Many parents are concerned about how exposure to technology might affect young children’s development. We know that our preschoolers are acquiring new social and cognitive skills at an impressive rate, and we don’t want hours glued to an electronic device to impede this. But adolescence is an equally important and rapidly developing period. Too few of us are paying attention to how our teens’ technology use (far more intense and intimate than that of a 3-year-old playing with his dad’s phone) affects them. Experts worry that social networking and texting, which have become essential to teenage life, promote anxiety and lower self-esteem.

Many essay topics are devoted to this problem, and recent research says this may be a good reason to worry. In a survey conducted by the Royal Society of Public Health, 14- to 24-year-olds in Great Britain were asked how social media platforms impacted their health and well-being. The survey results found that Snapchat, Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram increased feelings of depression, anxiety, poor body image, and loneliness.

Indirect communication

Teens can keep busy hours after school and even long after bedtime. When they’re not doing their homework (and when they are), they’re online and on their phones, texting, sharing, trolling, scrolling, whatever.

Of course, before everyone had an Instagram account, teens were also busy, but they were more likely to talk on the phone or in person when they were at the mall. While it may have seemed like a lot of pointless meetings, they were experimenting, testing skills, succeeding, and failing in hundreds of small, real-time interactions, which today’s kids need to catch up on. For their part, modern teenagers are learning to communicate mainly while looking at a screen, not at another person.

Cyberbullying and imposter syndrome

The other big danger of kids communicating more indirectly is that it has become easier to be cruel. “Kids are sending all kinds of messages they wouldn’t dream of saying to anyone’s face,” says Donna Wick, EdD, a clinical and developmental psychologist. She notes that this seems especially true for girls, who generally dislike disagreeing with their friends in “real life.”

Acceptance among their peers is essential to teens, and many of them care about their image as much as a politician running for office, and for them, it can feel that serious. Add to that the fact that kids today get real survey data about how much people like them or how they look, through things like “likes.” It’s enough to turn anyone’s head – who wouldn’t want to look “better” if they can? So kids can spend hours clipping their identities online, trying to project an idealized image. Teenage girls sort through hundreds of photos, with tremendous angst over which ones to post online. Teenage boys compete for attention, trying to outdo each other and pushing boundaries as much as possible in the uninhibited online atmosphere. They gang up on each other.

Teens have always been doing this, but with the advent of social networking, they face more opportunities and more pitfalls than ever before. When kids check social media posts and see how good everyone looks, it only adds to the pressure. We’re used to worrying about the impractical ideals that digitally retouched magazine models give our kids, but what happens when the kid next door is also retouched? Even more confusing, what happens when our profile doesn’t represent the person we feel we are inside?

Stalking (and being ignored)

Another big change with new technology, especially smartphones, is that we are never really alone. Kids update their statuses, share what they’re watching, listening to, and reading, and have apps that let their friends know their specific location on a map at all times. Even if someone is not trying to keep their friends updated, they will always be in the range of a text message. The result is that kids feel hyper-connected to each other. The conversation never has to stop, and there is something new happening all the time.

Everyone needs a break from the demands of intimacy and connection, time alone to reorganize, replenish or just relax. When you don’t have that, it’s easy to become emotionally drained and fertile ground for anxiety to breed.

Similarly, it’s surprisingly easy to feel lonely amid all that hyperconnectedness. For one thing, kids now know with depressing certainty when they’re being ignored. We all have phones, and we all respond to things pretty quickly, so the silence can be deafening when you’re waiting for a response that doesn’t come. The silent treatment can be a strategic insult or just the unfortunate side effect of a teenage online relationship that starts intense but then fizzles out.

“In the olden days, when a kid was going to break up with you he had to have a conversation with you. Or at least he had to call,” says Dr. Wick. “These days, he might disappear from your screen, and you might never get to discuss… what did I do?” Children are often left imagining the worst about themselves.

But even when the conversation doesn’t break, being constantly alert can cause anxiety. We can feel like we are being left out, and we make others leave out, and our human need to communicate is also effectively delegated in that way.

What should parents do?

Both experts interviewed for this article agreed that the best thing parents can do to minimize the risks associated with technology is first to reduce their own consumption. It’s up to parents to set an excellent example of what healthy computer use looks like. Most of us check our phones or e-mail very frequently, either out of real interest or nervous habit. Children should be used to seeing our faces, not our heads bent over a screen. Establish technology-free zones in the house and technology-free hours when no one uses the phone, including mom and dad. “Don’t walk through the door when you come home from work in the middle of a conversation,” advises Dr. Steiner-Adair. “Don’t walk through the door when you get home from work, say a quick ‘hello’ and then ‘just start checking your e-mail.’ In the morning, get up half an hour before your children and check your e-mail then. Give them your full attention until they walk out the door. And neither of you should use your phones on the way to or from school because that’s an important time to talk.”

Limiting the amount of time you spend connected to computers not only provides a healthy counterpoint to the technology-obsessed world, it also strengthens the parent-child bond and makes children feel more secure. Kids need to know that you are available to help them with their problems, talk about their day, or to give them a realistic perspective.

Outside of online services, the best advice to help kids develop healthy self-esteem is to get involved in something that interests them. It could be sports or music, or taking apart computers or volunteering, anything that sparks interest and gives them confidence. When children learn to feel good about what they can do, rather than how they look and what they own, they are happier and better prepared for success in real life. That most of these activities also include interacting with peers face-to-face is just the icing on the cake.