. Prior to the introduction of cellphones, there was the use of landlines.

In our country, it is not every home that was privileged to have a landline. If a family member or friend needed to talk to someone without a landline, they would call someone within the community where the call recipient lived and would ask for the call recipient to be sent for, or they would leave a message. The introduction of cellphones enabled one to have access to a phone regardless of where they were. When cellphones were first introduced, they were accessible to only a few owing to the high prices.

Nowadays, however, cellphones are now accessible to anyone who desires one as there is a cellphone type designed to meet any kind of budget.

But what have cellphones got to do with social media and parenting, you may ask? Well, I would say read on to find out.

Cellphones have been designed to accommodate a number of social media applications such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, Telegram, LinkedIn and Pinterest. These are just a few of the social media applications available. Social media refers to applications and websites that can be used to create and share content virtually or to participate in social networking.

Social media helps keep people connected, entertained and it also helps motivate and inspire people. At the same time, too much time spent on social media results in a lack of productivity in the real life set up. But that is not what we are looking at today, we are looking at parenting in the social media age.

There is a growing trend where expecting mothers share their pregnancy journeys on reels, sharing their ups and downs, highs and lows, sharing on the experiences they have encountered and how they have been able to handle it. This is advantageous in that it can help an expectant mother cope with the different stages of her pregnancy through learning from others and identifying her experiences in the experiences of others.

Notably, it is not everything shared on social media that should be followed, but that which is appropriate can be incorporated, thus the need for the expectant mother to also do some research on the tips she gets from the social media reels. I started at the stage of a pregnant mother because parenting begins at pregnancy. When one is pregnant, there is the need to eat healthy, exercise and drink healthy drinks for the benefit of the baby, so parenting begins at the pregnancy stage.

There are reels that have been shared by some expecting fathers on how to support their wives during the pregnancy journey as well as on how to create a bond with the baby in the womb.

This is one of the benefits of social media to parenting in the social media age as an expecting father can learn some valuable tips on how to support his expecting wife as well as on how to build a relationship with his unborn baby.

Social media has also exposed previously dominant patriarchal communities and shown them that it is possible for a father to play an active role in their child’s life. Through social media, dads can be seen playing with their children, plaiting their daughter’s hair, changing their children’s diapers, taking their families on holiday and helping clean the house among a whole list of other activities that some dads share on their social media.

This is helpful to society in that it helps to show that the dad is more than a breadwinner but has a critical role to play in the life and upbringing of his children.

Through social media, some parents have drawn closer to their children as they are constantly in touch with their children and they also feel a part of their children’s lives. There are the dance challenges that often pop up and in these dance challenges, we see parents partaking in these challenges with their children which is an absolutely beautiful thing. It helps strengthen the bond between the parents and their children.

There are a whole lot more examples of how social media has positively contributed to parenting in this day and we can’t exhaust them in one article. I however, suppose that from the examples given above, you have an idea of how social media has positively contributed to parenting.

Just as there are advantages to something, there are also disadvantages. Social media has contributed to its fair share of trouble to parenting in this age. Some parent-child relationships have collapsed or broken down owing to social media. There are some parents who can’t seem to put their phones down; they are constantly on WhatsApp, Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, all at the expense of their children.

Their children are sidelined; they can’t seem to get the attention of their parents just because of social media. This is a terrible thing as children need the attention of their parents, they need to be shown love and they need to be attended to.

At the same time, there are children in their teenage years who have been negatively influenced by social media. They have taken the term, “following trends” to another level. They are driven by every new trend on social media regardless of whether it is good or bad and regardless of whether their parents approve of the trend or not. This has had a negative influence on parenting in the social media age as some parents are experiencing challenges in the behaviour of their children owing to social media.

Social media has both a positive and a negative impact on parenting in this age. It is advisable for both parents and children with access to social media to limit the amount of time spent on social media so they can focus on spending time as a family. It is also important for both parents and children to be mindful of what they take in from social media because not everything on social media is worth being taken in.

I would love to hear your thoughts, comments and feedback as well as relationship topics you would like to have covered. You may send these to [email protected] or to +263775978857. Keep safe and be blessed.