The attitude of parents to their child’s use of the Internet in connection with their perception of the child’s personal identity

Abstract

In the 21 st century, universal digitalization and widespread use of the Internet transformed the living conditions of both children and adults. Children’s use of the Internet may be both a source of concern and a source of satisfaction for their parents. It is known that parents’ ideas and attitudes do not always fully reflect the reality — that is why surveys are especially important for collecting information about the attitude of the older generation to the modern digital environment, which constitutes a ‘habitat’ for today’s children. The article examines the attitude of parents to the Internet use by their school-age children in connection with the parents’ perception of the specific features of their children’s personal identity. We used a pilot version of a questionnaire developed by the Scientific Center for Mental Health (SCMH) to identify how parents perceive the use of the Internet by their children (both neurotypical and special). We also used the parental questionnaire LoPF-Q 6-18 PR adapted in the Department of Medical Psychology of the SCMH to identify the parents’ perceptions of the specific features of their children’s personal identity. These questionnaires allowed us to analyze the relationship between the parents’ attitudes towards their children’s online activity (the SCMH questionnaire) and the parents’ perceptions of their children’s personal identity (LoPF-Q 6-18 PR). The sample included 49 adults (parents or other relatives) aged 29 to 54 years and having children aged 6 to 18 years (among children, 21 were male and 28 were female). Both questionnaires were new to the sample, that is why we used different versions of mathematical assessment — both descriptive statistics and clustering. Where possible, the reliability of differences was assessed. The analysis of the data showed that the parental assessment of the danger/safety of the Internet use by their children is correlated with the parents’ perceptions of their children’s personal identity parameters. The significant parameters that divided the subjects into clusters were: the time spent on smartphone/computer and games (for the youngest children), and the time spent communicating on the Internet and the level of parental anxiety about the child’s Internet use (for adolescents aged 10– 12). The article contains discussion of the results and the prospects of future study.