As of March 2020, a survey on parenting in the United States revealed that a major reason for 76 percent of parents to have not shared anything about their children on social media was because they did not want other people to have access to the information. A major reason for 71 percent of responding non-sharers was due to them not wanting social media sites collecting data about their children.

This statistic shows the percentage of social media using mothers in the United States who access social networking sites several times per day. During the 2018 survey period, 59 percent of U.S. moms stated that they accessed social media several times per day.

In 2020, around 90 percent of parents surveyed in Mexico and in Peru stated that they knew what information on the social network profiles of their children was public. Concurrently, in Brazil, one out of five responding parents said they were not aware of the public information featured on their children's social media profiles. Furthermore, according to another survey, approximately one third of children in Mexico accessed online communications media content.

In 2023, children in the United Kingdom spent an average of 127 minutes per day on TikTok. This was followed by Instagram, as children in the UK reported using the app for an average of 40 minutes daily. Children in the UK aged between four and 18 years also used Facebook for 15 minutes a day on average in the measured period.

Mobile ownership and usage among UK children In 2021, around 60 percent of kids aged between eight and 11 years in the UK owned a smartphone, while children aged between five and seven having access to their own device were approximately 30 percent. Mobile phones were also the second most popular devices used to access the web by children aged between eight and 11 years, as tablet computers were still the most popular option for users aged between three and 11 years. Children were not immune to the popularity acquired by short video format content in 2020 and 2021, spending an average of 97 minutes per day engaging with TikTok, as well as over 50 minutes on the YouTube app in 2021.

Children data protection In 2021, 37 percent of U.S. parents and 44 percent of UK parents reported being slightly concerned with their children’s device usage habits. While the share of parents reporting to be very or extremely concerned was considerably smaller, children are considered among the most vulnerable digital audiences and need additional attention when it comes to data and privacy protection. According to a study conducted during the first quarter of 2022, 76 percent of children’s apps hosted in the Google Play Store and 67 percent of apps hosted in the Apple App Store transmitted users’ locations to advertisers.

Additionally, 42 percent of kids’ apps were found to collect persistent identifiers, such as users’ IP addresses, which could potentially lead to Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) violations in the United States. In the United Kingdom, companies have to take into account several obligations when considering online environments for children, including an age-appropriate design and avoiding sharing children’s data.

QUT Research Data Respository Dataset and Resources

While work on the relationship between social media use and adolescent mental health has allowed for some progress, research in this area is still relatively new and shows mixed evidence. This is partly the consequence of a rapidly changing field, resulting in conceptualisation and measurement issues that hinder progress. Given the need for robust conceptualisation, the present study included five focus groups with a total of 26 adolescents aged 11-15 in Northwest England, to understand their experiences, motivations, and perceptions of social media use, relating to mental health and wellbeing. Reflexive thematic analysis was used to analyse the transcripts. We developed three themes and 14 sub-themes. Young people discussed key motivations for using social media (theme 1) relating to social connections, keeping up-to-date, mood management, the ‘default’ activity, freedom to express and develop myself, and fitting in. They shared some of the benefits and positive experiences of social media use (theme 2) such as feeling connected, validation and reassurance, and enjoyment and supporting a sense of self, and finally, they talked about negative experiences of social media use (theme 3), including platform risks, loss of control, social conflict, social comparison, and self-presentation management. Our findings have contributed to our understanding of the salient dimensions and language to inform the development of an adolescent social media experience measure related to mental health.

The increased use of social media among young people has attracted the attention of the public, the media and the government, and has led to growing concerns about its impact on young people's mental health, wellbeing and levels of loneliness. This concern stems from reported increase in mental health difficulties and increased social media use among this population. Research on this area is however relatively new and with mixed evidence. While some of the experiences with social media can be challenging, there is not sufficient evidence to support that social media is fundamentally bad. Indeed, recent evidence challenges this and suggests that the connection between social media and mental health might be a weak one, and its benefits, that have been largely overlooked, should also be considered.

This area of research has suffered the consequences of a rapidly changing field, resulting in quick, but methodologically flawed self-report measures of social media experience, that hinders progress. We have identified three potential problems in the self-report measurement of social media engagement and experience:

1) Most measures were developed without asking young people's experiences. This means that social media measures are being developed for young people without young people having any input. How can we be sure we are asking the right things if we do not consider their views?; 2) Many measures focus on "addictive social media", however this term is based largely on anecdotal evidence. In fact, the questions they use in these measures are based on nicotine dependence and gambling addiction criteria. Assuming these are the same can lead to misleading conclusions; 3) Many of the existing measures were not developed using rigorous and robust theoretical and statistical (psychometric) methods. Their validity is therefore questionable; 4) Even though the engagement with social media includes objective digital behaviours, this kind of information and data have not been considered during the development of measures. We cannot capture however the full picture of social media experience without assessing both, because they each offer unique information.

