Source: pixabay We tell adolescents all the time to be careful about what they post online, that it will live forever and define them well into their adult years. Certainly, we see some of the often negative effects of this when the past rears up a very public and ugly head. But what about information posted when you were too young to even know what social media was?
“Sharenting”—parents “sharing” their child’s stories and photos on social media beginning as early as their sonograms, and documenting all of their young lives’ trials and tribulations—has been all over the news recently, in newspapers and magazines, and now it is in legal journals as well. Stacey Steinberg, a law Professor at the University of Florida, just published an article discussing the tensions between parents’ legal rights as guardians and children’s rights to privacy. There are no easy answers, but there are several good reasons to be extremely careful about sharing your child’s life online. Obviously, there are issues of safety: Once something is online, it is freely available to others who may not have good intentions. And, of course, issues that these postings will follow your child throughout their life—into school where their peers may see it and use it to tease and bully them, and through to adulthood when it could have repercussions for educational and professional opportunities.
But there is another reason to be cautious about creating an online identity for your child—and that is the question of whose identity is it? In my new book, Family Narratives and the Development of an Autobiographical Self, I describe research both from my Family Narratives Lab and many other research institutes documenting the powerful positive effects of parents sharing family stories with their young children. Parents who talk with preschoolers about the past in more elaborative and emotionally engaged ways have children who develop better memory skills, better literacy skills, better emotion understanding and regulation, a more differentiated sense of self and higher self-esteem. As we share the past with our young children, we help them understand their experiences in more coherent ways and this helps them to think about themselves and others in more complex ways, helping to build empathy and a sense of fairness. Reminiscing together about the past builds a shared history that bonds us emotionally across time, and helps children feel anchored and secure as they move outside of the home and into more complicated social worlds.
But these are stories that are shared together, that are created between parent and child, and where the child has an opportunity to disagree and negotiate not just about what happened but how the child felt and what it meant to them. When parents post about their children online, they may be undermining the children’s sense of ownership over their own experiences: The story is being told about them without their input. And then, years later, they discover these stories, stories they did not participate in creating, yet these stories define them. This can feel like an invasion of privacy, or even worse, can lead to feeling alienated.
I am not sure what the “right” answer is here: to post or not to post? But I do know that children want and need to share their own stories with others, to create their own identity with the help of supportive parents who help shape their stories together. Maybe before you share that story with the world, sit down and share that story with your child. Help them build a coherent story of what happened and why it was so funny, endearing, or heartbreaking. These stories will provide a positive foundation for your child as they enter more complicated social worlds, both in person and online. Help your child create their own identity through the stories you share together.