Parenting in the Age of Modern Technology
Families today live in a world saturated by media and technology. The average American child has 3.5 televisions, 3.3 radios, 2.9 VCR/DVD players, 2.1 video game consoles, 1.5 computers, and 3.6 CD or tape players in their home (Pigeron, 2009, p. 1). 84% of children ages 7-17 use the internet in their homes, and 57% have their own cell phones (Kennedy, Smith, Wells, & Wellman, 2008). Media has become intricately woven into the daily lives of families – it acts as a babysitter and teacher, a mediator, entertainer and everyday companion, but perhaps most significantly, it acts as a facilitator of daily family routines, transitions, and interactions. The ubiquity of new technology is quickly changing the means by which families interact with each other to create systems of shared meanings and experiences. Families are adapting to this influx of modern technology and media into their homes by developing new rules and systems of monitoring and regulation. The influence of media on the family life of a second-grade girl, Reagan, and her parents was examined in regards to these changes. In particular, two questions were asked: How do parents perceive and make decisions regarding their children’s use of technology, and how do new forms of technology alter family roles and relationships, particularly those between parent and child?
Reagan is the only child of two, married, professional parents. Her media use is typical for children her age, expect that she has just recently acquired an iPad. The iPad was bought to be used as an educational aid, as Reagan has learning disabilities. Informal observations were conducted over a period of several weeks, in which Reagan’s use of the iPad and her parents monitoring of her access to it were observed, in addition to the changing dynamics of roles and relationships within her family after the iPad become a part of their daily lives.
Underlying the decisions parents make regarding their children’s access to technology and media are their perceptions of this media. In this fast-paced, modern society, new forms of technology infiltrate homes daily. As soon as things like televisions, cell phones, and computers enter the home, they quickly become absorbed into the family life. Here, they take on new meanings that, like the existing body of research on the effects of technology on family life, are often quite ambivalent. Elisa Pigeron (2009) writes, “…media use has always been a controversial topic among researchers and parents alike and a source of contradictions. Media are simultaneously welcomed and feared, enthusiastically greeted and dreaded by parents concerned for their children’s well-being” (p. 17).
A research study by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that parents were both enthusiastic about the role of media in their young children’s lives – particularly in improving social and academic skills, but at the same time they felt a lot of guilt about their low level of parental interaction when their children were using media (Rideout & Hamel, 2006, p. 6). This balance between enthusiasm and guilt was distinctly portrayed within Reagan’s family. Reagan’s use of the iPad is unique in many ways because the iPad was purchased to help ameliorate her developmental delays in writing, reading, and certain visual and fine-motor tasks, all of which have greatly hindered her academic success and confidence. Thus, in serving as an aid in which she could hear books read aloud, write easier on the screen, and become motivated about learning again, the iPad served as a great source of pride for both Reagan and her parents. However, Reagan does not just use the iPad for educational purposes, she also plays plenty of games and other apps, and this had initiated some guilt with her parents.
In an informal, unstructured interview, Reagan was asked what about the iPad made her most proud. She replied that it was the ability to play games like hockey that she could never do in real life. Reagan is also delayed in gross motor skills, and struggles with activities like bike-riding, roller-skating, and jump-roping. While playing hockey on the iPad allowed Reagan to be successful at something she struggles with, it also prevented her from practicing these skills in the real, physical world. Her mother showed some guilt and regret at this, stating that once the weather got nice, Reagan would be outside more, and would start learning to ride her bike again.
The dilemma of this pride/guilt complex directly impacts how parents decide to monitor their children’s access to technology. This dilemma becomes even more pronounced with new, more interactive forms of technology, in which the child is less a passive consumer of media, but more an active participant. In a recent New York Times article, “A Parent’s Struggle with a Child’s iPad Addiction,” the columnist, a father of a 6-year-old boy, describes his son’s addictive-like behaviors to his iPad. The boy wants to use the iPad constantly and gets abnormally upset when the father says he has to take it away. The father states that he has set rules about the iPad, forbidding its use on school days or at mealtimes and bedtimes. However, his son asks incessantly for the iPad, and the author struggles with understanding what types of limits he should impose. After all, the iPad keeps his son quiet, engaged and happy; it brings instance peace to the household, and the games his son plays are creative apps that require thinking and problem-solving. He asks,
Is a gadget automatically bad for our children just because it’s electronic? What if it’s fostering a love of music, an affinity for theater and expertise in strategy and problem-solving? Is it a bad thing for a kid to be so much in love with mental exercises? Am I really being a good parent by yanking THAT away? (Pogue, 2001, n.p.)
