The founder of Good Inside shares how parents can set tech boundaries, build connection and lead with authority.
Jul 21, 2026 [[read-time]] minute read
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Raising tweens and teens in the digital age comes with a lot of questions. That’s why YouTube is partnering with renowned clinical psychologist Dr. Becky Kennedy for an exclusive video series designed to bring practical tech guidance directly to families. With two episodes a month premiering on Good Inside’s YouTube channel, parents can expect judgement-free advice on screentime, digital literacy, healthy boundaries and more.
"Parents consistently tell us they need credible, practical guidance for raising kids in the digital age," says Dr. Garth Graham, Director and Global Head of Public Health at YouTube. "Bringing her trusted, judgment-free advice to YouTube is a perfect example of our commitment to making our platform a helpful resource for families."
To mark the launch, we sat down with Dr. Becky to discuss what this partnership means for families.
You started your career in a traditional private clinical practice helping one family at a time, and now you reach millions across the globe. How has your definition of impact evolved over time?
Dr. Becky: Honestly, my definition of impact hasn't really changed. It's always come down to the same few things for me: lives changed, people who walk away feeling more capable than they did before, and clarity where there used to be confusion.
I felt all of that in private practice, one family at a time, and I never once thought of that work as small. What’s changed is the opportunity. I get to do the thing I've always cared about for more people than I ever imagined I'd reach. That's the part I am grateful for every single day.
What made you decide that YouTube was the right place to build this kind of digital toolkit?
Dr. Becky: This is the first time I've created a series like this, and it felt important to me that all of these conversations lived together in one place. Parents don't experience these challenges in isolation—they're all connected. And YouTube is where so many parents already go looking for answers, so it felt like the right home for this series.
How does the launch of this new series align with your broader mission at Good Inside?
Dr. Becky: Parenting in 2026 is like being asked to speak a language nobody taught us. We didn't grow up with a phone in our pocket at 15, giving us so much information and ease and comfort… and threatening to pull us away from all the in real life connection that is critical to mental health. Our kids are growing up in that world, and we are the adults in charge.
This series is my attempt to share a little of that new language. You don't have to speak it perfectly to start. To be honest, no one speaks it perfectly ever. I certainly don't. But we don't stop ourselves from learning Spanish because we’ll never be fluent. We start anyway and over time it feels a bit more natural.
That's the heart of Good Inside: we try to be experts in imperfect parenting. Guidance without judgment, practical, do-it-today strategies, all so parents feel a little more sturdy and a little less like they're flying blind.
What was the experience like for you when bringing this series to life?
Dr. Becky: Honestly? It was fun. More fun than I expected! I kind of like a hard truth, and this series kept handing me mine. It forced me to stay realistic. Every single episode, I'd catch myself asking, could I actually do this? Would it hold up in my own house? If it didn't, we kept working.
How do you approach these conversations so parents feel supported rather than judged?
Dr. Becky: Ugh, no. Who wants a lecture on anything? I don't. It's so pedestal-y—one person up front who's got it all figured out, everyone else taking notes on how they're falling short. I don't even love being called a parenting expert for the same reason. I wanted these to feel like we're on the same side of the table. This is hard, I'm in it too, let's figure it out together.
Of the 12 upcoming episodes, is there one in particular you are most excited for parents to watch, or one that was especially meaningful for you?
Dr. Becky: I was just working on an episode about what to do in the first 10 minutes after you find something concerning on your teen's phone. Parents often think the most important question is, ‘What do I say?’ I actually think the first question is, ‘How do I regulate myself?’ Those first ten minutes can impact whether your child walks away thinking, ‘I can come to my parent with hard things,’ or, ‘when bad things happen, involving my parent makes it all worse.’
At Good Inside, we always say the relationship is the intervention. Protecting that relationship doesn't mean lowering the bar—it means responding in a way that helps the situation today and preserves the relationship for tomorrow.
What are your biggest hopes for this series?
Dr. Becky: I hope this partnership reaches way past the everyday phone stuff. Something has happened in modern parenting—parents are scared to lead, scared to make any decision their kid might be upset about. We've swung too far. We went from ignoring kids’ feelings to letting them run every family decision. Neither one is it.
You can care deeply about how your kid feels and still be the one who decides. That's what Good Inside is handing back to parents: authority without aggression, connection without collapse.
