Research

Changes in children’s screen media use during & after the pandemic

Key findings from our research are:

Children’s use of tablets and computer games has increased since the COVID lockdowns began

Library visits play less of a role in family life than before the pandemic

Apps are more important for families’ access to media content

Media devices are more likely to be found in children’s bedrooms since COVID lockdowns

An infographic of 6 pie charts showing an overall 32%-58% screen media use during and after lockdowns observed by parents

Our results also demonstrate that the pandemic brought about significant changes in how parents manage their children’s access to and use of a range of media, shedding light on the important roles played by parents as primary media socialisation agents for youth.

Publications

Day, K., Shin, W., Nolan, S., ‘Children’s Reading and Screen Media Use Before, During and After the Pandemic: Australian Parent Perspectives.’ Communication Research and Practice (2024)
Nolan, S., Day, K., Shin, W., Wang, W., ‘Books Versus Screens: A Study of Australian Children’s Media Use During the COVID Pandemic’. Publishing Research Quarterly (2022), 38: 749–759.

Presentations

Independent Publishing Conference, Wheeler Centre, Melbourne, Victoria, December 2021
Australian and New Zealand Communications Association Conference, University of Wollongong, NSW, November 2022
Society for the History of Authorship, Reading and Publishing, SHARP 2023, University of Otago, NZ, June 2023.

Research Activity Summary

The team is currently writing a monograph, Children, Screens and the Future of Reading, led by Sybil Nolan and based on our surveys and interview data. Wonsun Shin is working with international collaborators to investigate parental mediation and reverse media socialisation in the post-COVID era in Australia, Indonesia and Singapore. Xin Pei and Wonsun Shin are studying the role of adult children in the adoption of smart technologies by ageing parents. Katherine Day and Xin Pei are exploring uses of generative AI in media content for children.

Our research began in 2021, when some group members began to study changes in children’s media use caused by the long COVID lockdowns. Our aim was to investigate how increased screen use was affecting children’s lives, including activities such as book reading and play.

Since November 2021, we ran two large national surveys of Australian parents. This research was supported by grant funding in 2021 and 2022 from the School of Culture and Communication.

In 2022, Wonsun Shin also received seed funding from the Faculty of Arts to pilot qualitative research towards an ARC Linkage grant application: this pilot has now been completed and is at write-up.

In June 2023, the Child and Family Mediascape Research Group was formally established as a Tier 3 research group within the Faculty of Arts, University of Melbourne.