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This dataset provides longitudinal survey data from a European project, ySKILLS, which was focused on the role of digital skills in youths’ development. It contains data from 10,821 participants from Grades 6–10 (in Wave 1) in Estonia, Finland, Germany, Italy, Poland, and Portugal. The data was collected between Spring 2021 and Spring 2023, the participants were recruited through schools, where the data collection also took place, except for online data collections due to restrictions caused by COVID-19. The dataset is novel in its multidimensional approach to the construct of digital literacy. It provides insight into the development of digital skills in youth and the role of digital skills and internet usage in youths’ positive and negative online experiences and wellbeing. It also contains data that allows for the analysis of the role of digital skills in class networks. The data are beneficial for researchers interested in the examination of youths’ online skills, internet usage, online experiences, and wellbeing from a longitudinal perspective.

While the Internet is part of everyday life for many children, inequalities exist in their digital skills, with little known about the influence of perceived discrimination on these inequalities. Building on survey data collected from nationally representative samples of 10,820 children aged 12–16 in 14 European countries, we seek to understand whether and how disadvantaged children may fall behind their more advantaged peers across Europe with respect to digital skills, as well as the role played by perceived individual and social discrimination in acquiring these skills. The findings show that perceived individual and social discrimination affect the relationships of socio-cultural resources (age, gender, preference for online social interaction) and personal resources (self-efficacy) with digital skills. Therefore, even in countries where Internet use is an integral part of children’s lives, interventions should be made to prevent perceived offline discrimination translating into digital inequalities.

onsidering parental mediation as a dual process that starts with the child and varies according to their age and online activities, this article examines digital socialization in the broader context of family communication. Based on the EU Kids Online questionnaire (2017-2019) which surveyed children (9-16 years old) in 19 countries, and on previous pan-European studies, the article explores results from Spain, Italy and Portugal in a comparative perspective among them and with then 19 countries average. In the three Latin countries, in line with the average, safety, support and family communication are more highlighted by children than digital socialization, which is marked by a protectionist and risk prevention approach. However, the three countries present variations in children’s perceptions about their online well-being, the support they use to deal with risks and their own role in digital socialization. Acknowledging these national differences favors appropriate interventions by decision makers of public safety and well-being policies, as well as from education, health, and family counseling professionals.

Coding and robotics education has drawn a lot of interest in recent years to get children ready for the future labour market and advance their digital skills. This paper focuses on coding and robotics workshops in non-formal educational settings in Belgium, Denmark, and Italy. Building on data from a comparative/cross-national study, we will present findings from 16 observations of such workshops followed by 11 interviews with the organisers and moderators with the purpose of investigating their pedagogical practices, learning and inclusion opportunities. Findings of this study suggest that while digital skills workshops in non-formal learning contexts are designed and implemented with the goal of encouraging children's collaboration and active participation, the structure of the learning activities, the organization of the learning environment, and the choices made by children themselves may promote individualistic practices. Furthermore, despite attempts to encourage diversity and inclusion, such as choosing a "free" and "open-door" approach, these workshops may fail to attract participants from diverse backgrounds. We argue that an active dialogue between organisers and moderators, researchers, parents, and, of course, children from various backgrounds is required to promote child-centered approaches that move beyond individualistic accounts of learning and toward the creation of more collaborative and inclusive digital skill activities through a systemic and holistic approach.

onsidering parental mediation as a dual process that starts with the child and varies according to their age and online activities, this article examines digital socialization in the broader context of family communication. Based on the EU Kids Online questionnaire (2017-2019) which surveyed children (9-16 years old) in 19 countries, and on previous pan-European studies, the article explores results from Spain, Italy and Portugal in a comparative perspective among them and with then 19 countries average. In the three Latin countries, in line with the average, safety, support and family communication are more highlighted by children than digital socialization, which is marked by a protectionist and risk prevention approach. However, the three countries present variations in children’s perceptions about their online well-being, the support they use to deal with risks and their own role in digital socialization. Acknowledging these national differences favors appropriate interventions by decision makers of public safety and well-being policies, as well as from education, health, and family counseling professionals.

The discrepancy between children's actual amount of viewing time and parents' accounts of their concerns, rules, and parental mediation choices has been documented in empirical research, and typically interpreted through the lens of the Uses and Gratifications theory - showing how parents change their attitudes towards screen media in order to satisfy their own needs. Based on a qualitative longitudinal research project, including app-based media diaries, with 20 families with at least one child aged eight or younger, we aim to make two contributions to the literature. With regard to theory, we aim to highlight the heterogeneous and contingent ways of balancing the place of digital media in children's lives that arise from parents navigating screen time discourses, social pressures, and daily schedules. With regard to methods, we argue for the combination of qualitative data and app-based media diaries to contextualise and interpret potential discrepancies between reported screen time and parental anxieties or hopes about digital media.

