Engl. transl.: Between Bibi Blocksberg and Alexa. Media biographical experiences of parents and their influence on media education. Second report of the sub-study "Mobile Medien und Internet im Kindesalter – Fokus Familie"

"What is the significance of media in families with children in the first years of life up to primary school age? How do children acquire digital and mobile media at different ages and stages of development? At the same time, what challenges do parents face in their media education? Where do they search and find solutions? For which questions and topics do they need professional support? These are the central questions of the sub-study "Familien-Medien-Monitoring", which is part of the project "MoFam – Mobile Medien in der Familie". The results of the long-term study will be available in spring 2021. Over the course of the four-year project period, initial results on specific topics have been presented and published.[...]This report looks at the influence of parents' biographical experiences in the context of media on their media education. In the interviews with the parents, they repeatedly brought up situations from their own childhood to explain and justify their media-educational actions or their perception of their children's media appropriation. It was obvious that the memories of their own experiences influenced their attitudes towards media in general, but also towards the importance of media during childhood and thus their attitude towards media education. A deeper investigation of these connections seemed appropriate. Therefore, the fourth wave of the survey (fall 2018) focused on the parents' media biographies. On the one hand, emphasis was placed on jointly uncovering parental memories. On the other hand, the parents were asked to reflect on the extent to which they themselves can establish a link between their childhood experiences and their current attitudes towards media." (Pfaff-Rüdiger et al. 2020, 5). [translated by the coder]

"All parents have childhood memories of their media use. Although most parents initially think of situations and experiences that they locate in later childhood or (early) adolescence, watching television, in particular, provides an anchor to memories of earlier childhood. As they get older, parents mainly remember their own media devices.[...]Overall, parents associate particularly leisure and entertainment situations with media and these memories are often linked to other people. All parents also remember positive social and emotional situations with media.[...]In general, the study shows that parental media experiences play an important role in identity development. Media heroines of their childhood and youth also play a central role. They served as a guide for their own growing up, for their wishes and dreams, and in retrospect, they attribute an important orienting function to them." (Pfaff-Rüdiger et al. 2020, 26-27). [translated by the coder] "The level of activity in media education was much lower than (at least in the parents' memory) than it is today. The parents could name a few concrete rules or sanctions and report just as little that their parents had dealt more intensively with their children's media use. Thus, many parents lack examples from their own biography of what successful media education can look like. They also do not name their parents as role models. It is striking that the parents repeatedly mention being the role model for their children, but hardly reflect or describe the role of their own parents." (Pfaff-Rüdiger et al. 2020, 35). [translated by the coder] "If we look at the influences of the parents' media biographies on the children's media behaviour, on the one hand, the ritualised media use dominates, which the parents remember strongly and which they have adopted into their own family. On the other hand, it is favourite media and programmes from the parents' childhood that they - probably slightly nostalgically - consider being particularly valuable and suitable for their own children." (Pfaff-Rüdiger et al. 2020, 41). [translated by the coder] "Due to the manifold chances and risks, the changing media environment requires a clear attitude on the part of the parents. The more positive the media experiences in childhood, the easier this is for them. A negative attitude, on the other hand, prevents parents from dealing with the children's needs. Some parents, therefore, limit themselves to offering their children content from their own childhood. For parents with a positive attitude, offers from childhood instead mean sharing their own passions with their children and seeing them as an opportunity to work on their relationship." (Pfaff-Rüdiger et al. 2020, 55). [translated by the coder]