Children's Attitudes to Parental Mediation in a Traditional Society.

Abstract

Since the 1980s there have been many reports on parental mediation of children's behavior, from TV watching to Internet surfing, but most of the data come from Western societies. Israeli Arab society is a traditional patriarchy, which is in a constant change. The use of handheld devices, mainly smartphones which enable Internet access, has become a status symbol, leading to challenges with parental control issues. This study examines the overlap between parents' and children's perceptions of parental mediation in the Arab population, specifically if parental education and the child's age influence parental mediation. Data were collected from 1,871 Israeli Arab parents living in northern Israel and their children (N = 1,199) in grades 5-10 using an online parental mediation questionnaire. Parental mediation was perceived differently by parents and their children, although the perceptions of fathers and mothers were similar as were the perceptions of boys and girls. The perceptions of academic fathers and academic mothers also differed. The results also indicated that children's perceptions of parental mediation are affected by age. The findings and their implications are discussed.