New amendment sets limits for social media, and parents should be more proactive than reactive.
By Butch Maier
The Virginia Consumer Data Protection Act includes an amendment, effective Jan. 1, 2026, to help limit children younger than 16 to one hour on a social media platform per day.
Dr. Heather Tedesco, a Virginia-based applied psychologist, has worked directly with approximately 1,000 families during her 15 years in private practice. Tedesco, who attended James Madison University as an undergraduate before earning her Ph.D. in social psychology from the University of Maryland, co-authored the book Raising a Kid Who Can: Simple Strategies to Build a Lifetime of Adaptability and Emotional Strength (2023, Workman Publishing Company).
Tedesco spoke at length about issues surrounding children and their technology time.
Coastal Virginia Magazine: In Virginia, there is a new amendment to a law this year that sets the limits on screen time for kids—though that is being challenged in the courts. Why is this amendment important?
Dr. Heather Tedesco: “I think anything that raises awareness about the potential harm of kids using social media and of kids using screens is really valuable. I think parents have been struggling with this issue since cellphones came into play. There’s a lot of early research that showed an increase in kids’ anxiety, depression, etc., that coincide with the introduction of the [smartphone]. No one can say causality, but it has been a very big issue for parents for 15 years. The research has been slow to catch up—as research tends to be—but over the past few years, there has been a lot of research that has come out to support the idea that technology and social media are changing kids’ brains, and—at least for a chunk of them—causing them significant harm.”
CVM: So, there’s a lot to unpack there. Can you steer me toward someone you trust as an expert who has done this research?
Tedesco: “Jean Twenge was the first national voice on this potential connection between cellphones and kids’ mental health. Jonathan Haidt wrote a really powerful book [The Anxious Generation, 2024]. The two of them are the leading voices, for sure in the U.S., and really, I would say, globally.”
CVM: What are some ways that kids’ brains are being changed by screen time and excessive social media use?
Tedesco: “There’s been research on attention span shifting, but I think the most concerning research is around the reward-and-motivation part of the brain. There’s a neurochemical called dopamine that’s responsible for both our drive and our pleasure. Social media and gaming, anything that gives us these little hits of reward, not only does that get us more—I wouldn’t say ‘addicted,’ that’s a tricky word—but drives us to use more screen time, it actually has more effects that are a little more subtle. One of the things that dopamine does is because the amount of dopamine we get when we get a like on a social media post or get to the next level in a video game, it’s a more intense amount—it’s an instant gratification reward that you don’t get from reading a book or doing a puzzle. And so, it’s not a fair fight, frankly, between these high-dopamine, instant-gratification activities and these delayed gratifications we are built to require a good amount of. It makes our ‘old-fashioned’ activities less enjoyable because of that contrast between the amount of dopamine.”
CVM: Such as what?
Tedesco: “Reading and any kind of hobby that doesn’t have that intense, ding-ding-ding, kind of reward. The stuff that we know for mental health are really important things.”
CVM: Putting together a puzzle…?
Tedesco: “Exactly.”
CVM: Playing capture the flag? A long game of some kind?
Tedesco: “Exactly. Monopoly versus a video game. Obviously, you have different kinds of enjoyment between the two. And it’s not that I don’t think there’s a place for video games, but we really, as parents, need to fight for balance for our kids so that they don’t have this motivation-reward system get hijacked. The other thing that dopamine does that’s concerning to people like me is it really does affect our drive and motivation. If you have ever fallen into the pattern of trying to reward your kids for something, you have learned already that you have to keep upping the ante if you want the same result. And that also happens with the dopamine rewards kids get from technology. So, suddenly, even what was very high dopamine—scrolling online, etc.—isn’t enough to give you that same ‘Yes!’ kind of feeling.”
CVM: In this law, the screen time limit for users under age 16 is one hour, but it’s not just one hour for the day, it’s one hour per platform. So, a kid could be on TikTok for an hour, Snapchat, Instagram, X, Facebook, YouTube—that’s six hours right there. How much screen time is enough? How much is too much?
Tedesco: “An hour on each platform is too much. I think that this law is most useful as an awareness generator.…I like the fact that the law gets the conversation going, and it does offer parents—theoretically, at least—more control, more ability to control. I have to say, I have been doing this a long time. I have yet to find a really motivated, tech-savvy kid who cannot work around whatever is being set, so I don’t think parents should be lulled into a false sense of security that they can just set it and forget it. Where technology and our kids is concerned, we must stay engaged.…In terms of knowing your kid, research is showing that there are certain characteristics that make some kids more vulnerable. That’s why there aren’t [specific mandates of] ‘every 8-year-old this, every 10-year-old that.’ I suggest to parents to proceed slowly and with caution whenever they’re dipping their toes in these waters.”
CVM: As in, if a child is on a screen for four hours, just get it down to three or get it to two?
Tedesco: “It’s a good question. If a kid is already on there for hours and hours, in some situations, drawing it back can help. But there are other situations that you sometimes just need to reboot it. And your kid is going to be pretty much equivalently upset if you cut it from four [hours] to one as if you cut it from four to two. Kids don’t always appreciate time in real terms.”
CVM: So, if they get upset the same way, you might as well just cut off their access.
Tedesco: “There is also some evidence that taking whole breaks—literally, a digital detox—can help reset a little bit of an equilibrium. So, I wouldn’t say that everyone should draw it back slowly.”
CVM: Maybe have a family social-free Saturday, where everybody—including parents—knocks it off, and you go out and play in the yard?
Tedesco: “You hit on a crucial point, which is that hypocrites are not influential. We can be hypocrites [as parents]. We’re just not going to accomplish what we think we are. To your point, no matter what the circumstances, there should be tech-free zones, activities, interactions, etc. One of the things, in terms of how technology has changed childhood, is that it is, in many cases, substituting real-life activities and interactions with digital ones, and they are not the same. We’re wired and required to have real-life activities. And kids and teens more than anyone.”
CVM: Do you have any other suggestions for parents?
Tedesco: “I think parents should be fighting for balance and keeping an eye. We tend, as human beings, to overdo the stuff that we like and to underdo, sometimes, the stuff that we need. For parents, if their kids are using social media later, limit it so kids aren’t on it late at night and missing sleep. And also, promote to your kids: Go meet up with your friend. Just have a telephone call instead of texting back and forth, back and forth. Kids don’t know what they haven’t experienced. They’re really concrete learners, so parents have to really educate and encourage the activities that kids are missing out on.…I always recommend that parents treat technology as a privilege—not a right. The same way you would treat, I think, access to a car for an older kid as a privilege—not a right. And we have a set of criteria. We don’t just give keys to 16-year-olds. We train them. We sit with them. We oversee their readiness, and as they become more and more skilled, we give them more and more freedom. I think that’s a good metaphor to think about with technology. And so, whether you are going to say, ‘You can be on screens for X amount of time, or from this time to that time,’ I think we should be saying, ‘You are not on screens after X o’clock,’ because we know that it interferes with sleep in a whole lot of different ways.”
For more information about Dr. Heather Tedesco, go to drtedesco.com.
Butch Maier
