How The Internet Skills Of European 11- To 16-Year-Olds Mediate Between Online Risk And Harm

Not all children who use the internet will experience harm from the online risks they encounter. One of the factors that might moderate the relationship between risk and harm is children's internet skills. As there has been little research on this topic, this article examines the influence of internet skills on the prevalence of online risks and the degree to which 11- to 16-year-olds experience being harmed by these risks, using data from the EU Kids Online project. The findings suggest that, whilst older children (aged 13–16) are exposed to more online risks, younger children (11–12) report more often being harmed by these risks. After controlling for differences between children due to demographics and internet experience, as well as country differences (using multilevel analysis), the findings reveal that children with more self-reported internet skills experience more risks online. Such skills do not seem to contribute much to differences in being harmed by online risks.     

Children's Meetings Offline with People Met Online:

Building on EU Kids Online data, this article deals with the psycho-social context of children's meetings with “complete strangers” as opposed to meetings with “friends of friends”, that is, people who are already connected to their social network. The original contribution of this article lies in the distinction operated between the types of people met this way for several measures of internet use and the children's psychological characteristics. The study hypothesizes children who met any type of online contacts (“friends of friends”, “complete strangers” or “both”) to be heavier internet users than children who met no one. Moreover, children who met “complete strangers” or “both” were expected to report higher levels of risk-taking behaviour online and offline than children who met “friends of friends” or no one. The same relations were hypothesized for the psychological characteristics. Finally, harm was expected to occur more in the case of meetings with “complete strangers” or “both” than in the case of meetings with “friends of friends”.     

Parental Mediation Of Children's Internet Use In Different European Countries

Given that various childrearing cultures exist in Europe, as confirmed by analysis of the 1999/2000 European Values Survey (Halman, 2001), the present study aimed to identify and explain cross-cultural similarities and differences in strategies of parental mediation of children's Internet use. The study also sought to identify which parental mediation strategies may protect children against experiencing content risks online in general and in various childrearing cultures in particular. Parental mediation strategies and content online risk were indexed on the basis of data from 18 European countries from the Eurobarometer 2005. Findings show that all parents favor social mediation of the internet for children over strategies based on technical solutions. Favoring restrictive (by time or content) to non-restrictive mediation depends on a country's value orientation in childrearing. Analyses showed that each parental strategy has the potential to reduce the probability of children's experience of content risk online. However, the extent to which particular parental mediation strategies are protective differs across European childrearing cultures.     

Coping with Online Risks: The experience of Russian schoolchildren

The rapid spread of information and communication technologies has led to new threats that may have a negative impact on children's social development. This article examines Russian schoolchildren's perceptions of difficult online situations regarding cyberbullying and online sexual content, and their strategies of coping. The empirical base of the research includes data from the EU Kids Online II project. Analysis was conducted according to age, gender, and user activity. A comparative analysis of European and Russian data shows how the current situation of internet development in Russia is affecting the coping behaviour of both children and adolescents.     

Determinants of Internet Mediation:

This article empirically examines if parents apply new types of mediation for the internet, using data from the Dutch EU Kids Online project. The high internet penetration in the Netherlands makes this study especially relevant because almost all parents and children use the internet. Factor analyses applied to reports by parents and children (aged 9–16) revealed four mediation types that are comparable for both groups: active safety mediation, restrictive content mediation, restrictive technical mediation, and monitoring. Demographics (age, gender, education, family size), measures of internet usage, and parental views towards internet use were analysed as determinants of the parental mediation types. Parents monitored younger children in particular, more often actively mediated girls and more often restricted children's internet use in larger families. The use of virtually all mediation types was related to children's diversity in internet use and the parents' view on the benefits of their involvement.     

A Shared Responsibility

Children's growing use of the Internet creates both opportunities and risks. Collecting and comparing empirical findings on risks and opportunities experienced across 20 different European countries shows significant differences between them. Using Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA), this article investigates which factors contribute towards a high degree of online risk experienced by children across these countries. The research shows that patterns of similarities and differences do not seem to coincide with regional, political, and historical divides across European Union countries. The findings seem to endorse the multilayered approach of multi-stakeholder governance, which stresses the co-responsibility in securing children's online safety. However, one of the most important country conditions explaining high risk appears to be the lack of positive online content provision.     

Parenting the Mobile Internet in Italian Households: Parents' and Children's Discourses

Drawing on the rich literature on parental mediation of children's use of digital and mobile media, this paper discusses the findings of an explorative study conducted in Italy, aimed at understanding how families appropriate smartphones in relation to the household's moral economy, their domestication of ICTs and the parenting style adhered to by parents. The aim of the paper is threefold: understand (1) how are social legitimations for or against children's use of smartphones constructed; (2) how do parents make sense of their mediation of children's mobile internet use drawing on different interpretative repertoires; and (3) how children negotiate, resist or evade parental justifications by producing alternative narratives.     

