331. Should Kids Have Smartphones? Rethinking Screens, Social Media, and Teens | Clare Morell, Author of The Tech Exit

Simple Farmhouse Life

Lisa Bass

Leisure, Home & Garden

4.9 • 2.1K Ratings

🗓️ 10 March 2026

⏱️ 56 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Smartphones, social media, and interactive screens are something many parents today are thinking carefully about, especially when it comes to their kids. In this episode, I’m joined by Clare Morrell to talk about what the research shows regarding how these technologies affect developing brains and family life. We discuss practical ways families can approach technology differently, from trying a 30-day tech detox to delaying smartphones and modeling healthier phone habits as parents. If you’re looking for thoughtful perspective and practical ideas for navigating screens in your home, this conversation will be the encouragement you need!

In this episode, we cover:

- Why smartphones and social media apps are intentionally designed to capture kids’ time, attention, and data

- The brain science behind dopamine hits and why interactive screens are uniquely addictive for children

- Why even short amounts of screen time can affect kids’ mood, focus, and behavior throughout the day

- The surprising limitations of parental controls and why they rarely give parents real oversight

- Distinguishing between passive technology (like watching a movie) and highly stimulating interactive media

- How excessive screen stimulation can dysregulate a child’s nervous system and mimic ADHD-like symptoms

- What families experience during a 30-day digital detox and the behavioral changes many notice within weeks

- Ground rules for a family tech reset, including which devices and activities are removed during detox

- Why addressing our own phone habits as parents—and modeling healthier technology boundaries—plays a critical role in helping kids succeed

- Alternative phone options that allow teens to communicate without introducing smartphone distractions

- How some families delay smartphones until late high school or adulthood and what they observe long term

- Navigating cultural pressures—from youth groups to employers—that assume every teen has a smartphone

- The bigger vision behind a “tech exit”: raising kids who prioritize real-world skills, creativity, and relationships over digital consumption

View full show notes on the blog + watch this episode on YouTube.

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RESOURCES MENTIONED

Get your copy of Clare’s book The Tech Exit at TheTechExit.com

Explore free resources to accompany the book, including screen-free activity ideas, a group discussion guide, and a tech-exit checklist

Follow along with more resources and updates at ClareMorell.substack.com

Interested in the Wisephone mentioned in this episode? Use code CLARE for $20 off

Master the rhythm of sourdough with confidence in my Simple Sourdough course

Gain the sewing knowledge and skills every homemaker needs in my Simple Sewing series

Keep all my favorite sourdough recipes at your fingertips in my Daily Sourdough cookbook

CONNECT

Clare Morell | Website | Instagram | Substack | X

See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0	When you're getting all these artificially high levels of dopamine from the screens,
0:03.6	it actually desensitizes you. Like you don't feel as much pleasure from real-world activities.
0:08.9	But then going off these screens, you know, for these 12 days, they actually started to enjoy things in real life again.
0:14.5	And so it made the screens less appealing. And so most of these families then, they said they got to 30 days.
0:19.6	This was going to be their trial period. But once they saw the changes in their kids and their homes, they were like, we have to keep going. Like, we don't want to go back to what life was like on the screens. My name is Lisa, mother of nine and creator of the blog and YouTube channel Farmhouse on Boone. On this podcast, I like to talk about simplifying your life so you can
0:38.2	live out your priorities. I help you learn how to cook from scratch and decorate on a budget through this
0:43.0	podcast and my courses Simple Sourdough in the Simple Sewing series. I will leave links to these
0:48.1	resources in the show notes and description box below. Now let's get into the show.
1:02.3	Welcome back to the Simple Farmhouse Life podcast. Today, Claire Morel and I are going to be chatting about one of my favorite topics, and that is technology and what it's doing to
1:08.5	us and how to protect our children from it. She wrote the book,
1:12.5	The Tech Exit. Now, just so you know, Miriam does end up sleeping through this entire interview.
1:18.3	So although she's distracting here in this intro, she won't be. I think you'll find this
1:22.0	discussion encouraging, especially if you feel like you've already failed in this area.
1:26.1	Now, Claire Marell is a mom writer writer, speaker, and tech policy expert helping families rethink
1:31.2	how technology fits into everyday life.
1:33.6	She's a fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center where she directs the technology
1:37.3	and human flourishing project and the author of The Tech Exit, a practical guide to freeing kids
1:42.4	and teens from smartphones and social media, a book offering
1:45.9	hopeful, practical steps for families ready to reclaim connection, curiosity, and real world
1:51.4	rhythms in a screen-saturated world. So let's dive in to this. I think you'll find a lot of this
1:57.6	discussion interesting. There were definitely some things that I learned,
2:01.2	even though I feel like I've been thinking about this a while, talking about this a while.
	...

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