ECREA16-Abstract

Friday, November 11

1 8 : 0 0 – 1 9 : 3 0

ARS03

Methodological Questions on the Research of Media Habits and Digital Literacy of Young Audiences

M.J. Brites

, C. Trültzsch-Wijnen

Communication and Society Research Centre CECS/UMinho, Communication Sciences, Braga, Portugal

Salzburg University of Education Stefan Zweig, Salzburg, Austria

Research on young people’s media habits, and particularly on digital practices, gets challenged from the transformation of the classical media environment

characterised by the emergence of a digital ecology, that indicates a hybrid system of technologies, cultural products and players as well as consumer

activities and practices (Aroldi & Vittadini 2010, 1). The field of using media and the social actions related to this have become more complex. A challenge

that derives therefrom is the fact that the ways young people are using and interpreting media differ from ‘traditional’ reading or viewing (Wijnen 2012;

Brites 2015) and from the using habits of audience researchers. But not only the age gap is a challenge also the great importance of the day-to-day life

contexts, the social environment and the socio-ecological background of a person that are closely related to his or her ways of using and acting with media

is a difficulty for audience research. Researchers always get an outside perspective on the life-worlds and media-worlds of young people no matter if they

are using qualitative, quantitative or mixed methods designs. And from this outside perspective academics are analysing and assessing the media habits

of young people not always knowing if the conclusions are right, because they do not know if they have sure enough understood the context and the social

actions related to media.This also implicates methodological challenges: On the one hand we have to discuss if we are always asking the right questions and

if these questions are understood by young audiences in the way they are intended to be (Brites, 2015). It is also worth to discuss, if the results of our surveys

can be biased because of misunderstandings and if yes, how such biases may be interpreted or avoided. On the other hand classical methods and research

designs should be evaluated and it should be asked if they are still sufficient. Additional it is worth to critically explore the usefulness of alternative and par‑

ticipatory methods for audience research and discuss if they could enrich our methodological repertoire. The proposed panel will focus on these questions

from different perspectives: Kjartan Ólafsson discusses measurement biases in quantitative large-scale surveys on digital literacy. ChristineTrültzsch-Wijnen

looks on the impact of social desirability in quantitative and qualitative studies on young people’s media literacy practices. Maria José Brites will reflect

on the advantages and usefulness of participative methods in the study of family digital cultures and news appropriations. Sascha Trültzsch-Wijnen and

Philip Sinner will discuss research biases regarding the use of photographs in the context of digital literacy and self exposure and how to overcome these

by the integration of alternative methods. Finally Shakuntala Banaji will reflect on young audiences and digital literacy from an intercultural perspective by

questioning a strongly North-Western research agenda as not fitting the media practices and challenges of young people in the Global South.

PN 228

Digital Literacy and the Dark Art of Survey Design

K. Ólafsson

University of Akureyri, Akureyri, Iceland

Theories on the question answering process and the various rules for the design of good questionnaires have been developed significantly in the past de‑

cades (see Saris & Gallhofer, 2007;Tourangeau, Rips & Rasinski, 2000).The main body of research on these issues has however been developed in surveys for

the adult population and in studies which do not involve comparisons over time or across countries. When surveying children it is necessary to take into ac‑

count the fact that children do not have the same cognitive functioning as adults. Questionnaires intended for children thus have to be adapted to the age-

group where they are to be used. Survey design involves many decisions which can have serious implications for the eventual results. Most researchers will

associate question design with systematic bias. However, it is also important to keep in mind that question design can result in randommeasurement error

which can seriously limit the strength of correlations observed in the data. Compared with the exact science of data analysis and hypothesis testing survey

design can appear as a bit of a dark art where decisions have to be made with limited information about the actual implications. Bearing in mind the serious

nature of errors which can be caused by research design it is interesting to note how researchers will often go to great lengths in adjusting the finer details

of their statistical analysis while ignoring substantial errors caused by question design. This presentation will look at approaches used to measure digital

literacy in several large-scale surveys on children’s internet use and what conclusions might be drawn on the quality of the measurements used in these

surveys. Mainly the presentation will look at the EU Kids Online survey of 2010 and the Net Children Go Mobile survey of 2013–14 but other studies will also

be briefly discussed. Building on Krosnick’s (1991) theory of satisficing the presentation will focus on whether it is at all possible to obtain the desired goal

of optimizing when attempting to measure digital literacies in surveys on children. References: Krosnick, J. A. (1991) Response strategies for coping with

the cognitive demands of attitude measures in surveys. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 5, 213–236. Saris, W.E., & Gallhofer, I.N. (2007) Design, evaluation

and analysis of questionnaires for survey research. Hoboken, John Wiley & Sons. Tourangeau, R., Rips, L.J., & Rasinski, K. (2000) The Psychology of Survey

Response. New York: Cambridge University Press.

PN 229

Researching the Media Literacy of Young Audiences: A Case of Social Desirability?

C. Trültzsch-Wijnen

Salzburg University of Education Stefan Zweig, Salzburg, Austria

There is a lot of research done on the media habits of children and adolescents, particularly regarding their use of the Internet as well as mobile devices.

Through large studies like EU Kids Online (2014) we are rather good informed about the risks and opportunities they face on the internet and researchers

are able to give policy recommendations with regards to media literacy education. Various national (e.g. mpfs 2015) and international (e.g. EU Kids Online

2014) studies found out differences concerning media behaviour and coping strategies with respect to gender, age and SES but researchers’ statements

concerning media literacy seem rather standardised. This was the starting point of a study on media literacy practices of young people. The aim was to get

a deeper insight on their handling of challenges and risks as well as chances and opportunities regarding the internet. Therefore data from a quantitative

survey (N = 2.491, age: 10–30) were complemented with a qualitative part with interviews and thinking aloud sessions on a sub-sample of the quanti‑