World (web) wise adolescents

The intensive use of the internet, the total invasion of new technologies in our every day lives and the sharp rise in virtual relations have dramatically changed the profiles of contemporary adolescents, almost always leaving adults bewildered and unprepared to handle the challenge of bringing up their children or of educating their students.
World (web) wise adolescents, which came out of the long-standing experience the author has had as a psychotherapist for adolescents and their families, offers, by way of examples and extremely practical tips, authoritative and effective educational strategies for responding to the developmental needs of digital natives.
Written for parents, teachers, educators and counsellors, the book helps adults understand and support pre-teens and teens in the most delicate phase of their growth, by finding solutions to the most common problems and teaching them to:
– understand who digital natives are and how to interact with them
– review maternal and paternal roles in the Internet age
– handle school relationships with teachers and head teachers
– recognise the phenomena of social withdrawal and virtual overexposure
– tackle and reduce Internet addiction
– find the right balance between the need for monitoring and the need for trust.

Adolescence is often accompanied by the shattering of an ideal, especially if it coincides with the discovery that you don’t possess the looks or abilities that you would like.
The fear of being put down by peers and of constantly feeling inadequate is hiding round every corner; this is why the web becomes a means through which difficulties can be expressed.  Hiding behind computer screens and always online, avoiding contact with the real world or, vice versa, using the web to put themselves on show are two different ways that narcistically fragile adolescents can choose to adopt in order to deal with their sense of inadequacy. Some face their fears by adopting uninhibited and reckless behaviour, they publish anything and everything to do with themselves online, exposing sides of their character and parts of their body, in the hope of receiving enough «likes». Others, however, feel embarrassed and withdraw from the social scene because they are afraid of being hopelessly ugly or undesirable.
In both cases we need to intercept the reasons that push them to adopt this kind of behaviour whilst growing up. The questions we need to ask are: what needs and necessities do the abuse and dysfunctional use of the Internet attempt to fulfil? What are the underlying fears and worries? What are the educational objectives in a stalemate you are desperately trying to break? What do our kids find in the web?