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Speaker 1: It's the Happy Families podcast. It's the podcast for the

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Speaker 1: time poor parent who just once answers.

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Speaker 2: Now, the more involved Dad is and the more Dad

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Speaker 2: feels like he can be helpful, the better it is

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Speaker 2: for his mental health.

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Speaker 1: And now here's the stars of our show, my mum

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Speaker 1: and Dad.

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Speaker 2: Good night. It's doctor Justin Colson, the author of six

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Speaker 2: books about raising happy families and the founder of Happy

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Speaker 2: Families dot com dot au. I'm here with Kylie, missus,

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Speaker 2: happy family's wife and co host for the Happy Families podcasts.

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Speaker 3: We received some wonderful feedback five star review our daily habit.

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Speaker 3: This is by Surreybomb. She says, my husband and I

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Speaker 3: started listening to Justin and Kylie to get a jump

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Speaker 3: start on making our family happier. We have a nine

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Speaker 3: month old daughter. That's a wonderful jump start.

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Speaker 2: We're making getting into it early.

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Speaker 3: That's great and we feel well equipped and positively challenged

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Speaker 3: to change our family's future. Kylie, you represent the mother's

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Speaker 3: heart so well and los Kylie and Justin get in

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Speaker 3: our day to day lives.

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Speaker 1: Now.

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Speaker 2: H that's what a great review. Five stars. Thank you

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Speaker 2: so much? Was it? Sariy Bomb? Sary Bomb, We really

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Speaker 2: appreciate that. It's the five star ratings and reviews that

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Speaker 2: you send through that help other people to find out

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Speaker 2: about the podcast and make their family happier. Now, every

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Speaker 2: second Thursday or thereabouts, we have a podcast duly devoted

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Speaker 2: totally devoted.

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Speaker 3: To you geeking out.

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Speaker 2: Oh, come on like that. So, research scientists don't usually

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Speaker 2: do the best job in the world of getting their

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Speaker 2: research findings out into the public domain. And what I

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Speaker 2: do is I get a whole lot of research papers

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Speaker 2: come across my desk every week. Every few days, I

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Speaker 2: get another pile of them, and I sift through them

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Speaker 2: and find the stuff that I think is most interesting

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Speaker 2: for us to talk about, to get the science from

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Speaker 2: the academic institutions into the real world. And that's what

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Speaker 2: we're going to talk about today. We have three different

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Speaker 2: reports that I am going to tell you about. Which

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Speaker 2: one do you want to play with first time?

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Speaker 3: Well, the first one was published in Child Development out

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Speaker 3: of Concordia University, and it talks about problematic Internet use

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Speaker 3: and link that that has with depression.

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Speaker 2: Okay, So PIU is the academic term that psychology researchers

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Speaker 2: use to talk about whether somebody's using the internet too

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Speaker 2: much or not or using their screens too much. Normal

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Speaker 2: people say, oh, my kids are addicted, but psychologists don't

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Speaker 2: like to use that term because addiction has a whole

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Speaker 2: lot of it has a whole lot of clinical significance,

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Speaker 2: and so we talk about compulsive internet use or problematic

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Speaker 2: internet use. And this was research from Helsinki, really really

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Speaker 2: well done research. Actually seventeen hundred and fifty high school

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Speaker 2: students followed over three years age between sixteen and nineteen,

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Speaker 2: and the research has looked at three things that could

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Speaker 2: predict whether somebody is going to have problematic internet use

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Speaker 2: or not. You haven't seen this research, so let me

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Speaker 2: ask you, what do you think would predict whether or

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Speaker 2: not a child's going to have problematic internet use?

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Speaker 3: So, whether or not their parents actually have conversations with

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Speaker 3: them around usage and limits like.

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Speaker 2: Boundaries, great behavior or parenting practice was one of the

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Speaker 2: predictors of whether or not those teenagers would have problematic

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Speaker 2: internet use or not. What the research is basically find

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Speaker 2: is that better parenting is linked to lower problematic internet use,

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Speaker 2: and better parenting is a composition of being warm and strict,

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Speaker 2: and you have to be both at the same time.

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Speaker 2: That is when you're enforcing limits. You've got to do

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Speaker 2: it with a really warm connection. You've got to actually

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Speaker 2: maintain the bond. You can't sever the connection between parent

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Speaker 2: and child. So when we are not parenting right, our

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Speaker 2: children are much more likely to engage in problematic internet use.

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Speaker 2: There was a couple of other outcomes that they found.

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Speaker 2: What do you reckon?