Coding and robotics education has drawn a lot of interest in recent years to get children ready for the future labour market and advance their digital skills. This paper focuses on coding and robotics workshops in non-formal educational settings in Belgium, Denmark, and Italy. Building on data from a comparative/cross-national study, we will present findings from 16 observations of such workshops followed by 11 interviews with the organisers and moderators with the purpose of investigating their pedagogical practices, learning and inclusion opportunities. Findings of this study suggest that while digital skills workshops in non-formal learning contexts are designed and implemented with the goal of encouraging children's collaboration and active participation, the structure of the learning activities, the organization of the learning environment, and the choices made by children themselves may promote individualistic practices. Furthermore, despite attempts to encourage diversity and inclusion, such as choosing a "free" and "open-door" approach, these workshops may fail to attract participants from diverse backgrounds. We argue that an active dialogue between organisers and moderators, researchers, parents, and, of course, children from various backgrounds is required to promote child-centered approaches that move beyond individualistic accounts of learning and toward the creation of more collaborative and inclusive digital skill activities through a systemic and holistic approach.

The present article reports on findings from a survey administered in Italy to a national representative sample of parents of children aged 0-8 around their sharenting behaviour. We first frame sharenting as a complex phenomenon where gendered, generational and agentic matters intertwine and mingle in complex ways. We then report results from a cluster analysis aimed at identifying different sharenting styles reflecting the scale and scope of parents’ sharing behaviour among our sample. The relationships between sharenting styles and parents’ socio-demographics, as well as parental practices of privacy management are further explored and reported. Altogether, findings provide insights into the experience of sharenting in family life pointing to a variety of sharing practices, while also showing first that sharenting represents a key site of identity performance for young mothers, and then how parents negotiate and manage related issues of agency and privacy.

Through a re-analysis of survey data collected with a sample of 9,731 youth aged 11–17 from 10 European countries, the article explores how some of the most popular online activities for children and young people (i.e., informational, social, and entertainment activities) relate to different types of perceived digital skills, as well as individual and social characteristics (such as age, gender, emotional problems, sensation seeking, parental mediation, and family environment). Furthermore, this paper looks at the moderating role of the family environment between enabling parental mediation and online activities. Using multi-group structural equation modeling we found that emotional problems, perceived informational and social digital skills, and enabling parental mediation were associated with informational online activities; sensation seeking, perceived informational digital skills, and enabling and restrictive parental mediation were associated with social online activities; and restrictive parental mediation was associated with entertainment online activities. Implications of these findings for educators, policy-makers, and parents are outlined, as well as limitations and future directions.

Italy was the first country in Europe to implement a nationwide lockdown. Children and their families lived in nearly complete isolation for almost two months. Students missed 65 days of school compared to an average of 27 missed days among high-income countries worldwide. This prolonged break is of concern, as even short breaks in schooling can cause significant loss of learning for children and lead to educational inequalities over time. At least 3 million Italian students may not have been reached by remote learning due to a lack of internet connectivity or devices at home. This report explores children’s and parents’ experiences of remote learning during the lockdown in Italy, drawing on data collected from 11 European countries (and coordinated by the European Commission’s Joint Research Center). It explores how children's access and use of digital technologies changed during the pandemic; highlights how existing inequalities might undermine remote learning opportunities, even among those with internet access; and provides insights on how to support children’s remote learning in the future.

Our review of the MeTag app and the MeTagAnalyze web app is based on an initial test project involving undergraduate students, and, later, its adoption as part of a mixed-methods longitudinal research project on the datafication of childhood and family life. We contextualise the value of media diaries as a research tool in phenomenological and user-centred research traditions, namely the Domestication of Technology approach and the constructivist mediatization research tradition. Based on our preliminary findings and these theoretical frameworks, we highlight the main methodological advantages of the MeTag app for researchers who aim for a nuanced understanding of media practices and communication repertoires within different contexts and across various timeframes.

Il presente report presenta i risultati di sintesi della prima ondata dell'indagine ySKILLS, somministrata a un campione di 965 studenti italiani di 6 scuole dell’area milanese (3 secondarie di primo grado e 3 secondarie di secondo grado). Nella prima parte si forniscono informazioni di sfondo sul campione di bambini e adolescenti partecipanti e le loro caratteristiche individuali e sociali. Vengono poi presentati i dati in merito all’accesso quotidiano dei partecipanti a internet, quali il tempo trascorso online e i dispositivi maggiormente utilizzati. A seguire, è riportata una lista delle attività online più e meno comuni svolte da bambini e adolescenti su internet. Seguono i dati sulle competenze digitali dei rispondenti, indagate su quattro dimensioni (competenze comunicative e relazionali, tecnico-operative, creative e informative). Infine, presentiamo i risultati relativi ai principali rischi che le ragazze e i ragazzi italiani incontrano online. Laddove rilevanti, sono riportate differenze di genere ed età rispetto a tutte le dimensioni indagate nel report.

