According to a 2024 Pew Research Center survey, 95% of teens have access to a smartphone. Nearly half say they are “almost constantly” online.
For most teens, social media is an important part of everyday life. By staying informed, parents can learn how to monitor their teens' social media use and help them navigate these platforms with care.
Some parents may have challenges keeping up with their technologically savvy teen. Teens can teach their parents a great deal about use of technologies. This can be a good way for parents and teens to co-create family rules and expectations and interact with the teen as the expert.
How to help your teens develop healthy social media habits
Parents and caregivers need to know more about how social media works and how their teens are using these sites and apps. Parents can help teens find credible, helpful websites and teach them to be critical consumers of information.
Create your own profile to learn how the sites used by your teen work. Ask them for help to learn how much they know about the virtual world.
When your teen creates a personal profile, make sure you are on the same platform so you can monitor their activities. Most social media platforms have an age requirement of 13 before teens are allowed to create their own profiles.
Engage in ongoing conversations with teens about online citizenship and safety, including treating others with respect, avoiding cyberbullying and sexting (sending sexually explicit photographs or messages), being wary of online solicitation, and avoiding communication that can put personal privacy and safety at risk.
Be clear about what is unsafe to post. This includes sharing their full name, address, specific places they go, phone numbers, vacation plans, or anything else that would help someone identify or locate them.
Remind teens that once something is posted online, it is no longer private, even if they think it has been deleted.
Work with teens to choose appropriate privacy settings for their social media accounts. Social media sites provide tools for parents on how to set privacy settings. Common Sense Media has "Parents’ Guides" that explain everything you need to know about social media, including how different apps work and how to set privacy controls. Some content is free, and you can subscribe for free for one month to access everything else.
Stress that the rules of social media must be followed, including age limits. Let teens know you will be monitoring their online activities.
Actively develop a network of trusted adults for your teen. These family members and friends can engage with them through social media, and your teen can turn to them if they encounter challenges.
Install protective software for blocking, monitoring, or filtering websites.
Do not allow your teen to sleep with their cell phone. When teens are always connected, their rest will be interrupted.
Pay attention to any behavioral changes that might be related to internet use. Signs to watch for include secretiveness, spending increasing amounts of time on the internet, inappropriate sexual knowledge, or sleeping problems.
Monitor your teens’ online purchases, whether material or downloadable. Encourage them to buy only from reputable companies.
Check what your teen does online and on social media by using web browsers’ history to check which websites they visited or by checking their social media profile.
- If you discover your teen has visited an unacceptable website, it is important not to overreact. A conversation about how the website was found and what kind of information was being sought will help sort out the situation. For example, a teen may have accidentally found a porn site when seeking health information.
What are teens doing online?
According to a 2024 Pew Research Center survey, 95% of teens have access to a smartphone, and nearly half say they are “almost constantly” online.
In the United States, YouTube is the most popular social media platform with 90% of 13 to 17-year-olds saying they have used it, 63% report having used TikTok, 61% use Instagram, 55% use Snapchat, and just 32% use Facebook. In addition to YouTube, Instagram, Snapchat, and Facebook, there are many other social media sites that some young people choose to use, including LinkedIn, Twitter, WhatsApp, Discord, Reddit, and Pinterest.
Social media, along with gaming sites and instant messaging, allow teens to have 24/7 access to peer networks through cell phones and other mobile devices. That allows teens to extend the time they spend with people they already know — and sometimes with those they don’t.
The developmental needs of teens match well with what social media has to offer: developing friendships, figuring out their identities, and establishing social status by being “in the know.” For example, it is typical for teens to try on different identities based on pop culture.
Maintaining existing friendships is reported as one of the most common reasons for using social media. As today’s teens grow up, they view social media as an online place to “hang out” and connect with friends around mutual interests.
And they are not using social media in isolation. Consider the world in which today’s teens are growing up. Entertainment, sports, and political celebrities live out their lives in the focus of public attention. Ordinary people become celebrities through reality shows on television or a viral social media post. Schools, universities, news outlets, and companies all have a social media presence. With so many people and organizations using social media, accessing social media to stay informed can feel like a necessity for teens.
When teens need to find information, they generally look to the internet first.
Access to a wide variety of resources helps them with school projects, as well as pursuing personal interests such as sports and music. Looking at large amounts of data via the internet can enhance teens' abilities to interpret and manipulate information.
Smartphones and social media make it easier for teens to:
- Pursue hobbies and interests
- Express themselves and be creative. It’s a chance to try out different activities or identities
- Build community with others who are like them, with similar interests, goals and values that they may not be able to find in their school or community
- Interact with friends when you’re not together. This can prevent youth from feeling isolated and alone
Other benefits include developing thinking and writing skills as they post to blogs or other online forums and connecting with others to discuss shared interests.
Despite the benefits, social media is also filled with risk.
The Digital Wellness Lab at Boston Children’s Hospital notes that frequent social media use among teens has been linked to poor academic performance and other potential negative consequences, like challenges with mental health and body image.
Just as parents are encouraged to monitor where teens are going, who they are with, and what they are doing, parents also need to be knowledgeable about their internet activities, and talk with them about the potential dangers of sharing personal information online like, phone number, address, and passwords.
- Information teens think would only be of interest to their friends can get into the hands of others and produce unintended negative results. For example, a joke about a friend could get circulated around school, hurt the friend, and ruin the friendship.
- College admissions officers and employers might screen out applicants who post negative or questionable information on social media.
- Giving out personal information, parents’ credit card, banking, or other financial information could lead to trouble. If an offer appears to be “too good to be true,” it probably is.
- Heavy users (when young people spend a large portion of their time online) are at risk for problematic internet use and internet addiction.
- Teens may find themselves in online relationships for which they are unprepared. For example, they may not realize the 15-year-old boy asking to be an online “friend” is really a 45-year-old man.
- Frequent social media users report higher rates of depression, low self-esteem, and eating disorders.
- Social media exposes adolescents to alcohol and vaping marketing and information about the experiences of alcohol and vaping use by peers. This may normalize the behaviors and convince teens it’s okay to try alcohol or vaping. This may apply to other risk-taking behaviors such as marijuana and other substance use.
- Teens can experience cyberbullying on social media, either as a victim or bystander. Unmonitored social networking could provide a forum for messages that are indecent, demeaning, violent, or racist. Sometimes comments are misinterpreted or intentionally hurtful and the conversation can quickly turn into bullying or harassment.
In addition to establishing basic rules, parents should advise teens to:
- Never agree to meet in person someone they have met online. Teens need to talk with a parent or trusted adult first.
- Avoid chat rooms or discussion areas that look risky or provocative. Encourage teens to trust their instincts.
- Be wary of those who want too much information. There is no rule that says personal information must be given out.
- Log off, close a browser window, or navigate away if something online doesn’t seem right or causes uncomfortable feelings.
- Never give out passwords, even to friends.
- Auxier, Brooke, Monica Anderson, Andrew Perrin, and Erica Turner. 2020. “Parenting Children in the Age of Screens.” Pew Research Center.
- Boston Children’s Digital Wellness Lab
- boyd, danah. 2008. “Why Youth (Heart) Social Network Sites: The Role of Networked Publics in Teenage Social Life.” The John D. And Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation Series on Digital Media and Learning. MIT Press.
- Harvard Center for Digital Thriving
- Lenhart, Amanda. 2015. “Teens, Technology and Friendships.” Pew Research Center.
- Sidoti, Olivia, and Michelle Faverio. 2024. “Teens, Social Media and Technology 2024.” Pew Research Center.
Reviewed in 2025