Parents unaware of exposure to harmful content20 May 2005
Children claim to know more about the Internet than their parents.
But even if parents are less net-savvy than their kids, they still have an important role to play in supervising and controlling their use of the Internet. |
Surveys have shown that there is a large gap between children and parents’ accounts of what young people do and see on the Internet. The 2003 SAFT (Safety Awareness Facts Tools) survey, which was conducted in five European countries, found that 90% of parents claimed they “knew a great deal about their children’s Internet use.”
Other statistics do not back up this confidence. Both the SAFT and recent UK Children Go Online (UKCGO) surveys have found that while around 50% of children have come across pornography either deliberately or accidentally, only 15% of parents believe this to be the case. This is likely to cause alarm among parents who cited pornography as their greatest concern regarding their children’s Internet use.
The experts’ advice to parents is not to pull the plug on their children’s Internet use. The UKCGO report concludes:
“Children who do not have access at home... find themselves ‘on the wrong side’ of the digital divide and are at risk of missing out on the many opportunities Internet has to offer.”
SAFT found that more than half of parents surveyed “talked very little or not at all” with their children about Internet safety. Parents are urged to discuss online activities more with their children and go online with their children to inform themselves.
Mrs Carmee Lim chairs the Parents Advisory Group for the Internet (PAGi) in Singapore. In a news release, she advised, "We need to continue to take an active interest in what our children do online. Times may have changed. But the tools for successful parent-child relationships have not.”
| Autor: |
Chris Coakley, EUN |
| veröffentlicht: |
Monday, 23 May 2005 |
| Letzte Änderung: |
Tuesday, 25 Oct 2005 |
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