To address these challenges and limitations reported in the current literature we propose a 3-year project to co-develop, with young people, a comprehensive and freely available self-report social media experience measure that will be appropriate for young people. This will take into account existing research, objective social media data, and the views of social media experts, clinicians, parents/carers, teachers, and policy makers. Importantly, the development of the measure will be guided by the views and experiences of young people.

The proposed project will follow a novel method that combines traditional methods of scale development and a novel approach that triangulates objective (e.g. online social media comments) and subjective (e.g. self-report) assessment. The current project has a strong focus on the voices of young people and it will be based on a co-production model with young people. We will draw from different disciplines including digital behaviour and social media, mental health, loneliness, psychometrics, and computer science. The project has the potential to improve the way we measure, and therefore understand, young people's social media experience and how that influences their mental health, wellbeing, and loneliness. It will also provide a...

80% of parents say that their children under the age of 11 watch YouTube regularly.

Although there is a wealth of evidence regarding the risks in the online environment, there is still a need to deepen our understanding of how to prevent them. Whether children are exposed to online risks largely depends on various factors. Determinants of children's risky behavior on social media include factors representing parental attachment and parental mediation of the online environment. Secure child-parent attachments contribute to preventing risky behavior on social media through the establishment of a foundation of trust, open communication, and the creation and respect of safe boundaries. Parental mediation focuses on monitoring internet safety, setting rules for online behavior, and utilizing various technical restrictions. In the present study, a standard descriptive multiple linear regression model was introduced to examine the relationship between children's risky behavior on social media and factors representing parental attachment, alongside factors of parental mediation in the online environment. The statistical significance of Model 2, explaining 28% of the variability, was demonstrated, highlighting the multifaceted nature of parental influence on children's online behavior. The research findings may be of interest to social workers, other professionals in helping professions working with families, as well as the families themselves, with the aim of promoting a safer online environment for adolescents. These findings highlight the critical need for fostering secure attachments and engaging in active parental mediation to mitigate online risks.

The survey focused on media use and experiences of media education of children aged 7 - 11 in Finland. Media devices in the respondents' room or elsewhere at home and amount of television, videos or other recorded programmes watched were investigated. Some questions covered habits of playing video games (online, on pc or game console), frequency of Internet use, reading habits and how often an adult read to the respondents. The respondents were asked how often they read comics, newspapers and magazines and listened to radio and music from other sources (CD, mp3 etc). Internet use was examined with questions focusing on the use of different websites and services online (e.g. search engines, social media, email) and the extent to which they agreed with some statements about Internet use (e.g. "using social media is important in order to keep up with what happens in one's group of friends", "I often have arguments over Internet use with my parents") The respondents were asked whether they had rules at home for using the Internet, playing video games or watching television, DVDs etc, whether the rules were appropriate, whether they were allowed to watch some material or play some games with older siblings and whether there were any parental controls at home. Further questions covered the respondents' assigned bedtimes and whether they had been punished for misbehaviour by forbidding the use of media devices. One theme pertained to whether the respondents had learned to use different services online, send picture messages by phone and use video camera and who had taught them. Experiences of providing content online (e.g. uploading videos, blogging, commenting on a forum) were charted. The respondents were asked if they had seen or read something that had disturbed or frightened them when watching programmes or reading, who they had told about it, what an adult had done when hearing about it and how long seeing the content had bothered them. The same questions were asked about the content in video games and Internet with an added question on why they had been frightened or disturbed (e.g. bullying, a piece of news, sexual content). Some questions explored whether the respondents felt that their parents or other adults at home were interested in their favourite media and how often they talked to adults about various media. Habits of browsing webshops and stores for desired products, reading advertisements for children's products and using money on online games or communities were investigated. The final set of questions surveyed whether the respondents had followed news about the 2011 parliamentary elections, what channels they had used and who they had discussed these news with. The same set of questions was asked about important foreign news. The Children's Media Barometer 2011 project also studied whether guided questionnaires and face-to-face interviews conducted by young people can be a viable method when studying children. The fifth-graders filled in the questionnaires themselves in a guided situation in class, while the first- and third-graders were interviewed by older students who filled in the questionnaires for them. In the data, the responses of the first-, third- and fifth-graders have been divided into separate variables and differentiated with initial letters a, b and c, respectively. Background variables included the respondent's grade at school, age, gender, household composition, number and age of children in the household (also including potential other home), own room at home, languages spoken at home, and school and respondent id.

