Parental Mediation Of Screen Media Use In Children And Youth At-Risk Of Attention Difficulties

Screen media is an omnipresent and ever-evolving component of children’s lives. Across development, it is essential to understand the strategies that parents use to manage their children’s screen media use (known as parental mediation), as they may serve as important predictors of healthy relationships with screen media. While children at-risk of attention difficulties (e.g., children with ADHD, children with early neurological risk) have been identified as being more vulnerable to screen media related risks, few studies have investigated parental mediation in these populations. Three studies were conducted to characterize parental mediation of screen mediation of children at-risk of attention difficulties by addressing the following research objectives: (1) examine the underlying dimensional structure of parental mediation, (2) characterize and compare parental mediation strategies in a community sample and in children and youth at-risk for attention difficulties, including those with ADHD and those with early neurological risk, (3) assess parent and child factors that relate to parent mediation strategies across community and at-risk samples, (4) determine the parental mediation strategies that predict better screen media outcomes, and (5) develop a more nuanced understanding of parents’ lived experiences of parenting around screen media use in children with attention difficulties via semi-structured interviews. In Study One, the factor structure of parental mediation was assessed, revealing a three factor models representing strategies of restriction, active mediation, and internet safety mediation. In Study Two, parental mediation and associated factors (e.g., parental stress, impact of screen media on the child, child age, child attention problems, etc.) were assessed and compared across three samples, namely a community sample, children with ADHD, and children with early neurological risk. Parents in the community sample generally endorsed using more parental mediation strategies, while parents of children with ADHD endorsed more negative outcomes including parental stress and negative impact of screen media on the child. Parental mediation strategies were found to be differentially associated with various screen media outcomes, including impact on the child, parental stress about child screen use, and daily child screen use. In Study Three, we conducted semi-structured interviews with parents of children with ADHD about their lived experiences of mediating their child’s screen media use and conducted a qualitative analysis to better understand their perspectives. Broadly, parents spoke about their challenges in navigating parental mediation, the strategies that they attempt to use, as well as how they adapt their approaches to their child’s developmental stage and attentional profile. Taken together, these findings suggest that children with attentional difficulties may experience unique challenges with screen media use, which may require unique parental mediation strategies to mitigate the associated risks.