Toddler pitching a fit in public? Why you don’t want to use your phone or other screens to mollify him

If Lincoln throws a “terrible twos” fit in the grocery store, Stephanie Parkin will do her best to distract her youngest. But she’s not going to fall back on a tactic that’s all-too-familiar to most parents who have an out-of-sorts toddler.

The cellphone stays in her purse. That’s not a tool the Roy, Utah, mom will use to mollify him.

Several years ago, she and her husband Tyler took Lincoln’s sister Tenley, now 7, to the pediatrician because they were worried about her. She didn’t make eye contact and didn’t...