Background:
The Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) is a large-scale, multi-purpose longitudinal dataset providing information about babies born at the beginning of the 21st century, their progress through life, and the families who are bringing them up, for the four countries of the United Kingdom. The original objectives of the first MCS survey, as laid down in the proposal to the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) in March 2000, were:

• to chart the initial conditions of social, economic and health advantages and disadvantages facing children born at the start of the 21st century, capturing information that the research community of the future will require
• to provide a basis for comparing patterns of development with the preceding cohorts (the National Child Development Study, held at the UK Data Archive under GN 33004, and the 1970 Birth Cohort Study, held under GN 33229)
• to collect information on previously neglected topics, such as fathers' involvement in children's care and development
• to focus on parents as the most immediate elements of the children's 'background', charting their experience as mothers and fathers of newborn babies in the year 2000, recording how they (and any other children in the family) adapted to the newcomer, and what their aspirations for her/his future may be
• to emphasise intergenerational links including those back to the parents' own childhood
• to investigate the wider social ecology of the family, including social networks, civic engagement and community facilities and services, splicing in geo-coded data when available

Additional objectives subsequently included for MCS were:

• to provide control cases for the national evaluation of Sure Start (a government programme intended to alleviate child poverty and social exclusion)
• to provide samples of adequate size to analyse and compare the smaller countries of the United Kingdom, and include disadvantaged areas of England

Further information about the MCS can be found on the Centre for Longitudinal Studies web pages.

The content of MCS studies, including questions, topics and variables can be explored via the CLOSER Discovery website.

The first sweep (MCS1) interviewed both mothers and (where resident) fathers (or father-figures) of infants included in the sample when the babies were nine months old, and the second sweep (MCS2) was carried out with the same respondents when the children were three years of age. The third sweep (MCS3) was conducted in 2006, when the children were aged five years old, the fourth sweep (MCS4) in 2008, when they were seven years old, the fifth sweep (MCS5) in 2012-2013, when they were eleven years old, the sixth sweep (MCS6) in 2015, when they were fourteen years old, and the seventh sweep (MCS7) in 2018, when they were seventeen years old. End User Licence versions of MCS studies:
The End User Licence (EUL) versions of MCS1, MCS2, MCS3, MCS4, MCS5, MCS6 and MCS7 are held under UK Data Archive SNs 4683, 5350, 5795, 6411, 7464, 8156 and 8682 respectively. The longitudinal family file is held under SN 8172.

Sub-sample studies:
Some studies based on sub-samples of MCS have also been conducted, including a study of MCS respondent mothers who had received assisted fertility treatment, conducted in 2003 (see EUL SN 5559). Also, birth registration and maternity hospital episodes for the MCS respondents are held as a separate dataset (see EUL SN 5614).


How to access genetic and/or bio-medical sample data from a range of longitudinal surveys:
For information on how to access biomedical data from MCS that are not held at the UKDS, see the CLS Genetic data and biological samples webpage.

Secure Access datasets:
Secure Access versions of the MCS have more restrictive access conditions than versions available under the standard End User Licence or Special Licence (see 'Access data' tab above).

Secure Access versions of the MCS include:

• detailed sensitive variables not available under EUL. These have been grouped thematically and are held under SN 8753 (socio-economic, accommodation and occupational data), SN 8754 (self-reported health, behaviour and fertility), SN 8755 (demographics, language and religion) and SN 8756 (exact participation dates). These files replace previously available studies held under SNs 8456 and 8622-8627
  
• detailed geographical identifier files which are grouped by sweep held under SN 7758 (MCS1), SN 7759 (MCS2), SN 7760 (MCS3), SN 7761 (MCS4), SN 7762 (MCS5 2001 Census Boundaries), SN 7763 (MCS5 2011 Census Boundaries), SN 8231 (MCS6 2001 Census Boundaries), SN 8232 (MCS6 2011 Census Boundaries), SN 8757 (MCS7), SN 8758 (MCS7 2001 Census Boundaries) and SN 8759 (MCS7 2011 Census Boundaries). These files replace previously available files grouped by geography SN 7049 (Ward level), SN 7050 (Lower Super Output Area level), and SN 7051 (Output Area level)
• linked education administrative datasets for Key Stages 1, 2, 4 and 5 held under SN 8481 (England). This replaces previously available datasets for Key Stage 1 (SN 6862) and Key Stage 2 (SN 7712)
  
