Typology of children media users

Abstract

Research about children’s media use is often concerned with the effects of one particular medium. There is rather little research about more general media diets in terms of their diversity and the resulting outcomes. Against the theoretical background of media repertoire approaches, we developed more general types of children’s overall media use. We analyzed standardized interviews with children as part of the MIKE-2017-project in Switzerland. Drawing on a representative sample of 448 primary school children of the French-speaking part of Switzerland, we developed a typology of children media users based on their media diet, referring to a media repertoire approach. Data revealed three media use patterns labelled as “visual drifters” who dominantly use screen media, “modern diversifiers” who use a wide variety of media, and “traditional offliners” with a narrow repertoire. Contrary to often-expressed concerns, “modern diversifiers” frequently engage in non-media activities compared to the other groups. Results show that it is not only essential to concentrate on the children’s frequency of particular media usage but also on children’s media diets or repertoires.