Bengaluru, 6 March

Appreciating Chief Minister Siddaramaiah’s move to ban social media for children under 16 years of age, Dr Saritha Nagaraj, Psychology and Child Development consultant, Motherhood Hospital, here said it would help address a range of mental health issues afflicting them.

With this, the risk of poor mental health among children and teenagers — including symptoms of depression, anxiety, poor sleep, and body image issues arising from unhealthy comparisons, which can further lead to disordered eating — will be reduced, Dr Nagraj asserted.

"Their cognitive performance and emotional regulation are also likely to improve. Exposure to dangerous content will decrease, and this could help improve attention span as well as academic performance," she added.

Dr Rakshay Shetty, Clinical Director, Pediatric Services Head, Pediatric Intensive Care Services, Rainbow Children's Hospital, said that while there are a lot of disadvantages of excess use of mobile devices in children, considering their ill-effects on their psychology, at the same time, it provides a lot of practical utility for parents, teachers, and children.

"We need to look at a balanced solution because a blanket ban can be counterproductive since implementing it is not practical, and it might remain like a paper tiger where there is a rule, but no one follows it. Instead, giving guidelines on how to practically use mobile devices and limit their excess use would be more practical," he said.

More than the government, the role of parents is important in monitoring children, understanding the harms of excess mobile use, cyberbullying, and addiction to online games, and protecting them, he added.

BJP Rajya Sabha MP Lahar Singh Siroya, welcoming the move in a post on 'X', said he had raised this issue via a special mention in parliament.

"Prime Minister (Narendra) Modi had also spoken about securing the interest of our younger generations at the AI summit, recently. I had further asked for restrictions on smartphone use among children in my parliamentary speech. I hope this, too, will be looked into seriously," he said.