research

According to research, children have great access to internet due to growth in technology. A survey conducted on the children of age 9-16 years to investigate the impact of internet showed that a larger percentage was occupied by negative impacts. About 22% said that pornography was the greatest risk to them, 19% complained of cyber-bulling while 18% were concerned with violent content. Most of the aggressive content is found in social media websites such as YouTube and twitter. This study is aimed at investigating the impact of internet on children through recognition of children’s voice and experience.

Literature Review

According to Staksrud 2016, internet made 30% of children aged 9-16 years have contact with people they haven’t met before. Through online communication, strong links are created between people of different races and ages which negatively affect them. However, some connections end up bringing people together and helping each other. Another study showed that 9% of children get into contact through internet and go to meet such people face-to-face. Meeting people for the first time sometimes happens to be dangerous for the intentions of the meetings are not well known.

Staksrud says that according to Livingstone et al 2012, 14% of children using internet comes across sexual images while 6% send nasty messages on internet. Children complained of coming into contact with sexual images which made them upset. Sending hurtful messages online by children in most cases is as a result of responding to other people’s posts or after had been provoked by others.

According to analysis of the impact of internet on the life of children, pornography was rated the most upsetting followed by online bullying which does not have a great impact. Meeting new people online and making arrangements to meet offline was rated the least upsetting impact of internet to children. Apart from the aforementioned impacts of internet on children, other impacts like unkind behavior and privacy invasion are under research.

Methods

Interview was conducted on internet- using children aged 9-16 years using closed-ended questions. Before the closed-ended questions were issued to the children, one open-ended question was asked for the children to give their view on what issues bother them so much in the internet. The children wrote their answers on a sheet of paper and sealed them such that no one could know what the children wrote.

Results

The research showed that pornographic risks among the children was highest rated at 20.5% which included naked and private images from adults. Violent risks which include rape was rated 17.5% while other content risks such as torture and animal killing was rated 17.4%. Conduct risk which included conduct with both adult and children was 19.4% while other risks not classified was 7.7%.

Discussions

Internet has been diversified worldwide since almost everything is done through internet and has been risky to children. Children identify a long list of internet issues concerning them despite the fact that such issues are familiar from public agenda. Most of the findings came from direct experiences where children complained of how bullying and pornographic images were found online. An awareness concerning online risks was found to be worrying children on the issues they expect to find on the internet.

Conclusions

In conclusion, this research calls for attention to children’s concerns which they express themselves as a result of internet. Online posts such as pornographic videos uploaded on YouTube and other websites requires to be examined for the sake of children whose exposure is diversified.

Reference

Staksrud, E. (2016). Youth 2.0: Social Media and Adolescence—Connecting, Sharing and Empowering. Journal Of Children And Media, 10(4), 515-518. doi: 10.1080/17482798.2016.1234730