PERSONAL USES OF MOBILE PHONE AND PERCEPTIONS OF PARENTAL MEDIATION: A RESEARCH WITH CHILDREN 9-11 YEARS OLD

The exploratory research here presented investigates the relationship between children and mobile phone, the sense they attribute to its use and their perception of parental mediation related to this medium considered into the domestic context: family is the first place where meanings, norms and values on media use are supposed to be socialized and negotiated. According to studies on parental mediation, the research is aimed at understanding if children perceive an educational intervention by parents or, as it is a personal medium, parents don’t interfere in children’s relationship with the mobile phone.
Through a closed format questionnaire, self-completed by 272 students aged 9-11 years, the research surveys ownership, practical uses, meanings given to personal practices and perceptions about interventions of mediation by parents in relation to mobile phone.
The data analyses show different levels of mobile phone usage, the functions most often experienced, the dimensions of meaning that accompany children’s practices with the mobile phone and the perceptions of different forms of parental intervention, revealing a not clare correlation between children’s practices and parents’ educational perceived intervention.
The results suggest the opportunity of further investigations to deepen the understanding of parental mediation and to check if the limited educational impact reported by children relates only to the use of this technology or if it deals with a more general problem of educational engagement by parents.