• linked education administrative datasets for Key Stage 1 held under SN 7414 (Scotland)
• linked education administrative dataset for Key Stages 1, 2, 3 and 4 under SN 9085 (Wales)
  
• linked NHS Patient Episode Database for Wales (PEDW) for MCS1 – MCS5 held under SN 8302
• linked Scottish Medical Records data held under SNs 8709, 8710, 8711, 8712, 8713 and 8714;
• Banded Distances to English Grammar Schools for MCS5 held under SN 8394
• linked Health Administrative Datasets (Hospital Episode Statistics) for England for years 2000-2019 held under SN 9030
• linked Health Administrative Datasets (SAIL) for Wales held under SN 9310
  
• linked Hospital of Birth data held under SN 5724.

The linked education administrative datasets held under SNs 8481,7414 and 9085 may be ordered alongside the MCS detailed geographical identifier files only if sufficient justification is provided in the application. Users are also only allowed access to either 2001 or 2011 of Geographical Identifiers Census Boundaries studies. So for MCS5 either SN 7762 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 7763 (2011 Census Boundaries), for the MCS6 users are only allowed either SN 8231 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 8232 (2011 Census Boundaries); and the same applies for MCS7 so either SN 8758 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 8759 (2011 Census Boundaries).

Researchers applying for access to the Secure Access MCS datasets should indicate on their ESRC Accredited Researcher application form the EUL dataset(s) that they also wish to access (selected from the MCS Series Access web page).

The Millennium Cohort Study: Linked Health Administrative Data (Scottish Medical Records), Scottish Birth Records, 2000-2002: Secure Access includes data files from the NHS Digital Hospital Episode Statistics database for those cohort members who provided consent to health data linkage in the Age 50 sweep, and had ever lived in Scotland. The Scottish Medical Records database contains information about all hospital admissions in Scotland. This study concerns the Scottish Birth Records.

Other datasets are available from the Scottish Medical Records database, these include:

• Child Health Reviews (CHR) held under SN 8709
• Prescribing Information System (PIS) held under SN 8710
• Scottish Immunisation and Recall System

Information for parents and families about the Standards for the Use of Personal Mobile Devices and Social Media in Schools.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

The Young Lives survey is an innovative long-term project investigating the changing nature of childhood poverty in four developing countries. The study is being conducted in Ethiopia, India, Peru and Vietnam and has tracked the lives of 12,000 children over a 20-year period, through 5 (in-person) survey rounds (Round 1-5) and, with the latest survey round (Round 6) conducted over the phone in 2020 and 2021 as part of the Listening to Young Lives at Work: COVID-19 Phone Survey.
Round 1 of Young Lives surveyed two groups of children in each country, at 1 year old and 5 years old. Round 2 returned to the same children who were then aged 5 and 12 years old. Round 3 surveyed the same children again at aged 7-8 years and 14-15 years, Round 4 surveyed them at 12 and 19 years old, and Round 5 surveyed them at 15 and 22 years old. Thus the younger children are being tracked from infancy to their mid-teens and the older children through into adulthood, when some will become parents themselves.

The 2020 phone survey consists of three phone calls (Call 1 administered in June-July 2020; Call 2 in August-October 2020 and Call 3 in November-December 2020) and the 2021 phone survey consists of two additional phone calls (Call 4 in August 2021 and Call 5 in October-December 2021) The calls took place with each Young Lives respondent, across both the younger and older cohort, and in all four study countries (reaching an estimated total of around 11,000 young people).
The Young Lives survey is carried out by teams of local researchers, supported by the Principal Investigator and Data Manager in each country.

Further information about the survey, including publications, can be downloaded from the Young Lives website.

This study includes data and documentation for Round 2 only. Round 1 is available under SN 5307, Round 3 under SN 6853, Round 4 under SN 7931 and Round 5 under SN 8357.

Latest edition:
For the fourth edition (August 2022), the Peruvian Younger cohort data file (pechildlevel5yrold) has been updated to include the mother's health variables.

Main Topics:

This dataset comprises the data from the 5-year-olds' and 12-year-olds' household surveys and the 12-year-olds' child survey carried out in 2006. For each of the four countries the dataset contains files at the community, household and child level for both ages. The household/child level data file for the 12-year-olds' survey also includes data from the child questionnaire. In addition there are several files at lower levels (i.e. where there are several records per household). These include the household roster and activity schedules for livelihoods. The Peru community level data includes an additional file with community data covering new communities for children who have migrated.

