Everyone was running in all directions, and suddenly everything stands still. At the same time, although we are forced into lockdown, many of us cannot bring ourselves to believe it. Is all this really happening? Are we not in a bad dream from which we will soon wake up? With the Covid-19 epidemic, what each of us is going through is indeed unbearable in many respects, but it is at the same time an opportunity for major change: building new rules together to live better as a family, and beyond that, thinking differently about our relationships. For this virus obliges us to break with competitive thinking (“if I have something, you don’t”) and forces us to think in terms of shared reciprocity: “What I do to protect myself also protects you, and what I do to protect you also protects me”. It is no longer you OR me, it is you AND me at once, and you and me together! Whether we are thinking of protecting ourselves from the virus so as not to catch it, or we are concerned about not passing it on to others, the same actions are called for.
Lockdown follows exactly this logic. But before we can perhaps measure its positive long-term effects on how we think about social ties, let us acknowledge its difficulties. And first of all, that while the situations each of us lives are different, none is more enviable than the others. People who live alone are faced with the obligation to keep themselves company, often no longer hearing the sound of a human voice; couples are faced with the obligation to put up with each other at every moment, which many are not used to; finally, in families, the differences in rhythm between teenagers who need to move around and adults or seniors who seek calm risk quickly creating friction and tension. In fact, even if each of us lives through this crisis differently depending on our situation, the anxieties we face are the same: on one side, that of being forgotten and abandoned, and on the other, that of being prevented from organising our time as we would like.
To live through lockdown as well as possible, we will need to establish a programme for daily life, solitary if we live alone, and shared if we live with others. As soon as two or more people are confined together, it is indeed essential to think about how each can have time alone and time for exchange, and ideally, when possible, spaces for personal reflection and shared spaces.
But in this new organisation, the thorniest problem will very quickly be that of screens. The temptation of them risks being considerable. More than ever, we will have to ask ourselves at every moment whether we are using them to kill time, to think about something else or even to think about nothing, or whether we are using them for the interest and pleasure we find in them. In short, the advice to “learn to use them and learn to do without them” has never been more relevant! And the first of our tasks on this path will be to divide our time, and that of our children, between work screens and leisure screens, between solitary screens and shared screens, and between information, entertainment and education. Without forgetting that some may use screens to move away from or isolate themselves a little from the other people in the house or flat, when the narrowness of the space prevents satisfactory physical isolation. And without forgetting either that children and teenagers do not consume the same content, and that we must take care that the youngest do not find themselves, without meaning to, in front of images that are not for their age, because another member of the family is watching them in the living room!
Fortunately, the three principles that guide the 3/6/9/12 milestones can help us manage these situations.
The first is the principle of alternation. Let us organise a daily timetable for everyone that provides for working time with and without screens, sharing time with and without screens and solitary leisure time with and without screens, especially if we have several children of different ages. And let us not be afraid to make this timetable a little rigid, it will become more flexible with use! It is indeed easier to relax a rule than to tighten it. Without forgetting that the first two principles of good screen management in the family are never to use them during shared mealtimes and never to take them to one’s bedroom in the evening. Let us think about establishing a digital curfew: at 10 or 11 pm, all digital devices are switched off and stay outside the bedrooms.
The second principle that guides the 3-6-9-12 milestones is that of accompaniment. For many of us, remote working makes the nature of our professional activity more visible to our children, while freeing up available time. Let us take advantage of this to explain to our children what we do, which is often mysterious to them, but also to accompany them in their own activities. And this does not concern only screens. Too many parents think it is enough to give a toy to a child for them to spontaneously find pleasure in it. It is true that this is often what advertising wants us to believe. “With this toy, your child will be hooked at once”, implying: “They will leave you in peace”. But a child will occupy themselves much better with a toy if a parent has taken the time to play with it with them. For then the child is no longer alone with their toy, they play with it recalling at every moment what that parent did or said as if they were still with them.
Finally, let us not forget that whatever screens bring, they promote neither verbal expression nor the narrative-building abilities that are so important for success in social life. Let us therefore take advantage of the emotions that screens arouse in our children to invite them to tell us about them, notably at meals taken together. Let us show them the interest we take in the adventures or anecdotes they tell us. Let us ask them questions and thus teach them to build a story without them even realising.
Finally, learning self-regulation, which is the third principle of the 3-6-9-12 milestones, will be placed at the centre of family life. Indeed, from the moment screens are available everywhere in the home, but it has been decided to use them only at certain times and for a limited time, everyone’s capacity to wait will be put to a severe test. But after all, we manage to eat at fixed times and not to snack during meals: let us do the same with screens!
And let us also resist the temptation to constantly check the rolling news sites, to find out how many have died, whether a vaccine has been developed or whether the lockdown measures have already shown their effectiveness. This way of snacking on information is not only conducive to giving credence to fake news. Rolling news also often favours emotion over contextualisation, with the risk of exhausting our capacity for empathy, or even of arousing a terrible feeling of powerlessness. Let us rather favour official news bulletins, at fixed times. And for the rest of the time, let us think of films watched together, video games played with others, board games set out on the living room table, the possibility of shared reading… And let us not forget that on the Internet, you can also stroll through a museum, explore the world with historical and geographical documentaries, find tutorials for yoga, gymnastics or dance, start learning foreign languages, and much more besides.
To find out more: https://www.france.tv/france-5/c-a-dire/c-a-dire-saison-13/1303591-confinement-comment-gerer-psychologiquement.html
Serge Tisseron is a psychiatrist, doctor of psychology with accreditation to supervise research, member of the Académie des technologies, and associate researcher at Université de Paris (CRPMS).