This report is based on findings from a cross-national qualitative study investigating young people’s digital skills practices in non-formal learning contexts in Belgium, Denmark, and Italy. The goal of this study was to gain better knowledge about how to foster digital skills acquisition and practices in non-formal learning contexts. This study combined 16 observations of digital skills workshops (i.c. programming and robotics workshops), 11 interviews with organisers and moderators of such activities, and 4 subsequent co-design activities with the collaboration of children, organisers, moderators, and researchers. The research activities took place in non-formal learning contexts, such as public libraries, youth clubs, and school spaces used for extra-curricular activities (i.e., outside the formal curriculum). Due to different COVID-19 restrictions across Belgium, Denmark and Italy, flexibility with the research protocol was needed. The main aim of the observations and interviews was to first map existing situated experiences of digital skills workshops across countries, investigate their structure and teaching philosophies, and inform co-design activities. Then, with the co-design activities, we aimed to gain knowledge about potential future trajectories, drawing insights from best practices and formulating recommendations, with Italy focusing on teaching style, Denmark on technology and tools, and Belgium on policy. Our work allowed us to address several research questions, investigating three main areas to be understood as broader thematic units. As a first thematic unit concerned with teaching, we questioned how the philosophies that drive the digital skills workshops ran by moderators and organisers have an impact on the workshop organisation in terms of their formality, activities chosen, teaching styles, imaginaries and values. Indeed, we argue that these matters should not go unnoticed, as part of a hidden curriculum (Gordon, 1982), as these are likely to

This chapter draws together contributions from different areas of the world in order to explore how different national responses to the pandemic, socioeconomic conditions, and levels of mediatization – that is, increasing embedment of (digital) media in social processes – shaped children’s everyday lives under these difficult circumstances. COVID-19 represented a huge challenge for each and every country in the world, spotlighting more than ever before differences between societies, socioeconomic contexts, legal and political systems, communities’ reactions, and age groups’ specific problems. The countries that are represented in this chapter include – Argentina, India, Italy, New Zealand, Nigeria, and Taiwan. They were chosen as case studies representing different continents to highlight these differences. The chapter presents six separate analyses of challenges encountered in each country and was written by one of the authors, followed by a brief conclusion.

What are the consequences of growing up in a datafied world in which social interaction is increasingly dependent on digital media and everyday life is shaped by algorithmic predictions? How is datafication being normalized in children’s everyday life? What are the technologies, contexts and relations that enhance children’s datafication? What are the meanings of data practices for parents, teachers, and children themselves? These are some of the questions that Mascheroni and Siibak address in Datafied childhoods: Data practices and imaginaries in children’s lives. When the data-driven business model emerged twenty years ago, we could not have imagined how pervasive data extraction would have become in the context of everyday life, including the “institutional triangle” of children’s lives (the home, the school and the playground). Today, the COVID-19 pandemic has intensified the datafication of everyday life and our reliance on data-relations. Yet, we still know little about the nature, meanings and consequences of the data practices in which children, and the adults around them, engage. This book tries to fill in this gap in two ways. First, drawing on the authors’ knowledge of children and media studies and their own research on children’s, families’ and teachers’ interactions with multiple technologies (IoT and IoToys, artificial intelligence, algorithms, robots) in different contexts (home, school and play), it promotes a non-media-centric and child-centered approach. Second, in so doing it encourages further scholarly inquiry into the everyday as the analytical entry point to understand how datafication is transforming parenting, education, childhood and thereby the children.

The Internet of Toys (IoToys) is a developing market within our Internet of Things (IoT) ecosystem. This book examines the rise of internet-connected toys and aims to anticipate the opportunities and risks of IoToys before their widespread diffusion. Contributors to this volume each provide a critical analysis of the design, production, regulation, representation and consumption of internet-connected toys. In order to address the theoretical, methodological and policy questions that arise from the study of these new playthings, and contextualise the diverse opportunities and challenges that IoToys pose to educators, families and children themselves, the chapters engage with notions of mediatization, datafication, robotification, connected and post-digital play. This timely engagement with a key transformation in children’s play will appeal to all readers interested in understanding the social uses and consequences of IoToys, and primarily to researchers and students in children and media, early childhood studies, media and communications, sociology, education, social psychology, law and design.

