“Someday you’ll have children just like you”: what tomorrow’s parents can teach us about parental mediation research

Abstract

This commentary considers adolescents’ media habits and the ways they can guide future research on parental mediation. Three lessons from “tomorrow’s parents” are applied: (1) teens are accustomed to on-demand media, (2) teens are used to multitasking with multiple screens, and (3) teens have come to expect media targeted specifically to them. From these lessons, researchers should consider focusing their work on parenting strategies that are responsive to individual differences among children, easily accessible during media use, and rigorously tested for effectiveness. The commentary concludes with a call to direct future research in ways that will help future parents’ do a better job of mediating children’s media use.

Keywords:

• Parental mediation
• research
• children’s media use
• digital media use
• mobile media use

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.