The author concludes that his current answer is to live by the mantra “moderation in all things,” and balance his son’s iPad use with plenty of physical play and non-electronic activities. However, he understands that there is no easy answer and welcomes comments and thoughts from his readers. In response, over 900 individuals submitted comments – an incredibly large number of responses, and indicative of the universality of this issue to all parents. An informal analysis of the 900 responses to the article sheds incredible light on parents’ perceptions of the iPad and its use among children. Overall, the reactions were more negative than positive, and parents expressed a lot of concern about rapidly accelerating technology and this new digital world their children were growing up in. The negative and/or concerned comments fell into four distinctive themes, in which parents, and other professionals who work with children discussed: developmental and health concerns related to children’s use of the iPad; what children were missing out on because of using the iPad; issues with the iPad acting as a “babysitter,” and issues with children being engaged with an electronic device. Each of these concerns will be explained more in-depth, and examined in light of Reagan’s family’s experiences. Concerns over children’s development and health made up the largest percentage of negative comments. Respondents thought that six-years-old was too young for an iPad, and that young children needed experiences in the physical world for proper cognitive, physical, and social development. Parents expressed concern over attention, and how the iPad instantly entertained and soothed children. They thought there was a certain quality to boredom that sparked innovative, undirected play that was disappearing with the instant-gratification of the iPad and other electronic devices. There was a general consensus that even the iPad applications that allowed children to build, paint, create, and pretend didn’t provide the same learning experiences as doing those activities in real life. Overall, parents acknowledged the existence of technology in their children’s current and future lives, but expressed the desire to give them these few years to simply play – to be imaginative and inventive and not spend this critical developmental period sedentary, and in front of a screen. The second major concern of parents and caregivers was the opportunity cost of using the iPad, or in other words, what children were not doing because they were using the iPad. Here the commenters believed that there was nothing inherently wrong with using the iPad, but what mattered more were the activities the child was missing out on. An alternative to using the iPad of watching television was much different than an alternative of playing outside. Another shared concern with parents was the easy possibility of the iPad to function as an electronic “babysitter.” Parents, teachers, and doctors stated over and over again how children learn through human interaction, and not through screens. They noted an interesting dilemma – children’s “addiction” to electronic devises was an addiction that benefitted parents. It takes time and energy for parents to create purposeful and meaningful activities to do with their children, and it was much easier to entertain children instantly with an iPad or other electronic device. If a child is engaged with an iPad during every transition of their daily lives (before school, in the car, during mealtimes, after homework, before bedtime…), the device can quickly become more like an electronic parent, which has very serious consequences.
Finally, the last major concern of parents was the intrinsic electronic nature of the iPad itself. Some parents thought there were problems with children spending time engaged with a machine or gadget, as opposed to a book or friend. One commenter noted that children were more susceptible to the fantasy-world of cyberspace than adults, and how becoming disconnected from reality was harmful to young children, who need a firm grounding in the real, physical world. Most parents didn’t think any significant or meaningful learning occurred with an iPad that children couldn’t learn somewhere else, and that the iPad, like other electronic devices, lent itself too easily to addiction, causing problem behaviors when it was taken away.
Among these four categories of concerns, the ones that seemed most prevalent and salient within Reagan’s family were developmental concerns, the opportunity cost of using the iPad, and the iPad acting as a babysitter. Reagan’s afterschool caregiver expressed concern over how most of the apps Reagan plays on her iPad do not involve the use of imagination or creativity. She used to spend time creating complex stories, drawing pictures, and developing elaborating play schemes after school, but now all she wants to do is use the iPad. In addition, when Reagan gets her iPad privileges taken away by her parents, she complains about it constantly and becomes fixated on not having the iPad in a way that resembles the addictive-like behaviors of the New York Times columnist’s son.
Other research validates these concerns of parents. Negative perceptions of media included parents’ anxiety over the sedentary nature of media activity, children’s lack of playing outside, children’s exposure to media violence and other developmentally harmful material, and parents spending too little time with children (Pigeron, 2009, p. 24).
Parents’ perceptions of media are also reliant upon the function of this media in their daily lives. Many parents had positive attitudes toward media that allowed them to better manage their busy schedules, keep peace between siblings, calm children down, enforce discipline, and facilitate family routines such as eating, relaxing, and falling asleep (Rideout & Hamel, 2006). Rideout and Hamel (2006) found that this practical side of media was more significant in creating positive perceptions among parents than any educational benefits of media.
