The influence of social networking, video games and general computer usage on parent-child relations

Ewelina Kroliczek

doi:10.5920/fields.2015.1112

Abstract

The aim of this project was to find out how parents feel about controlling the media/technology use of their adolescent children and how it influences their parent/child relations. This is important because modern entertainment technologies are easily accessible and available to the population; thus they inevitably invade family space and influence family life. A gap in the literature is identified, indicating that existing research does not explore the reasons why parents control or do not control their adolescent children’s use of social media, video games and more. Additionally, there was no literature concerning how parents feel about such control and whether it was part of emotional labour; that being any activities that are performed with a child’s well-being in mind. The project was carried out as the part of an undergraduate degree course by the final year student in sociology. The data was collected through face-to-face and telephone semi-structured interviews with mothers and fathers of adolescents. It was observed that both mothers and fathers felt their control over children’s use of media and technologies influenced their relations. Also the findings show a variety of reasons why parents choose to exercise their control in a particular way, and how it links to parent-child relations.

Highlights

Introduction and literature reviewThis paper begins with a short, critical evaluation of existing academic literature and a brief explanation of the methodology and sampling used in this study
Findings and Analysis Parenting styles and mediation techniques Halpenny et al (2010) determined that adolescents are subject to authoritarian parenting styles; the data found showed that it is not always possible to determine such facts as a stabilised and unchangeable phenomenon
Some parents experienced the change in their parenting and mediation strategies; that is the idea that the change between the authoritative and authoritarian parenting styles depends solely on the child’s age (Halpenny et al, 2010; Kundanis, 2003; Wartella et al, 2013) did not reflect in the data

Summary

Introduction

Introduction and literature reviewThis paper begins with a short, critical evaluation of existing academic literature and a brief explanation of the methodology and sampling used in this study. Sociology of family/ family studies Family studies tend to look at the inner workings of relationships between family members, how they are constructed and how they are interpreted by society (Newman, 1991) This body of literature provides a theoretical background by outlining: parenting styles and habits (Mesch & Talmud, 2010; Newman, 1991; Plowman et al, 2010; Silverstone & Haddon, 1996); the influence of new media and entertainment technologies on children (Curran et al, 2012; Lohr & Meyer, 1991; Wartella et al, 2013); parental usage and their understanding of new media and technologies (Plowman et al, 2010; Ward, 2005; Wartella et al, 2013) and parentchild relationships (Chambers, 2012; Downing-Matibag, 2009; Steinberg, 2001). There is a body of academic literature concerned with the use of technologies as educational aids and the parental roles in such involvement (Downey et al, 2007; Hollingworth et al, 2009; Passey, 2011; Plowman et al, 2010; Rogers & Wright, 2008), those exclude children’s perceptions within studies as well as the influence of parent-child relationships

Methods

Results

Conclusion