What Parents Think About Their Kids' Social Media and Smartphone Usage

Used in 3 entries

For each citing entry, the verbatim excerpt and Likelier's calculation notes (how the source's number was converted to the lifetime-probability framing) are shown below. Click through to read the full claim ledger.

1. [1] Child social media account access Decision · action side

   Statistic

   54% of parents felt they had to give their children social media because so many other families already had; 39% of parents who had given their child a smartphone wish they hadn't

   “"54% felt that they had to give their children social media, because so many other families had already done so. 39% of parents who had already given their child a smartphone said they wish they hadn't but they felt that they had to give in because so many of their children's friends already had one."”

   Calculation notes

   Harris Poll conducted February 21-27, 2025 for Let Grow. N=1,013 US parents aged 18+ with at least one child under 18, nationally representative online panel. IMPORTANT CONSTRUCT NOTE: the verbatim 54% figure measures felt social compulsion — "felt that they had to give their children social media, because so many other families had already done so" — NOT retrospective regret. The closest direct regret item in the same survey is the 39% smartphone figure ("said they wish they hadn't"), which is itself entangled with felt-compulsion and refers to smartphones, not social-media accounts. The action-side regret_rate (0.54) is therefore labeled as a felt-compulsion rate, not a clean "wish they hadn't" regret rate. The survey was commissioned by Let Grow and social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, who publicly advocate delaying social media access; Harris Poll is an independent polling organization, but the commissioning party should be weighed when interpreting the result.
   

   Source date: 2025-02-27 · Accessed: 2026-06-30

2. [2] Child smartphone timing Decision · action side

   Statistic

   39% of parents who had already given their child a smartphone said they wish they hadn't but felt they had to give in because so many of their children's friends already had one; 54% of parents who had allowed social media access said the same

   “"39% of parents who had given their child a smartphone said they wish they hadn't but felt they had to give in because so many of their children's friends already had one. 54% of parents who had allowed access to social media said they wish they hadn't."”

   Calculation notes

   Harris Poll, conducted February 21–27, 2025. N=1,013 US parents aged 18+ with at least one child under 18, nationally representative online panel. The 39% is a direct retrospective regret question among parents who had already given their child a smartphone. The question wording conflates regret with social-pressure rationalization ("wish they hadn't but felt they had to give in") — the true uncoerced regret rate may differ in either direction. Survey was commissioned in collaboration with social psychologist Jonathan Haidt, who publicly advocates delaying smartphones for children; this is a commissioning-party consideration, though Harris Poll is an independent polling organization. This is the most methodologically defensible nationally representative US figure for action-side parental regret about early smartphone provision.
   

   Source date: 2025-02-27 · Accessed: 2026-05-13

3. [3] Child smartphone timing Decision · inaction side

   Statistic

   Just 1% of parents said they wish they had given their child social media and smartphones earlier; by contrast, almost a third of parents whose children have social media, and nearly a quarter whose children have smartphones, say with hindsight they gave these things too young

   “"Almost a third of parents whose children have access to social media, and nearly a quarter whose children have smartphones, say that with the benefit of hindsight, they gave them these things too young. By contrast, just 1% of parents said they wish they'd given their kids social media and smartphones earlier."”

   Calculation notes

   Harris Poll, conducted February 21–27, 2025. N=1,013 US parents aged 18+ with at least one child under 18, nationally representative online panel; same survey as the action-side source. The "just 1% wish they'd given their kids social media and smartphones earlier" figure is a direct retrospective measure of inaction-side regret (parents who wish they had NOT delayed) — the closest available direct measure of regret about waiting. The inaction-side proxy rate (0.03) is set at 3% as a conservative upper bound, modestly above the survey's 1%, to account for wording ("earlier" is directional, not an explicit regret question) and for parents who delayed but whose regret is unmeasured. Earlier versions of this entry misattributed the 1% figure to an HMD/Perspectus press release, which does not contain it; the figure originates with this Harris Poll.
   

   Source date: 2025-02-27 · Accessed: 2026-07-01