Topics covered in the dataset include: community characteristics (environmental, social and economic); parental background; household education; livelihoods and asset framework; household food and non-food consumption and expenditure; social capital, economic changes and recent life history; socio-economic status; child care, education and activities; child health; anthropometry; caregivers' perceptions and attitudes; school and activities, child time use; social networks, social skills and social support; feelings and attitudes; parents' and household issues; child development; perception of the future, environment and household wealth.

Also included are calculated indices such as a wealth index, various social capital scores, and mental health scores, which are all detailed in the documentation. The SPSS syntax code and/or Stata 'do' files that show methods of calculation for the composite indices are also included in the dataset.

Background & purposePrevious research has noted that Hispanic pre-adolescents may be at an increased probability for engagement in risk-taking behaviors. The purpose of this study was to explore parent-child communication among Hispanic parents and 4th-6th grade children related to substance use, puberty, sex, and social media use.MethodsA qualitative descriptive design was used to examine Hispanic parents’/caregivers’ communication with their children about substance use behaviors, pubertal developments, engagement in sexual risk behaviors, and social media use. The study included two components: four focus groups consisting of 23 children; five focus groups and one interview consisting of 24 adults. All were conducted until data saturation was reached. Parents and pre-adolescents were interviewed separately. Interviews with parents and pre-adolescents were audio-recorded, transcribed verbatim, and analyzed using content analysis techniques.Results & conclusionThe themes that emerged from the interviews were about children’s feelings, parents’ feelings, communication messages that children received from their parents, and information parents provided to their children during parent-child communication. The results indicate discrepancies between information that parents provided and information that the pre-adolescents reported. The results have implications for healthcare providers in that parents need to be better educated on communicating effectively with their pre-adolescents about risk-taking behaviors. Healthcare providers may help facilitate parent-child communication with Hispanic families. More research is needed to develop intervention programs for Hispanic parents to learn how to effectively communicate with their pre-adolescent children in a developmentally appropriate manner.

The barometer was collected as part of a research project funded by the Ministry of Education and Culture of Finland and it aimed to investigate children's media use and their relationship with the media in the year 2013. The data were collected from families that had children aged 0-8. The parents of the children responded to the survey. In the survey, media include television, the Internet, digital games, mobile phone, the radio and music, and print media. The data was collected in a manner that makes comparisons with Children's Media Barometer 2010 possible. The respondents were asked how well they knew the media contents their children used and which media devices their children had access to at home. The respondents were asked whether their children used different media (television and films, the Internet, digital games, mobile phone, radio and music, and print media), in which format / on which device and how often, and what kind of content they accessed using each medium. Additional questions concerning digital media charted who accompanied the children when they used each medium and how often the children were accompanied by a parent when they accessed different media content. With regard to media use in the family, the respondents were asked how often they discussed media use or media content with their children, how often they did things not related to media together with the child (e.g. went shopping, did sports, visited friends or family), and to what extent they agreed with a number of statements related to media use in the family (e.g. "Playing digital games together is a nice way to spend time with the children", "The child often asks me to stop watching TV or using the computer"). The respondents' own media use was charted by asking them how often they used used different media (television and films, the Internet, digital games, mobile phone, radio and music, and print media), in which format / on which device and how often, what kind of content they accessed using digital media, and how often they kept in contact with different people through media. Finally, the respondents were asked how often they met different people face-to-face. Bakcground variables included the respondent's role (mother/stepmother, father/stepfather, other guardian), age, economic activity, education, major region, and type of neighbourhood of residence as well as the number of adults in the household, and ages and genders of children. In addition, there were background variables charting information on the child on whose behalf the parent responded, which included the child's year of birth, gender, and whether the child had a room of his/her own.

The third International Social Survey Programme (ISSP) survey by COMPASS Research Centre at the University of Auckland.A verbose rundown on topics covered follows.Social relations and social networks. Number of adult brothers and sisters; frequency of personal (visits, meetings) and non-personal contacts (telephone, letter, fax or email) with the parents, brothers and sisters and own children; time for the journey to where the mother lives, frequency of the contacts to relatives (uncles and aunts, cousins, parents-in-law, brothers-in-law or sisters-in-law, nieces and nephews, godparents); number of close friends at work place, in the neighbourhood, and in general; sex of best close friend; frequency of contact to the best friend; participation in activities of groups like sports club, charitable organisation, neighbourhood, political party, an association, and a church or religious organisation.First and second contact person for support in respondent's household, at money problems and in case of a depression; frequency of helping others in household, by loaning money, by talking to depressed persons and in giving help at job search; information source at the search for the present job; importance of character traits of close friends: Intelligence, helpfulness, understanding and enjoyable company (scale); attitude to the moral obligation of adult children to care for their parents; people who are better off should help friends who are less well off; attitude to development of friendships to once own advantage; attitude to a state responsibility to provide the childcare and an adequate standard of living for old people; personal luck assessment; feeling of being overused by family, relatives or friends; trust in neighbours (scale); duration of living at the place of residence; political efficacy; frequency of political discussions with friends.Demography: sex; age; marital-status; education; current employment status; hours worked weekly; occupation; working for private or public sector or self-employed; if self-employed: number of employees; supervisor function; trade union membership; current employment status; earnings; family income; household size; religious denomination; attendance of religious services; size of community; type of community: urban-rural area; ethnicity.

