Care in parental social media mediation
Team
Duration
Role
Tools
The problem space
As a generation that grew up with this technology using social media is simply a part of daily life. However, we aimed to uncover the parental perspective of how social media and mediation plays into the parent-teen relationship.
Secondary research
Tension: Secrecy
Teens tend to behave rebelliously (ex: secretly using phones in bed when parents set limits).
Care: Motivations
Parents worry about the digital footprint teens may leave on the internet
Autonomy: Identity
Social media encourages teens to explore their sense of identity and form social relationships
Secondary research
Active Mediation
Mediation that encourages open discussions, typically about critical thinking and safe practices for social media use.
Restrictive Mediation
Mediation that involves monitoring and setting limits on teen’s media activities, typically through screen time apps.
Research question
Interviews
Most research studies were one-sided conversations with parents or teens. So, we wanted to understand both of their perspectives to properly acknowledge tensions/behaviors with both sides of the conversation.
Insights
Ideation
It’s important to note that our speculative concepts were created to invoke a response for interviewees, rather than create a solution.
Concept feedback
In the interview, we made sure to differentiate our speculative and earnest designs.
Final concepts + workbook
To document how far we’ve come, however, we’ve compiled a workbook that goes into our research more in-depth. I encourage you to check it out here!
Reflections + takeaways
It’s extremely hard to remove social media and technology altogether. So, it follows that striking a balance, satisfying both sides, is perhaps the compromise in the parent-teen dynamic (while keeping social media in the relationship). In the end, it’s simply not possible to conclude this study without mentioning a common ground.
While there was no snazzy eye catching final solution attached to this research question, this research study has been extremely fulfilling. Research is its own fascinating field of its own, and it was great to get a taste of it. Special thanks to Audrey Desjardins for being a mentor in this study, and to Ava, Steve, and Mike for being great teammates!