In this chapter we outline a research toolkit for the study of Internet-connected toys and their processual and situated affordances. We account for the complex and varied ways in which connected toys, children, adults and media infrastructures interrelate and interact to form systems of meaning and ensembles of technologies and agency, which constitute the digital materialities and social practices of connected play. This toolkit of research methods uses an ethnographic methodology but is informed by two epistemological approaches – phenomenological and non-representational. Thus, this toolkit takes into account the sociocultural context, materiality and symbolic dimensions of connected toy use.

This introduction aims to contextualise The Internet of Toys (IoToys) within the tradition of media and communications, set out the theoretical foundations for this volume, and explore the notions of mediatization, datafication and robotification. First, it makes the argument that IoToys should be conceived of as media that are triply articulated in children’s everyday lives. Their network-connectivity and sensor-based functions provide the basis for the mediatization and datafication of children’s lives. Second, it analyses IoToys as toys that enable forms of hybrid play and embedded play, and as social robots that are automated in such a way that they elicit social responses from or interaction with children. Finally, it provides a summary of the chapters of the book.

The concluding chapter reviews the key themes as set out in the introduction and in the contributions to this volume. Here, Mascheroni and Holloway revisit the concepts of datafication and surveillance capitalism in order to emphasise critical questions and map out possible trajectories that future research in the field could address and pursue. The discussion of surveillance capitalism emphasises the double positioning of children in the market as both digital consumers and digital labourers. The chapter also makes the argument that the social and political consequences of datafication extend beyond privacy issues to the transformation of the very conditions under which citizenship is enacted.

Digital parenting is a popular yet polysemic concept that refers both to how parents are increasingly engaged in regulating their children’s relationships with digital media (parental mediation), and how parents themselves incorporate digital media in their daily activities and parenting practices, and, in so doing, develop emergent forms of parenting.

Given the considerable policy and practical importance of digital skills and literacies for young people’s life chances, especially as regards inequalities and digital inclusion, and the increasing reliance on digital technologies for learning, employment and civic life, a systematic evidence review was conducted to answer this question. The review was informed by the International Telecommunication Union’s (ITU) definition of digital skills: "the ability to use ICTs in ways that help individuals to achieve beneficial, high-quality outcomes in everyday life for themselves and others" and to "reduce potential harm associated with more negative aspects of digital engagement" (2018, p.23). A preliminary rapid evidence mapping found that relatively little research was published in the early years of mass internet use (2000–09). Hence the systematic evidence review encompassed all research published between 2010 and 2020, thus representing the large majority of available studies. The search protocol, registered on PROSPERO, included studies of moderate to high quality (judged using the Weight of Evidence approach) that used quantitative methods, were published in the English language, and related directly to the digital skills of 12- to 17-year-olds. The results of 110 studies were analysed to identify what is known about youth digital skills, and to examine the evidence for the antecedents (or factors influencing the acquisition) of digital skills, and the consequences of having digital skills. They were also scrutinised for research gaps and to generate questions and hypotheses for future investigation. In addition, they were examined for the many ways in which digital skills have been conceptualised and measured in the research literature.

Digital skills, risks and wellbeing among European children: Report on (f)actors that explain online acquisition, cognitive, physical, psychological and social wellbeing, and the online resilience of children and young people

Based on the Italian data from a four country qualitative research (Australia, Belgium, Italy and the UK) carried out with children aged 8-to-10-years-old, the paper analyses the domestication of Cozmo, a social robotic toy. Robotic toys are conceptualised through the lens of the domestication of technology and drawing on the concept of “affordances-in-practice” (Costa, 2018) – that is, as the ongoing and always situated enactments of the properties of technological artefacts through practices of use-in-context. in order to investigate the digitalmaterial assemblage of the robotic toy, children’s play practices, parents’ and children’s imaginaries of social robots, a child-centred qualitative research has been designed, which involved two family visits and engaged parents and children as co-researchers. Parents were asked to film their children’s interactions with Cozmo in between visits, whereas children co-constructed the stoy of Cozmo through the Book Creator app. Findings show how children enact the affordances of Cozmo based on its anthopomorfisation. More specifically, they enact its liveliness (through practices of care such as feeding the robot) and its affective stickiness (through the actualisation of an emotional bond). Less practised, instead, is the affordance of programmability..

The market for children’s apps aimed at pre-school aged children is expanding in the context of the schoolification and marketisation of very young children’s education and development. When subject to critical analysis, the download pages pertaining to these apps reveal the dominant discourse to be one of ‘pedagogical responsibilisation’, for parents who seek to optimise their children’s educational opportunities. A neoliberal market-driven rationale frames the parenting role, encouraging investment in extracurricular activities for children. Thus, good parenting becomes analogous with the use of early learning educational apps.