This project leveraged existing datasets to ground policy for children in the digital age for the first time. The project provided evidence to policy-makers, parents, teachers, and GPs on the impact of digital technologies in the lives of British children, highlighting key risk and resilience factors for future interventions. Using existing data, advanced statistical techniques, and robust open science methodologies, we addressed three main research questions: 1. What risk and resilience factors influence the effect of digital technology on adolescents' psychological well-being? 2. How does digital technology use relate to psychological well-being, and do identified risk factors mediate this relationship? 3. What are the causal pathways between risk factors, digital technology use, and psychological well-being that could inform future interventions? This helped develop profiles to explore long-term technology use and effects, distinguishing between over-hyped concerns, like social isolation, and those warranting further scrutiny, such as poor sleep. While the data cannot be shared or underlaying code is made available open access under Related Resources.

This project aims-for the first time-to use existing ESRC datasets to generate the science required to ground policy in this area. We aim to provide policy-makers, parents, teachers, and GPs with the evidence required to understand the role digital technologies play in the lives of British children, and to highlight potential risk and resilience factors that could be the focus of future interventions. We will use ESRC data assets, advanced statistical approaches, and robust open science methodologies to answer three pressing research questions:

1. What risk and resilience factors predispose adolescents to experiencing an effect of digital technology use on their psychological well-being?
2. What are the directional links between digital technology use and psychological well-being, and do the risk factors identified play a mediating role in this?
3. What are the causal pathways linking risk factors, digital technology use and psychological well-being that can inform future intervention?

Answers to these questions are currently elusive, due to the poor data quality and methodological shortcomings that restrain research on technology effects. We will leverage our extensive experience working with large-scale social datasets to examine the general effects of digital technologies and more technology-specific effects (e.g. social media and gaming). We will use machine learning, network modelling, and advanced longitudinal approaches to pinpoint potential risk and resilience factors (e.g. social support, economic deprivation) that alter children's reactions to digital technologies, and which could help guide future technology policy. This will create different profiles of children that we can use to investigate the uses and effects of digital technologies over the longer-term-determining which possible technology effects (e.g. social isolation) are currently unevidenced and over-hyped, and which (e.g. poor sleep) deserve a closer look.

The dataset includes information about gaming activity, potential gaming, Internet and SNS addiction, collected among a large sample of Polish adolescents. The study was a part of the project named: "Internet Gaming Disorder - the characteristics and prevalence of the phenomenon and its psychological correlates among primary and lower secondary school students in the Kuyavian-Pomeranian and Warmian-Masurian voivodships" - a public task co-financed by the Gambling Problem Solving Fund at the disposal of the Minister of Health (Poland), grant number 165/HBK/2018. Data were collected in 2018 in two voivodships: kujawsko-pomorskie (Kuyavian-Pomeranian) and warmińsko-mazurskie (Warmian-Masurian). The selection of educational institutions (primary and lower secondary schools) was random. The study was conducted in 10 locations (urban and rural). The sample consists of 1500 students aged 10-18 years. Headmaster of the particular school gave the consent for the study. The students during school time (usually at educational lesson) were informed about the purpose of the study, that it is anonymous and participation is voluntary, and that they may refuse or resign from it at any time. Dataset contains sociodemographic variables. The following measures were used: (i) Gaming activity questions (playing or not playing; types of games played - online, offline; with who the participant play games; devices used for gaming, frequency, emotions related to gaming, parents control and interest in children gaming, parents gaming activity); (ii) The Internet Gaming Disorder Scale-Short Form (IGD9-SF; Pontes & Griffiths, 2015); (iii) Ten-Item Internet Gaming Disorder Test (IGDT-10; Király, Sleczka, et al., 2017); (iv) Internet Addiction Test (IAT; Young 1998),(v) The Scale of Excessive Use of Social Networking Sites (Kotyśko, Michalak, in press). Measures of Internet Gaming Disorder (IGDS9-SF and IGDT-10) were randomly distributed to participants (one half of the measure sets included IGDS9-SF and other half the IGDT-10 - however all of the sets were mixed to improve the randomisation). The rest of the measures were used among all participants.

