Reclaiming Conversation: The Power of Talk in a Digital Age

Turkle attended a family dinner in Maine. She watched a young girl named Alexa on her phone. Alexa engaged with the other guests until her phone lit up, then it took her attention. The other children were also on phones.

Turkle talked with an older man named Stan, and the two compared their childhoods. Stan was in his fifties and was also observing the children. They remembered family dinners and hearing gossip, desperate to join in the adults’ conversations. These children at this dinner did not seem to have any inclination to listen to what was being said.

Children beg their parents to pay them more attention than their phones. They’ve told Turkle about phones interrupting their parents, even though they know that they treat their friends the same way their parents treat them.

“Families 2.0: The Work of Family Conversations”

On the surface, family life appears to have changed little, but technology plays a role in the mutation of family life. Face-to-face conversations now happen online, even between parents, children, and siblings. However, in-person family conversation teaches children how to listen, and it helps them establish their identities. Conversation teaches children that the words other people use are clues to their feelings—this is part of