The rights of very young children in the digital environment of the family home : findings from a UK survey of children 0-36 months and their parents

Winter, Karen and Flewitt, Rosie and El Gemayel, Sandra and Bunting, Lisa and Arnott, Lorna and Connolly, Paul and Dalziell, Andy and Gillen, Julia and Goodall, Janet and Lui, Min-Chen and McLaughlin, Katrina and Savadova, Sabina and Timmins, Sarah (2025) The rights of very young children in the digital environment of the family home : findings from a UK survey of children 0-36 months and their parents. Children and Society. ISSN 0951-0605 (In Press)

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Abstract

As digital technologies have become increasingly embedded in daily family life, there has been a growing international concern about children’s protection, provision and participation rights in a digital environment. Recognising this, the Committee on the Rights of the Child published General Comment No. 25 Children’s Rights in Relation to the Digital Environment (CRC, 2021), giving detailed advice on implementation issues in this area and calling for up-to-date research about children’s digital lives. This paper makes a significant contribution to that much-needed knowledge base by reporting the findings of an online survey conducted with parents and legal guardians (n=1,444) (hereafter parents) of children aged 0-36 months across socially and ethnically diverse families in the four UK nations. The survey represented Phase One of a larger three-phase project, ‘Toddlers, Tech and Talk’, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, which aimed to build an empirically robust body of knowledge about how 0-3-year-olds' lives intersect with digital technologies at home in socially and ethnically diverse families in inner-city, urban and rural communities. The survey found that nearly all family homes have Wi-Fi connection, that many homes have a wide range of digital devices, and that very young children engage in a wide range of digital activities both with their parents and on their own. Parents’ mediation practices are shaped by parental digital practices and attitudes, with concomitant implications for children’s digital rights. Implications are highlighted.