Australia has done it. Indonesia has followed, and the United Kingdom intends to do so from 2027. As governments move to keep children below a prescribed age off social media, South Africa faces the same difficult question: should it shut the door too?
Linique Hanekom, whose work at the North-West University’s (NWU’s) Centre for Health and Human Performance includes a special interest in neurodevelopmental disorders, early communication intervention, and language and specific learning disorders, believes the country should seriously consider an under-16 restriction.
She is careful, however, about what it should be called—and what it could accomplish.
“I would prefer the language of an ‘age restriction’ rather than simply a punitive ‘ban’,” she says. “I would not view a restriction as a complete solution. It should form part of a broader child-development and online-safety strategy involving parents, schools, government and technology companies.”
Australia became the first country to enforce a national minimum age of 16. Since 10 December 2025, designated platforms have had to take reasonable steps to prevent under-16s from creating or retaining accounts. The burden rests on the companies, not children or their parents. Indonesia subsequently began enforcing restrictions for users under 16, while the UK has announced that certain social media services will become unavailable to under-16s from spring 2027.
Hanekom says South Africa should study these approaches, not copy them blindly. Local policy would have to account for unequal access to technology, digital literacy, education, data costs and the reality that many children also go online to learn, create, find community and seek support. Age checks introduce privacy questions, while determined adolescents may simply circumvent them.
“A restriction without education, platform accountability and accessible alternatives is unlikely to be sufficient.”
The developmental concern reaches far beyond offensive content. For younger children, Hanekom says, real human interaction is the “developmental work”. Language is not learnt merely by hearing words on a screen. It develops through joint attention, taking turns, reading faces and body language, asking questions and repairing misunderstandings.
“The issue is not simply what a screen does to a child; it is what the screen may prevent the child from doing.”
That distinction is supported by research. A 2024 systematic review and meta-analysis in JAMA Pediatrics found that greater programme viewing and background television exposure among children under six were associated with poorer cognitive outcomes. Age-inappropriate content and caregiver screen use during children’s routines were associated with poorer psychosocial outcomes. The study also found positive associations between co-use and cognitive outcomes, underscoring that context matters.
For older children, social media arrives while identity, emotional regulation and self-concept are still developing. It can intensify social comparison, fear of missing out, pressure to manufacture an idealised identity and cyberbullying, while algorithms can surface self-harm, eating-disorder, sexualised or violent material that children never sought.
Sleep is another casualty. Late-night use, notifications and the pull of endlessly refreshed content can make disengagement difficult. Poor sleep then affects attention, memory, learning, behaviour and emotional regulation. Highly stimulating platforms may also crowd out the experiences through which children practise patience, sustained attention, problem-solving and tolerance of boredom.
Unlike bullying, online abuse can follow a child home, continue around the clock and be broadcast to an enormous audience. Children may encounter grooming, scams, misinformation and harmful challenges. That is why Hanekom believes reporting channels must be visible and trusted, and children must know that discomfort is reason enough to approach an adult. Safety depends on keeping communication open, not access closed.
Protection, Hanekom argues, therefore requires more than policing a child’s handset. Parents can delay social media accounts, keep phones out of bedrooms at night, create technology-free family time and model the habits they expect. Schools can establish phone-free periods, teach media literacy and explain how algorithms and advertising influence behaviour.
Government should demand child-safe default settings, meaningful parental controls, stronger data protection, limits on contact from unknown adults, independent safety assessments and transparency about recommendation systems. Technology companies, she says, must reduce harmful content loops and manipulative design features.
“We need to move away from a model where children are expected to adapt to platforms designed primarily to maximise engagement.”
Hanekom does not want exhausted parents blamed for occasionally reaching for a screen while working, cooking, travelling or simply surviving a difficult day. Her message is practical rather than puritanical: children need sleep, play, movement, books, imagination, friendships, conversation and responsive adults more than they need another feed to scroll.
“Technology should become part of childhood without becoming a substitute for childhood.”