Children's Digital Media Practices within the European Family Home: Does Perceived Discrimination Matter?

This article builds on unreported data from the EU KIDS ONLINE project (25,142 9–16 year-olds, fieldwork mid-2010), presenting findings about children viewed by their parents as being discriminated against (n = 774), compared to a group whose parents held no such opinion (n = 22,690). We look at majority youth, excluding ethnic minorities. Since reasons for discrimination were not asked for, we suspect they may be diverse. Our central question is whether the feeling of being discriminated against has a bearing on children's experiences with respect to online risks and on their parents’ response in the form of online mediation strategies. We hypothesize that perceived discrimination will lead to more exposure to online risks, but not necessarily to more harm. We expect that parents of children who are perceived as discriminated against will be more worried about their children and, will restrict their digital media use. Generally speaking, these hypotheses were confirmed.     

Monitoring,Mediating, and Modeling: Parental Influence on Adolescent Computer and Internet Use in the United States

Proliferating internet-accessible media have altered the home context, raising questions about parental influence on youth computer/internet use. This study examines parents' monitoring, internet mediation, and modeling behaviors as predictors of adolescents' computer/internet use among 629 US adolescents and their parents. Parents' time spent with computers was positively associated with teens' computer time, and parents' engagement in seven internet activities (e.g., IM/chat) also predicted teens' engagement in those activities. Greater general parental monitoring of adolescents predicted less teen engagement in IM/chat, social networking site use, video streaming, and multiplayer online games, while parental tracking of internet use predicted more teen IM/chat. Older teens spent more time with computers and in various internet activities and reported lower rates of general parental monitoring and parental internet mediation. Findings suggest that parents act as models for their children's internet use. Additionally, general parental practices not specific to media may affect youths' media behaviors as well.     

Click here,Kids!

Information processing theory suggests that children may be particularly vulnerable to online advertising. This study examined the structural and privacy features of advertisements placed on popular children's websites. A total of 697 advertisements on 133 of the most popular children's websites were analyzed. Results revealed an online advertising world for children that is both tempting and confusing. Moreover, protection of children's privacy is not ideal on advertisers' websites. In all, online advertising raises challenging fairness and privacy issues. Better protection of children on the Web is needed.     

Perceptions of Online Support for Hospitalized Children and Adolescents

Abstract

This study identifies perceived outcomes following hospitalized children's participation in a pediatric online support network. Nineteen participants were interviewed, including child and adolescent patients who had used the network while in hospital, their parent/family caregiver, and a familiar health care provider. This triadic sampling approach provided a range of stakeholder perceptions.

Results convey a wide spectrum of benefits and challenges in accessing and utilizing an online support network for hospitalized children. Participation in the network was identified as a means of fostering pediatric patient enjoyment, education, connection with peers, and coping. Information, social connection and distraction served as catalysts fostering positive outcomes for children. Identified barriers to network participation included inaccessibility and limited availability of computers, issues with technology, and discomfort with online interaction. Findings advance understanding of online networks as supportive resources for seriously ill children and their families.     

Playful and creative ICT pedagogical framing: a nursery school case study

This article reports on the findings of a one-year qualitative study in which a nursery school used information and communication technology (ICT) and a digital media consultant as a catalyst for cultural change leading to teachers’ improved pedagogical framing and children's enhanced learning dispositions. The pedagogic framing included the children making mini-movies and avatars which were uploaded onto the nursery website. It is argued that such innovative and creative ICT pedagogy was strongly motivational and afforded opportunities for co-construction and sustained shared thinking (SST) as it engaged with children's and families’ digital cultural habitus. The research reports on field notes, interviews and observations (n?=?15) of child peer interactions and teacher child interactions.     

Ethical considerations of children's digital image-making and image-audiancing in early childhood environments

This research examines a multi-year investigation of preschoolers’ experiences participating in a media-driven exploration of informal play experiences as a means to engage children as artists, researchers, and documenters of their own worlds. In this writing, I will explore the ethical issues that arise for adult researchers engaged in participatory research employing digital technologies with young children. In particular, this writing contributes to emerging understandings of the responsibility of the adult researcher in the academic representation, presentation, and discussion of children's digital imagery and other artistic works. The role of the adult researcher is highlighted through the exploration of the ethical considerations surrounding aims to represent children's work in ways that are ethical, respectful, and adhere to the child's artistic, creative, and aesthetic intent.     

