Your device policy: Does it apply to your adult children?
The Art and Science of Parenting #54
By: Catherine Lynch and Glenn Collins
Dear Awesome Parent,
Yes, we are still talking about devices! Last week was all about creating a device policy, and it was really geared toward parents of littles. But what if your kids aren’t little? This week we talk about the device policy in our own home, how it applies to us, our grown kids, and what one adult son thinks of it.
Your device policy: Does it apply to your adult children?
Recently we got a question from a reader: “Is there a place for a device policy that applies to your adult children?” For us, the answer is yes. But as usual, context matters. A lot.
Every family’s situation is different. Here’s what our’s looks like: Our 28 year old son and 20 year old grandson live with us, work full-time, and contribute to the household. We don’t have a “device policy” for them or our other adult kids. What we have instead is a house device policy that applies to the common areas of the house. And the policy includes us - we follow it too.
It’s very simple and the whole goal is to facilitate connection between the members of our home. (It’s also the same rules we had governing device use in the public area of our house when our kids were younger and all living with us.)
Here’s our house device rules:
Eating Together: No devices at the table when we’re eating together as a family. Note: This does not apply if you’re eating alone, have friends over, or the World Cup is on during dinner.
Earbuds: You can only wear one when you’re in public space like the kitchen or living room because people should be able to talk to you without having to work hard to get your attention.
We called our adult son while we were working on this article. The convo went something like this:
Us: Hey son, we’re writing an article about our house device policy. You know, the rules of no devices at the table during dinner and only one ear bud in when you’re in the public part of the house. How do you feel about those rules?
Our son: “I don’t follow them because they’re the rules, I follow them because it’s the right thing to do.”
Friends, we have to tell you: That made our hearts happy. Our kid chooses to follow the rules because it’s the right thing to do, not just because they’re the rules. Do you know what that means??? That means our boy picked up the values behind the rules! Our parenting efforts actually worked! Woohoo! Do the happy dance with us!!!
A few more details:
We don’t have a device policy for non-public areas of the house. Our son and grandson are adults and we respect that. They decide what they do on their devices, how much, and how late they stay up doing it.
Our adult children who don’t live at home follow the same rules when they come to visit.
We don’t impose our device rules on our daughter-in-laws or our son-in-laws. That said, they generally follow their spouse’s lead, which means they end up following our rules.
We don’t impose our device rules on our grandchildren when their parents are present - we let their parents handle their device usage.
We don’t call it “A device policy” or “Our device rules”… it’s just how we do it at our house. It’s how we’ve decided to live our lives. It’s part of our family culture.
Why does it work for us?
In-person connection is one of our core values, and the house rules reflect that - they’re not just random rules. Our kids know and respect that - it’s how we raised them. They didn’t always appreciate it when they were young, but now they’re grown, they get it. It’s something they value, too. When they’re at our house, they’re there to visit us.
We’re respectful. We’re not trying to control their lives, we’re just making it easier for family members to talk and connect with each other when they’re in the public part of the house.
We’re not trying to control the devices. We’re simply prioritizing ease of connection with the people who live in the house. When connection is a priority, devices are (often) a third wheel that gets in the way of our primary goal: enjoying the company of the people we love.
We’re not dogmatic about it. Our kids are adults with busy lives. They have jobs, spouses, kids, and friends - and not a ton of free time. Like everyone these days, they’re connected by their phones to the rest of their lives. If a text comes in that they want to respond to, they do so. It’s not a big deal.
The rules haven’t changed. We’re using the same standards in the common areas of the house that they grew up with.
Back to the original question from our reader: “Is there a place for a device policy that applies to our adult children?”
As you can see, our answer is yes. It all boils down to our values and what we want to prioritize in our home with our adult kids. We have a house device policy because we value connection with the people we love and live with. We all have busy lives, and it’s easy to completely miss opportunities for connection because we’re on our devices. We decided our device policy should reflect our values: The people we love and live with are more important than our devices.
Want to create a device policy for your house, or for the adults in your house? Here’s a few ideas to get you started:
Get clear on your goals. Having a clear idea of what you hope to achieve with your device policy is the first step to making it happen. Here are some questions to get you started:
What are your values, and how do devices support or undermine them?
How is device use affecting the emotional tone of your house?
If you could change only one thing about device use in your home, what would it be?
The answers to these questions will help you get clarity on your goals and give you a place to start.
Mindset. “This is a work in progress. An experiment. We’ll see how it goes.” If your new device policy results in less of what you want (good times and connection with the people you love) then obviously it’s doing the opposite of what you’ve set out to do and you need to rework it. Iterate, iterate, iterate.
Work. Many businesses require their employees to respond to texts and calls even when they’re “off”, so take that into consideration when implementing a device policy that will effect your young adult kids.
School. Collaboration is a big part of education, so young adults in college are expected to be available to work on projects with their peers. Make allowances in the house device policy for their obligations at school.
The state of your relationship. The better your relationship with your kid, the more willing they are to:
Listen to what you have to say.
Go along with what you propose.
Give you the benefit of the doubt.
The converse of these is also true, so take the current state of your relationship into consideration when thinking about making any changes to the house device policy. If your relationship needs work, improve it first. Then work on your device policy. See this newsletter of ours on the Magic 5:1 Relationship Ratio for how to improve your relationship.
Conversations. If you decide you’d like to change how the adults in the house use their devices, talk to your kid and your spouse about it. Have conversations. Express how the current situation makes you feel and what you would like to see change. Get their input. Don’t simply decree “This is the new device policy”. Your adult child is an adult, not a little kid anymore. You can’t just make them follow your rules. Trying to impose restrictions on their device usage without their buy-in is guaranteed to have a negative impact on your relationship with them.
Start slow. People don’t like change, so start slow. What might that look like? If you’re recreating our policy (which is not our goal, by the way) starting slow might look like this: One meal a week without devices. One day a week with only one earbud in when in the public area of the house. Talk about what worked, what didn’t, and why. Make a change and try agin.
Pro tip: If the norm is for everyone to be on their device during meals and you go to a “no devices” policy during meals, make sure you have something interesting cued up to talk about… Something your adult kid would be interested in - popular culture, a favorite game or movie, their favorite sport or team. If you’re feeling extra brave: politics or religion (!!!)
A Final Note: A device policy is only one facet of the much bigger puzzle of how to live harmoniously with adult children. We’ll delve into that in a future issue!
Do you have a particular situation in mind, or a specific question? We’d love to hear about it.
King of the rock pile
A brown anole staking out his territory on a warm spring day.
"I follow them because it’s the right thing to do." A great article. But this says it all.
Thank you so much for this. Simple conversations at the dinner table, comfortable silence without devices are moments I miss most. A home device policy would greatly help.