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Speaker 3: I think friends will have a huge impact.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, you could be a psychologist. You're doing You're doing

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Speaker 2: really well with this. The other one that they came

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Speaker 2: up with was loneliness, defined as a lack of satisfying

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Speaker 2: in a personal relationships or the perceived inadequacy of social networks.

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Speaker 2: So they're the two main predictors loneliness, kids just feeling

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Speaker 2: isolated and secondly parents either parenting well or not linking

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Speaker 2: that to problematic internet use. The other thing that they

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Speaker 2: looked at was gender. They found that boys are more

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Speaker 2: likely to engage in problematic internet use than girls because

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Speaker 2: they tend to be more prone to addictive like behavior.

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Speaker 2: They're more impulsive, and as other studies have shown, they've

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Speaker 2: got more online options like gaming, watching YouTube, looking at pornography.

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Speaker 2: Girls are less likely to do any of those things.

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Speaker 2: They still do those things, but not as much as boys.

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Speaker 2: Girls are much more likely to just be online for

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Speaker 2: socializing purposes.

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Speaker 3: What's a couple of things that we can do as

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Speaker 3: parents to help with this problematic internet use?

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Speaker 2: Okay, so this is really important because what these researchers

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Speaker 2: found is not only do those three things predict problematic

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Speaker 2: internet use, but once problematic internet use is embedded and

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Speaker 2: is an issue, those children who have PIU experienced high

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Speaker 2: levels of substance abuse, lower levels of academic achievement, and

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Speaker 2: they're more likely to experience depression and other mental health issues.

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Speaker 2: So I think the first thing is that we want

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Speaker 2: to help our children to lead whole and balanced lives.

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Speaker 2: That is, they need to be socially connected in real life.

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Speaker 2: And I know that's hard because sometimes we've got quiet

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Speaker 2: kids or kids that are a little bit I don't know,

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Speaker 2: a bit dorky, you're a bit geeky, or a bit

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Speaker 2: socially awkward. And I'm not saying those words in unkind ways.

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Speaker 2: I mean we all have those moments where a bit

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Speaker 2: like that. They're teenagers, they're supposed to be trying to

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Speaker 2: figure it out. Our job, therefore, as parents is to

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Speaker 2: somehow guide them towards some sort of physical activity, some

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Speaker 2: kind of art or theater, some kind of something outside

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Speaker 2: of their bedroom and away from their screen, so they

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Speaker 2: can be physically active, so they can be mentally alert,

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Speaker 2: so they can be socially engaged. Helping them to do

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Speaker 2: that is going to tick off that first thing of

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Speaker 2: being lonely, because they're going to be active and engaged. Secondly,

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Speaker 2: as parents, we've got to maintain that connection with them.

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Speaker 2: We cannot sever the connection no matter how frustrating they are.

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Speaker 2: And Thirdly, stay connected to them no matter what's going on.

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Speaker 2: This means that we've got to establish boundaries with them.

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Speaker 2: And I think the three is of effective discipline that

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Speaker 2: I talk about all the time, Exploring, explaining, and empowering

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Speaker 2: are going to be the best method to move through

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Speaker 2: that for people who are not familiar with them. We've

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Speaker 2: got plenty of podcasts where I talk about it, and

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Speaker 2: i'll direct you to there for now. In just a

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Speaker 2: sec we're going to talk about the other two research

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Speaker 2: findings that have come across the Doctor's Desk. We're going

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Speaker 2: to talk about how parents can get over involved in

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Speaker 2: their children's lives and what it does to their children

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Speaker 2: and what dad's being involved with their infants does for

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Speaker 2: their well being.

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Speaker 1: It's their Happy Famili's podcast.

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Speaker 2: For a happier family.

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Speaker 3: Try a Happy Families membership, because a happy family doesn't

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Speaker 3: just happen.

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Speaker 2: Details at happy Families dot com dot Au.

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Speaker 3: It's the Happy Families podcast, the podcast for the time

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Speaker 3: poor parent who just wants answers Now and today we

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Speaker 3: are exploring a bit of research that's come across the

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Speaker 3: doctor's desk.

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Speaker 2: You're the doctor for today, I am, well, actually all

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Speaker 2: the time. So we've got two other pieces of research

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Speaker 2: that I think are really worth exploring right now.

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Speaker 3: The second one comes out of a article that was

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Speaker 3: published in the Frontiers and Psychology Journal, and it talks

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Speaker 3: specifically about what happens to dads as they become more

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Speaker 3: involved in the care of their infants.

