“ ‘Give childhood back to kids so that they do what they most need to do, which is develop the skills of being an independent adult. Remember that the job of a parent is to work him or herself out of a job.’ ”

That’s author and NYU professor Jonathan Haidt talking to the Big Think blog about how parenting changed [for the worse] in the 1990s and where exactly he believes we took a wrong turn when it comes to raising our children.

He says that when he toured the country to promote his book, “The Coddling of the American Mind,” he would always ask audiences the age when their parents allowed them to go outside and play without supervision.

The over-40 set would invariably answer between 5 years old and 8 eight years old. The under-25 group would say 12 to 16. Yes, 16 years old. Haidt said this shift toward helicopter parenting began to take place in the 1990s.

“As the crime rate was plummeting, as American life was getting safer and safer, Americans freaked out and thought that if they take their eyes off their children, the children will be abducted,” Haidt noted. “It’s not until the 1990s that we really start locking kids up and saying you cannot be outside until you’re 14 or 15.”

He contends that such overprotective measures stunted a generation of children’s growth and kept them from practicing independence at a crucial stage.

“They’re just not used to being independent,” Haidt said. “When they get to college they need more help, they’re asking adults for more help. “’Protect me from this. Punish him for saying that. Protect me from that book.’”

He also blames social media for impacting modern childhood.

“They spend a lot less time going out with friends, they don’t get a drivers license as often, they don’t drink as much, they don’t go out on dates, they don’t work for money as much,” he explained. “What are they doing? They’re spending a lot more time sitting on their beds with their devices interacting that way.”

Haidt says kids should be limited to two hours a day on social media.

Listen to his full take on overparenting:

Haidt, along with co-author Greg Lukianoff, published the book in July, after they wrote an article with the same name that went viral for the Atlantic in 2015.

The crux of the piece is that college campuses, by shielding students from words and ideas deemed offensive, actually interfere with their growth and ability to get along with each other, while potentially affecting their mental health.

Read:Princeton students push back on speech ban

Haidt and Lukianoff wrapped up the 2015 article with this quote from Thomas Jefferson, upon the founding of the University of Virginia:

This institution will be based on the illimitable freedom of the human mind. For here we are not afraid to follow truth wherever it may lead, nor to tolerate any error so long as reason is left free to combat it.

“We believe that this is still — and will always be — the best attitude for American universities,” the they wrote. “Faculty, administrators, students, and the federal government all have a role to play in restoring universities to their historic mission.”