There is a clear distinction between parents idealized views of technology, as evident in the plethora of negative comments to the New York Times article, and parents actual, or lived, experiences, as evident in parents’ positive perceptions to the practical function of media in their daily lives. The pressures of modern society make it very hard for parents to live up to cultural ideals of limited media use, especially when faced with the convenience an iPad can offer. In her interviews with parents on their children’s media use, Pigeron (2009) found that, “many parents strove to appear in a virtuous light… in a society where children’s heavy media use is profoundly morally loaded” (p. 96). The parents she interviewed drew upon “a collective public script” (resembling the collective comments from the New York Times article) that “warns against the dangers of media, stipulating potentially harmful consequences on children’s physical, mental, and social development” (p. 95). Parents wish to raise their children in consensus with the public perception of media as harmful, yet in their actual lives, media takes on a different value, and parents are not as vigilant as they may seem. How are parents actually monitoring their children and making decisions about technology usage? A public policy report on children’s media use in the home found that parents did not actively seek out external information on children’s programming. They based their rules on children’s media usage on personal experiences, advertisements, and the time a television program aired. Children also often made decisions about what to watch without any influence from their parents (Schmitt, 2000).
An independent use of media was especially prominent for Reagan. Many of her app purchases were done entirely on her own. She would peruse the apple store and select apps she wanted to download. If it was a free app, she just had to ask her mother’s permission, and her mother would often agree after reading a few reviews of the app, or sometimes just by asking Reagan what the app was about. Her mother never turned to external sources to look for information regarding educational apps, or what was developmentally appropriate for her child. In fact, Regan was more likely than her mother to express concern over the content of apps. For instance, Reagan described an experience of asking her mother for permission to get an app, and her mother replying, “This app is okay with me, but it has violence,” which was not okay with Reagan. In this sense, Reagan’s parents did not have to worry about monitoring her access to media violence, as Reagan was extremely vigilant in this regard, and capable of doing it herself.
The competence of children with electronic media is often overlooked in favor of the common discourse of the power of media “to exploit children’s vulnerability, to destroy their innocence and to undermine their creativity” (Buckingham, 1998, p. 557). However, for some parents, children’s relationship with electronic media is perceived in a more positive and constructive light. Children are seen as possessing a “powerful form of ‘media literacy’” that guides their interactions with new technology (Buckingham, 1998, p. 557). This view, which Reagan’s parents seem to hold to a certain degree, would frame Reagan’s technological intuition and effective monitoring of her own media content as a positive benefit of technology.
Especially in today’s world, how a family uses and perceives media helps to define their family identity (Pigeron, 2009, p. 96). Despite the negative public perceptions of media and the belief that “families are pulled apart because of media-use creating world bubbles” (p. 216), Pigeron argues that media can bring families together in positive ways. She states that media can be used to “promote family interactions that are positive in tone and affect, and that foster bonding and feelings of collaboration and cooperation” (p. 165). Mothers mentioned that one of the most positive outcomes of video games were how they facilitated bonding between their sons and husbands (Rideout & Hamel, 2006, p. 6). A Pew research study found that “a majority of adults say technology allows their family life today to be as close, or closer, than their families were when they grew up” (Kennedy et al., 2008).
Most parents, in discussing the impact of media on their family lives, don’t take into consideration the brief, unplanned moments of shared media activity throughout their children’s day, which turn out to be some of the most positive experiences children have with media. It is within these communal, spontaneous moments that media “can generate a sense of collaboration, community, emotional togetherness, and physical connectedness within families” (Piegeron, 2009, p. 218).
Among the families Piegeron (2009) videotaped and studied, she found three positive benefits of media use within families: (1) media allowed for physical and emotional connectedness among families, and provided parents with tools to enter their children’s worlds; (2) media promoted collaborative activities among family members and the expression of shared interests, and (3) media allowed parents to communicate about important and sensitive topics with their children (p. 165).
In Pigeron’s observations of families, media provided opportunities for physical closeness (cuddling on a parent’s lap, playing with someone’s hair, kissing a child’s head), that she argues are “made possible by the inherent physical properties of the media and the built environment” (p. 216). In other words, the nature of media encourages physical closeness – such as watching television together on a couch or bed, playing video games with siblings on the floor, or huddling around a computer together to watch a video or listen to music. Pigeron also found that families frequently communicated with each other verbally and nonverbally while using media – laughing together, singing and dancing, listening attentively to one another’s stories about what had happened on a show, and exchanging knowing eye glances (p 180).
Another way in which new technology has affected family roles and relationships is due to a phenomenon known as the “digital divide” between younger and older generations—or the consequences of the younger generation having mastered digital technology to a greater extent than the older generation. Contrary to its negative perceptions, researcher Pål André Aarsand (2007) found that the digital divide provided children with the opportunity to become teachers to their parents and grandparents and proudly display their technological knowledge and competence. Aarsand found that parents and grandparents used their position as the less knowledgeable in order to interact with their children and gain access to playtime. He believes that the generational digital divide is not a problem, but rather, an interactional resource—a space “where generations meet and do something together” (p. 18). It provides a means in which both children and adults can enter into and sustain participation in the same activity.