Norwegian Children's Experiences of Cyberbullying When Using Different Technological Platforms

Cyberbullying is an emerging threat to children in Europe. However, European research into this topic is scant and knowledge of it incomplete. In this study, “cyberbullying” involves the use of different technological platforms to support hostile behavior by an individual or group that harm others. The article examines whether children's experience of cyberbullying differs according to technological platforms and socio-demographic variables. Results from two Norwegian studies show that cyberbullying most often occurs via e-mail, and that girls and frequent users of the internet are more likely to encounter cyberbullying. Most cyberbullying encountered in social networking sites was sexual and took place in communities in which the users are anonymous. This was most often encountered by teenage girls and perpetrated by adults.     

Evaluating Mexican American Children's Social Language Interactions During Sociodramatic Play

This article focuses on partial findings of a microethnographlc study that examined the language functions and cultural traits of Mexican American children during sociodramatic play In a two way bilingual preschool classroom. Analysis of the data exhibited varied recurring themes including the development and practice of social skills. Data were collected in a two way bilingual (Spanish and English) prekindergarten classroom four days a week for 8 weeks during the morning session of the preschool program. The principal sources of data included videotaped observations, written field notes, a field diary, and informal interviews with the children's parents. The findings showed that children learn how to use social language by having the opportunity to practice it freely but with guidance. Suggestions on how to evaluate children's social language are also provided.     

Evidence for the effects of parental mediation and childhood media use on US college students' social media use

Parents' rules and restrictions on media use have been shown to reduce amounts of media consumed by children. It remains unclear as to whether the effects of parents' restrictions on media use persist when children reach early adulthood. The present survey analysis assesses the extent to which restricted media use in childhood affects amounts of social media use among a sample (N = 454) of young adults and how self-control affects this relation. The results suggest that young adults who are higher in self-control and are introduced to social media at a later age use less social media as young adults. Being introduced to social media at an early age is also associated with texting during class as well as texting before sleep. Rules on children's media use appear to have no lasting effects on amounts of social media use.     

Investigating children's emotion regulation in socio-emotionally challenging classroom situations

Decades of research have associated effective emotion and behaviour regulation with learning and social competence among young children. However, further studies on children's use of emotion regulation in their everyday lives are required. This study focuses on investigating six- to nine-year-old children's (N?=?24) use of emotion regulation strategies in various socio-emotionally challenging classroom situations. Data consist of video recordings of different classroom situations, which were analysed using interaction analysis and theory-oriented content analysis in connection with the Multisource Assessment of Social Competence Scale questionnaire results on social competence. The results of this study indicate the differences in children's abilities to use emotion regulation strategies appropriately in socio-emotionally challenging classroom situations. Qualitative features of children's strategies in different situations also vary. These findings, along with those of previous studies, suggest a need for teachers to scaffold children's developing skills of emotion regulation in school contexts.     

Relationship between young children's habitual computer use and influencing variables on socio‐emotional development

This study investigates the relationship between young children's habitual computer use and influencing variables on socio‐emotional development. The participants were 179 five‐year‐old children. The Internet Addiction Scale for Young Children (IASYC) was used to identify children with high and low levels of habituation to computer use. The data for this study were collected using the Socio‐Emotional Development Scale and questionnaires regarding children's computer use at home and in the classroom. Results of this study show that for computer use both in the home and in the classroom, children with a higher score on the IASYC had a lower score on the Socio‐Emotional Development Scale. Conversely, children with a higher score on the Socio‐Emotional Development Scale had a lower score on the Internet Addiction Scale. Moreover, variables regarding children's computer use at home influenced the children's score on level of habituation more than variables of their computer use in the classroom.     

‘It's all about Ben10™’: children's play,health and sustainability decisions in the early years

In today's fast food, fast-paced consumer society, too few questions are asked about the influence of digital media on young children's health and sustainability choices, and indeed how such choices are expressed in children's play (and early childhood classrooms). By interviewing children and parents, and using such data to prompt teacher discussion, a team of interdisciplinary researchers have started to develop an understanding of the interconnectedness of these issues in the early childhood environment. Data reveal the strong relationship between children's digital media viewing and their associated clothing choices, their food selections and the sustainability consequences of such behaviour. We conclude that early childhood education must move beyond silo approaches to digital literacy, healthy eating and sustainability messages.     

Mean Girls and Tough Boys: Children's Meaning Making and Media Literacy Lessons on Gender and Bullying in the United States

This study examines children's thinking about media content and processes in the context of portrayals of gender and bullying. As part of a critical thinking-centered media literacy curriculum, sixty-five sixth graders in the United States responded to questions about depictions of gender roles and bullying in their favorite media content or in content they would create as media producers. A grounded theory analysis of responses revealed students' various levels of thinking, ranging from direct application of lesson concepts to evaluation and critique of media content. The analysis also suggested the conditions under which students demonstrated more or less advanced meaning-making processes. These findings highlight the dynamic and context-dependent nature of media literacy, as well as the unique and varying levels of thinking children enact as media users. The success of the curriculum in encouraging children's independent thinking supports the value of bridging the empowerment and protectionist perspectives on media literacy education.