Whilst everybody’s approach to mediating their child’s technology use is different, our research found that parents often fell into specific gendered roles, and that whilst this could sometimes cause conflict in some families, in other families it also allowed for parents to play to their strengths.
In our findings, some parents admitted that it was impossible to know everything and that there was always room to improve. This is a very healthy attitude as it is unreasonable to think anyone should know everything about the internet.
Parents acknowledged the complexity in their own knowledge of technology impacted their mediation style and their guidance of their own child’s technology use.
Conversation tip: Keeping in mind what each parent knows about technology and how it might be used, a conversation between parents about which parts of technology each parent will manage should mean a better overview of your child’s digital use.
This conversation also allows you to work out where the gaps in your technology knowledge are. None of us know everything, but if you speak to your partner about how each of you will guide your child digitally, you can identify gaps in knowledge and commit to learning more about a new social media platform or other technology.
There were also good examples of active engagement by parents in developing rules in collaboration with their child. Some of the time this meant that the child and parents shared the rule setting equally, whereas for others it meant that the child was consulted about rules before being set in place.
Conversation tip: focus on one aspect of technology use and develop a rule with your child about it. Make it an equal collaboration, give each person the space to have their say and work towards a win-win decision. Trial the rule for two weeks and then discuss if it is working and what changes might need to be made.