All of this research is reflected in Reagan’s experiences. While Reagan does engage in many hours of solitary play on her iPad, by far she prefers to share her iPad with a friend or family member. Because of the nature of the iPad being a handheld device, if she wants to show a parent something, she will slide up next to them on the sofa, and together they will share in a game she is playing – in this sense, the iPad facilitates more moments of physical closeness between Reagan and her parents throughout the day. Reagan stated that her parents play many games with her, and in particular, she enjoys going to a website with her mom, and laughing together about the funny photographs on this website. Reagan especially delights in downloading new apps that seem to fit the interest of her parents. For instance, she could not wait to show her father a new air hockey app she had downloaded, as this is a game he particularly enjoys. These types of moments foster emotional connectedness, and feelings of collaboration between Reagan and her parents, as Piegeron’s (2009) research suggests.
Reagan is much more technologically competent than her parents, and like the research of Aarsand (2007), this has provided her with a chance to teach her parents about how to play iPad games, and to encourage their sustained attention in the activity. However, it has also caused some problems. As mentioned earlier, Reagan is the more vigilant monitor of her iPad use, and in many ways, her parents do not understand completely how the iPad works, and how to research and download new apps. Reagan thus can get away with not using the iPad for its intended education purpose as much as she should, and convincing her parents to download apps of questionable value. Reagan also has access to the password to get into the app store, and just recently she purchased four apps without her mother knowing. In these ways, the digital divide has limited her parents’ capabilities for monitoring her access to this technology.
The iPad has changed Reagan’s family dynamics in other negative ways too. She is read to less at night now that she has the iPad, and she uses it in car rides – limiting the amount of conversation she has with her parents. The iPad is now taken away from Reagan for punishment, which has really changed family dynamics, as this is the first real incentive that has mattered to Reagan. However, considering that before the iPad, Reagan was mostly engaged in watching television at her house, the iPad has had an overall positive effect of improving her relationships with her parents.
In conclusion, it is clear that the iPad has significantly affected Reagan’s family in both positive and negative ways. With the rapid influx of electronic media and new forms of technology into households, parents are forced to re-examine the systems by which they evaluate and monitor media, and renegotiate the meanings of family togetherness and quality time. This process is not easy, and while the messages about media are loud, they are not clear. In a world in which the average child spends over six hours a day engaged with media (Pigeron, 2009, p. 30), one of the most critical emerging parenting problems is the management of children’s “screen time”. The decisions parents make while navigating this new world greatly impact their children. As Rideout and Hamel (2006) state, “children’s media is as much or more about parents as it is about children” (p. 6). Pigeron (2009) found that there was a clear distinction between parents’ idealized and actual experiences with technology, which was echoed in most of the other research studies, and evident in Reagan’s family’s experience. In addition, contrary to the public script of media as always harmful to families, Pigeron found that it could facilitate emotional and physical connectedness between children and their parents. This shows that families are not as helpless and vulnerable to the power of media as they are portrayed, but rather, they are active participants willing to renegotiate family rules and parent-child roles in order to maintain close relationships and quality time with their children.
References
Aarsand, P. A. (2007). Computer and video games in family life: The digital divide as a resource in intergenerational interactions. Childhood, 14(2), 235-256.

Buckingham, D. (1998). Review essay: Children of the electronic age?: Digital media and the new generational rhetoric. European Journal of Communication, 13, 557-566.

Hughes, R. H., & Hans, J. D. (2001). Computer, the Internet, and families. Journal of Family Issues,
22(6), 776-790.

Kennedy, T. L. M., Smith, A., Wells, A. T., & Wellman, B. (2008). Networked families: PEW
Internet & American Life Project report. Retrieved May 15, 2011 from http://www.pewinternet.org Pigeron, E. (2009). The technology-mediated worlds of American families. Ph.D. dissertation,
University of California, Los Angeles, United States.

Pogue, D. (2011, February 24). A parent's struggle with a child's iPad addiction. The New York
Times. Retrieved May 15, 2011, from http://pogue.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/02/24/a-parents- struggle-with-a-childs-ipad-addiction/ Rideout, V. J., & Hamel, E. (2006). The Media Family: Electronic media in the lives of infants, toddlers, preschoolers and their parents. Washington, DC: Kaiser Family Foundation report.

Schmitt, K. L. (2000). Public policy, family rules and children’s media use in the home. The
Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. Report Series #35.