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Speaker 2: So this was a really nice study. It's consistent with

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Speaker 2: what other research has shown for a while now, but

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Speaker 2: I wanted to highlight it because we're getting this really

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Speaker 2: nice what we call a signature of evidence. There's been

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Speaker 2: different bits and pieces trickling through for a few years

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Speaker 2: about dad's involvement with their young children, their newborns through

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Speaker 2: the first year or two of life. And this is

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Speaker 2: an extension of that. A few years ago I was

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Speaker 2: working with Beyond Blue on something that was a big

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Speaker 2: program all about dads. There were some fantastic resources that

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Speaker 2: were created all about giving dad vice, which is advice

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Speaker 2: for dad's. Do you like that dadvice? It's still available

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Speaker 2: with Beyond Blue. You can actually look it up and

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Speaker 2: watch the videos. It's really really great. But there's this

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Speaker 2: called postnatal depression for dads. That is when some mums

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Speaker 2: get postnatal depression, so dad's. In fact, sometimes mums don't

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Speaker 2: get it and dads still get it after the birth

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Speaker 2: of a baby. And some people sort of over the

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Speaker 2: years of rob their eyes and say, oh, come on,

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Speaker 2: it's not really a thing, but the evidence shows that

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Speaker 2: it is.

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Speaker 3: There is so much that changes in that first year

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Speaker 3: of life together. Yeah, your relationship morphs so many different

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Speaker 3: times in that first year.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, once that baby is born, everything changes. Availability to

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Speaker 2: be awake and talk to each other, to connect, to

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Speaker 2: have the adult conversations, and then there's the stresses that

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Speaker 2: come with having a child. So what this research showed

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Speaker 2: was that fathers who have what we call greater parental

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Speaker 2: self efficacy, that is parental self efficacy basically means a

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Speaker 2: dad who knows believes he knows how to be helpful,

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Speaker 2: whether it's changing the baby's nappy or picking up an

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Speaker 2: unhappy child, or assisting with the feeding, of playing with

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Speaker 2: them and tickling them, whatever it is. If you feel

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Speaker 2: like you've got self efficacy in something, you feel like

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Speaker 2: you can do it. So dads who had greater parental

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Speaker 2: self efficacy they spent more time with their kids number one,

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Speaker 2: which kind of makes sense. If you feel like you're

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Speaker 2: not self efficacious, you're not going to spend time with

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Speaker 2: the child, But if you do feel that, then you're

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Speaker 2: not going to be so scared of being around them.

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Speaker 2: But they also number one provided more material support for

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Speaker 2: the child a month after birth, and they showed less

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Speaker 2: depression during the baby's first year of life. And this

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Speaker 2: didn't matter whether they were well educated or not. It

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Speaker 2: didn't matter what their financial means were, age, ethnicity, none

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Speaker 2: of that mattered, whether they were cohabiting or married. The

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Speaker 2: more involved dad is and the more dad feels like

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Speaker 2: he can be helpful, the better it is for his

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Speaker 2: mental health. Now, there's research that shows that it's good

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Speaker 2: for everybody when that's happening. We've talked about that recently,

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Speaker 2: lightning the cognitive load. But it's especially good for dads.

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Speaker 2: The more involved they are, the happier and healthier they are.

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Speaker 3: So I guess to take home for me listening to

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Speaker 3: this and I'm seeing that there's some take homes for

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Speaker 3: both mums and dads out of this research. What would

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Speaker 3: you suggest mums can do to help with this process?

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Speaker 2: Let dad be involved every now and they're going to

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Speaker 2: hear these stories about very very protective mums or mums

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Speaker 2: who just don't really believe that much in the confidence

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Speaker 2: of dad. I mean, this research actually held across even

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Speaker 2: dads who are absent. You know, they're not living with mum,

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Speaker 2: they're not living with the baby. The more they can

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Speaker 2: be involved, the less likely it is that they'll have depression.

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Speaker 2: And the less likely they have it is that they'll

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Speaker 2: have depression. Guess what, the more involved they can be.

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Speaker 2: In fact, we don't know whether it's being involved with

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Speaker 2: the baby that reduces depression or whether it's people who

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Speaker 2: have got less depression and more likely to be involved

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Speaker 2: with the baby. We still can't figure that out. But

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Speaker 2: what we do know is that these two things happen together.

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Speaker 2: So I would say, get dad involved with the child.

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Speaker 2: It's better for the child and it's also better for

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Speaker 2: the dad. So get dad involved early and often. And second,

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Speaker 2: mums bring dad in, teach him how, induct him, learn

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Speaker 2: to together, figure it out together. Because paternal depression is

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Speaker 2: a really serious issue. It requires attention and we're all

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Speaker 2: going to be better off if nobody's dealing with any

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Speaker 2: kind of postpartum depression of any kind, whether it's mum

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Speaker 2: or dad. That's kind of the take home message. Let's

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Speaker 2: get everyone involved, and let's encourage that involvement and teach

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Speaker 2: how to be involved. I love that number three, Lucky.

