Category Children
The effect of Covid-19 on education in Africa
Tech companies use “persuasive design” to get us hooked. Psychologists say it’s unethical.
Behind the screens of the games we play and digital communities we interact with are psychologists and other behavioral science experts, who are hired to create products that we want to use more and more. Big tech now employs mental…
[Book] Everyday Schooling in the Digital Age
Everyday Schooling in the Digital Age: High School, High Tech? By Neil Selwyn, Selena Nemorin, Scott Bulfin, Nicola F. Johnson Routledge 2018 – 224 pages [Amazon link] Today’s high schools are increasingly based around the use of digital technologies. Students…
[Book] The Cyber Effect
The Cyber Effect: A Pioneering Cyberpsychologist Explains How Human Behavior Changes Online Dr. Mary Aiken Spiegel & Grau, August 2016 400 pages A groundbreaking exploration of how cyberspace is changing the way we think, feel, and behave Mary Aiken is…
[Book] The Class: Living and Learning in the Digital Age
The Class: Living and Learning in the Digital Age Sonia Livingstone and Julian Sefton-Green New York University Press May 2016, 368 pages > Read online for free Do today’s youth have more opportunities than their parents? As they build their…
Patients know best: Qualitative study on how families use patient-controlled personal health records
Patients Know Best: Qualitative Study on How Families Use Patient-Controlled Personal Health By Hanna Schneider, Susan Hill, and Ann Blandford Journal of Medical Internet Research 2016;18(2):e43 Background: Self-management technologies, such as patient-controlled electronic health records (PCEHRs), have the potential to…
IKEA Play Report 2015
IKEA has undertaken a major research-driven project in 2014 across 12 countries (report here) to explore the subjects of children’s development and play, and young people and parents’ perception of family life at home. This is a follow-up to the…
Design fiction personas illustrate possible impact of educational tech
People talk about the future of technology in education as though it’s right around the corner, but most of us get to that corner and see it disappearing around the next. This innovation-obsessed cycle continues as we are endlessly dissatisfied…
The touch-screen generation
Young children — even toddlers — are spending more and more time with digital technology. Hanna Rosin wonders what will it mean for their development? “As technology becomes ubiquitous in our lives, American parents are becoming more, not less, wary…
How to involve children in the design process?
What are the advantages and challenges inherent in working with children in the design process for creating games or apps? How do you stop them getting bored, and get useful information? This case study by Monica Ferraro (a UX Researcher…
Book: The App Generation
The App Generation How Today’s Youth Navigate Identity, Intimacy, and Imagination in a Digital World Howard Gardner and Katie Davis Yale University Press October 2013, 256 pages [Yale University Press link – Amazon link] Abstract No one has failed to…
A beautiful kids’ book that combines interactivity with good old-fashioned text
The Jörgits and the End of Winter, an indie fantasy novel for kids nine and up, uses interactivity as a supplement to the story, not a stand-in for it, and shows how interactivity can work in a slightly more substantial…
Five reasons why kids need special user research
Sabina Idler, who runs a UX research company in Amsterdam, provides five reasons why kids need special attention when it comes to user research: 1. Kids form their own target group 2. Kids form a diverse target group 3. You…
Recent studies on the impact of tablet use in schools – an overview
2012 One-to-one Tablets in Secondary Schools: An Evaluation Study (see also here and here) Dr Barbie Clarke and Siv Svanaes, Family Kids and Youth, UK, 2012 Research was carried out between September 2011 and July 2012 and included a literature…
Research on the impact of tablets in secondary schools
Two months ago I wrote about what was then one of the first qualitative studies on the impact of tablets in schools: “Carphone Warehouse (corporate site), a UK mobile phone retailer, recently commissioned the Family Kids and Youth research agency…
Research on Android tablet use in 5th grade classrooms
The series of research projects on tablet use in schools (see here, here and here) now also has an Android study. A small research project by Marie Bjerede and Tzaddi Bondi, equipped a 5th grade class of 27 students in…
In a Fisher-Price lab, apps become child’s play
At a Fisher-Price lab, researchers watch children at play to come up with ideas for new products, including toys that incorporate apps on iPads and iPhones. At Fisher-Price, “we bring babies in with their moms and watch them at play…
Truth, lies and the internet
The internet is the greatest source of information for people living in the UK today. But the amount of material available at the click of a mouse can be both liberating and asphyxiating. Although there are more e-books, trustworthy journalism,…
Usability testing with children: a lesson from Piaget
In this post, Sabina Idler, information designer at Usabilla (The Netherlands), introduces Piaget’s theory of cognitive growth and explains how it can be useful for usability testing with children. “Children are becoming an increasingly important target group on the web.…