Always scrolling social media
Before You Begin
Pause and breathe. Even if this shouldn't be happening... accept that it is and embrace it with composure and calmness.
Calmness is the only way forward because without calm, there is no possibility for receptiveness and connection. Your child won't give to you any more than they see from you.
Never forget that a strong connection is fundamental, as there will be no correction in them if there is no connection with you.
The Core Problem
The child doesn't see that they are trading the upfront short spikes of excitement/enjoyment they get on social media, for extended valleys of negative emotions offline.
What Will Make It Worse
Jumping straight to banning them from social media as a solution will lead to their feelings of confusion, distrust, resentment, and likely sneaky disobedience.
What The Child Needs
1. Digital responsibility education: Help the child understand the importance of self-control in the context of social media usage and the potential consequences of excessive use (e.g. lowered self-esteem from comparison, depression, self-isolation while scrolling through endless content, and/or feelings of being alone in life).
2. Healthy habits: Encourage the child to engage in a variety of activities beyond social media, such as hobbies, sports, exercise, and spending time with friends and family. The more they get a relatively greater enjoyment from these activities, the less they will turn to social media.
3. Face-to-face social connections: Help the child foster meaningful real-life connections with peers to reduce interest in social media, and realize the shallowness of social interaction online.
4. To not see you scrolling away also: Children will always pick up their parents' worst habits. Don't expect them to spend less time on social media if they see you on it constantly.
How To Have The Conversation With Your Child
Find a private space, without distractions, where the child feels comfortable talking freely.
Begin the conversation with empathy, saying that you noticed they are spending a lot of time on social media, but also agreeing that it is very easy to do.
Share with them that social media is designed to make you want to spend all of your time on it by exploiting how our minds work and what people really like.
Next, talk through the provided "What The Child Needs" pointers listed above.
If your intuition is telling you that they are going on social media as an escape from something else in their life, explore that possibility with them as well.
Ideally, the child will come away from the conversation being willing and able to stop and ask themselves in the moment if they've reached the point of spending too much time on social media, and if there is something better they could be doing.
The child will likely need a little nudge here and there for points 2 and 3, until the benefits of spending more time doing those things over browsing social media become undeniable to them.