According to a 2023 study, 50 percent of kids in the United Kingdom used TikTok, making the short-video sharing platform the most popular social media among users aged between four and 18 years. X (formerly known as Twitter) followed with a reach of 43 percent, while Facebook ranked third with a 40 percent audience reach.

Mobile use and kids on apps

Coming in all price ranges, mobile phones have become a common entry point for children to access the wonders of the internet. Despite their ubiquitous usage, many Brits still have doubts about kids using them: as of January 2023, only 15 percent of respondents considered it appropriate to give primary school children smartphones. In 2023, half of UK children between eight and 11 years of age were reported to have a smartphone, while among kids aged between five and seven, 20 percent were reported to own smartphones. Tablets were still the most used device among the youngest users, with almost seven to 10 UK kids aged between three and four using them to watch videos; four in 10 users aged between eight and 11 reported watching videos on mobiles.

A childproof digital environment In 2021, the Information Commissioner’s Office, the UK's data protection regulation body, approved the Age-Appropriate Design Code. The code covers the design of features and functionalities for global apps, games, connected devices, and news sources to adopt an age-appropriate design. Additionally, apps might be required to get parental permission before collecting personally identifiable information about children. According to a study of 400 apps hosted on the Google Play Store, only five percent required parental permission when collecting data. In April 2023, TikTok was fined 14.5 million euros (or 12.7 million pounds) by the ICO for failing to get parental approval for accounts of kids aged under 13 years.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.

The Young Lives: Rounds 1 and 2, 2002-2006: Ethiopia: Teaching Dataset contains information obtained from all 1,999 participants at Round 1 (one-year-old) and all 1,912 participants at Round 2 (five-years-old) in Ethiopia.

In total there are 1,942 variables on the dataset taken from the child level data files available as part of the main Young Lives study (SN 5307). In order to distinguish data from the two rounds a suffix has been added to each variable:

• Round 1 (one-year-olds): _et1
• Round 2 (five-year-olds): _et5

Main Topics:

The variables in this dataset include all those in the child level data files for Ethiopia for children who were one year old at Round 1, and those who were five years old at Round 2.

In Round 1 the main topics were: household composition; child health; caregiver background; livelihoods; economic changes; socio-economic status; social capital and anthropometry.

In Round 2 the main topics were: parental background; household education; livelihoods and asset framework; household food and non-food consumption and expenditure; social capital, economic changes and recent life history; socio-economic status; child care, education and activities; child health; anthropometry; caregivers perceptions and attitudes; school and activities, child time use; social networks, social skills and social support; feelings and attitudes; parents and household issues; child development; perception of the future, environment and household wealth.