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Speaker 3: Last research came out of Stanford, published in the Journal

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Speaker 3: of Family Psychology reveals the impact of too much parental

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Speaker 3: direction with our children.

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Speaker 2: This is really interesting. I've written about this previously, but

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Speaker 2: I really really love this piece of research. As from

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Speaker 2: the Stanford Graduate School of Education. As you said, in

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Speaker 2: this study, the researchers were observing parents when their kindergarten

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Speaker 2: age kids age between four and six were actively engaged

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Speaker 2: in playing and cleaning up toys and learning a new

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Speaker 2: game and discussing a problem. It was a twenty five

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Speaker 2: minute scenario and what happened was that you'll ldren of

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Speaker 2: parents who more often stepped in to provide instructions or

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Speaker 2: corrections or suggestions, or to ask questions despite the child

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Speaker 2: being appropriately on task and engaged with what was going on,

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Speaker 2: Those children displayed more difficulty in regulating their behavior and

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Speaker 2: their emotions at other times. The kids in this situation

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Speaker 2: also performed worse on tasks that measured delayed gratification and

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Speaker 2: other executive functions, skills associated with impulse control and the

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Speaker 2: ability to shift between competing demands for attention in a nutshell,

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Speaker 2: when parents intrude and take the lead and children already

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Speaker 2: engaged in something, that is, when parents step in and

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Speaker 2: start to become controlling, we get lousy outcomes with our kids.

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Speaker 2: They don't know how to regulate, they don't know how

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Speaker 2: to control themselves, they don't know how to shift from

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Speaker 2: one task to another. They keep on looking to the

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Speaker 2: parents to take the lead, and we actually undermine their

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Speaker 2: learning and development.

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Speaker 3: Well how did they figure that out?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a really clever study. Actually, So each parent

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Speaker 2: and child's observe separately. They're not all in a big

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Speaker 2: room parent and child together, And normally what will happen

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Speaker 2: is the parent child diad will be observed over a

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Speaker 2: ten minute or twenty minute or a one hour period,

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Speaker 2: and then there'll be a rating given based on the

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Speaker 2: quality of the interaction. But what these researchers did was

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Speaker 2: they recorded the twenty five minute activity and then they

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Speaker 2: broke it down second by second, and it literally evaluated

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Speaker 2: each second of interaction independently, which means that we're not

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Speaker 2: getting this sort of overall view of what's going on.

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Speaker 2: We're literally getting a second by second viewpoint, which helps

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Speaker 2: us then to see exactly what's going on. So they

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Speaker 2: were broken down second by second, and that way they

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Speaker 2: can be evaluated independently. As an example, during this twenty

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Speaker 2: five minute activity, a mom might be following her son's

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Speaker 2: lead for thirteen seconds and then she sort of withdraws,

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Speaker 2: looks at a phone for five or ten seconds, and

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Speaker 2: then she steps in and says no, no, no, no, like this,

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Speaker 2: and she shows him how to do it and takes

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Speaker 2: over for thirty five seconds. And that way they're getting

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Speaker 2: this really really deep insight, this beautiful look at what's

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Speaker 2: actually going on, and the results speak for themselves. The

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Speaker 2: more involved we are, which which is kind of interesting, right,

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Speaker 2: because we're always sad that we have to be involved,

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Speaker 2: but we just have to be present to help when

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Speaker 2: they're struggling. The research shows when they're struggling by all means,

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Speaker 2: gently ask how you can help, but don't do it

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Speaker 2: for them. But what these researchers found was that when

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Speaker 2: the parents stepped in, suboptimal results helicopter parenting and it's

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Speaker 2: lousy for our kids.

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Speaker 3: You know, parenting is just such a mind field of

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Speaker 3: contradiction and advice. We can everywhere we look somebody's giving

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Speaker 3: us advice. So we really hope that today's podcast you've

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Speaker 3: been able to navigate that mindfield just a little bit

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Speaker 3: easier as a result of the things that we've shared

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Speaker 3: from the doctor's desk.

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Speaker 2: The Happy Family's podcast is produced by Justin Ruhlan from

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Speaker 2: Bridge Media. Our executive producer is Craig Bruce. For more

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Speaker 2: information about making you family happier, visit happy families dot

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Speaker 2: com dot au

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Speaker 1: In Colle