Teens’ Media Consumption Regulated by Parents, Who Now Like Internet Less

Parents are engaged with their children’s media consumption - that is, they regulate it - and they have less positive views of the internet today than they did in 2004, according to data issued by the Pew Internet and American Life Project, reports sister site MarketingCharts.

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Shortcuts to charts/tables referenced in this article:

1. Attitudes of teenagers’ parents toward the internet
2. How parents regulate teens’ media content, use time
3. Gadget ownership within households with teens

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According to the study (pdf):Some 59 percent of parents say the internet has been a good thing for their children, down from 67 percent in 2004, whereas those who say it has had no effect of have no opinion on the matter has gone up five point, from 25 percent to 30 percent. (See chart: Attitudes of teenagers’ parents toward the internet.)Most parents check up on their teens’ internet use: 65 percent say that they check to see what websites their teenagers visit.

Even more parents have rules about media consumption (TV, internet, videogames): Two-thirds have some sort of rule about their teenage children’s media use. (See table: How parents regulate teens’ media content, use time.)

Most parents also say digital technology makes their lives easier, but their children are even more positive: 88 percent of teens report that information and communication devices make their lives easier, compared with 69 percent of their parents.

Some 93 percent of youth are online and 94 percent of their parents are online. Overall, 87 percent of parents who have a child ages 12-17 use the internet, up from 80 percent in the 2004 survey.

Most parents (64 percent) and teens (60 percent) say they own two or three gadgets (see table: Gadget ownership within households with teens). Family members living in the same household also tend to own the same number of gadgets - but often not the same type of devices.