Abstract copyright UK Data Service and data collection copyright owner.Background:The Millennium Cohort Study (MCS) is a large-scale, multi-purpose longitudinal dataset providing information about babies born at the beginning of the 21st century, their progress through life, and the families who are bringing them up, for the four countries of the United Kingdom. The original objectives of the first MCS survey, as laid down in the proposal to the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) in March 2000, were:to chart the initial conditions of social, economic and health advantages and disadvantages facing children born at the start of the 21st century, capturing information that the research community of the future will requireto provide a basis for comparing patterns of development with the preceding cohorts (the National Child Development Study, held at the UK Data Archive under GN 33004, and the 1970 Birth Cohort Study, held under GN 33229)to collect information on previously neglected topics, such as fathers' involvement in children's care and developmentto focus on parents as the most immediate elements of the children's 'background', charting their experience as mothers and fathers of newborn babies in the year 2000, recording how they (and any other children in the family) adapted to the newcomer, and what their aspirations for her/his future may beto emphasise intergenerational links including those back to the parents' own childhoodto investigate the wider social ecology of the family, including social networks, civic engagement and community facilities and services, splicing in geo-coded data when availableAdditional objectives subsequently included for MCS were:to provide control cases for the national evaluation of Sure Start (a government programme intended to alleviate child poverty and social exclusion)to provide samples of adequate size to analyse and compare the smaller countries of the United Kingdom, and include disadvantaged areas of EnglandFurther information about the MCS can be found on the Centre for Longitudinal Studies web pages.The content of MCS studies, including questions, topics and variables can be explored via the CLOSER Discovery website.The first sweep (MCS1) interviewed both mothers and (where resident) fathers (or father-figures) of infants included in the sample when the babies were nine months old, and the second sweep (MCS2) was carried out with the same respondents when the children were three years of age. The third sweep (MCS3) was conducted in 2006, when the children were aged five years old, the fourth sweep (MCS4) in 2008, when they were seven years old, the fifth sweep (MCS5) in 2012-2013, when they were eleven years old, the sixth sweep (MCS6) in 2015, when they were fourteen years old, and the seventh sweep (MCS7) in 2018, when they were seventeen years old.End User Licence versions of MCS studies:The End User Licence (EUL) versions of MCS1, MCS2, MCS3, MCS4, MCS5, MCS6 and MCS7 are held under UK Data Archive SNs 4683, 5350, 5795, 6411, 7464, 8156 and 8682 respectively. The longitudinal family file is held under SN 8172.Sub-sample studies:Some studies based on sub-samples of MCS have also been conducted, including a study of MCS respondent mothers who had received assisted fertility treatment, conducted in 2003 (see EUL SN 5559). Also, birth registration and maternity hospital episodes for the MCS respondents are held as a separate dataset (see EUL SN 5614).Release of Sweeps 1 to 4 to Long Format (Summer 2020)To support longitudinal research and make it easier to compare data from different time points, all data from across all sweeps is now in a consistent format. The update affects the data from sweeps 1 to 4 (from 9 months to 7 years), which are updated from the old/wide to a new/long format to match the format of data of sweeps 5 and 6 (age 11 and 14 sweeps). The old/wide formatted datasets contained one row per family with multiple variables for different respondents. The new/long formatted datasets contain one row per respondent (per parent or per cohort member) for each MCS family. Additional updates have been made to all sweeps to harmonise variable labels and enhance anonymisation. How to access genetic and/or bio-medical sample data from a range of longitudinal surveys:For information on how to access biomedical data from MCS that are not held at the UKDS, see the CLS Genetic data and biological samples webpage.Secure Access datasets:Secure Access versions of the MCS have more restrictive access conditions than versions available under the standard End User Licence or Special Licence (see 'Access data' tab above).Secure Access versions of the MCS include:detailed sensitive variables not available under EUL. These have been grouped thematically and are held under SN 8753 (socio-economic, accommodation and occupational data), SN 8754 (self-reported health, behaviour and fertility), SN 8755 (demographics, language and religion) and SN 8756 (exact participation dates). These files replace previously available studies held under SNs 8456 and 8622-8627detailed geographical identifier files which are grouped by sweep held under SN 7758 (MCS1), SN 7759 (MCS2), SN 7760 (MCS3), SN 7761 (MCS4), SN 7762 (MCS5 2001 Census Boundaries), SN 7763 (MCS5 2011 Census Boundaries), SN 8231 (MCS6 2001 Census Boundaries), SN 8232 (MCS6 2011 Census Boundaries), SN 8757 (MCS7), SN 8758 (MCS7 2001 Census Boundaries) and SN 8759 (MCS7 2011 Census Boundaries). These files replace previously available files grouped by geography SN 7049 (Ward level), SN 7050 (Lower Super Output Area level), and SN 7051 (Output Area level)linked education administrative datasets for Key Stages 1, 2 and 4 held under SN 8481 (England). This replaces previously available datasets for Key Stage 1 (SN 6862) and Key Stage 2 (SN 7712)linked education administrative datasets for Key Stage 1 held under SN 7414 (Scotland)linked education administrative dataset for Key Stages 1, 2, 3 and 4 under SN 9085 (Wales)linked NHS Patient Episode Database for Wales (PEDW) for MCS1 – MCS5 held under SN 8302linked Scottish Medical Records data held under SNs 8709, 8710, 8711, 8712, 8713 and 8714;Banded Distances to English Grammar Schools for MCS5 held under SN 8394linked Health Administrative Datasets (Hospital Episode Statistics) for England for years 2000-2019 held under SN 9030linked Hospital of Birth data held under SN 5724.The linked education administrative datasets held under SNs 8481,7414 and 9085 may be ordered alongside the MCS detailed geographical identifier files only if sufficient justification is provided in the application. Users are also only allowed access to either 2001 or 2011 of Geographical Identifiers Census Boundaries studies. So for MCS5 either SN 7762 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 7763 (2011 Census Boundaries), for the MCS6 users are only allowed either SN 8231 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 8232 (2011 Census Boundaries); and the same applies for MCS7 so either SN 8758 (2001 Census Boundaries) or SN 8759 (2011 Census Boundaries).Researchers applying for access to the Secure Access MCS datasets should indicate on their ESRC Accredited Researcher application form the EUL dataset(s) that they also wish to access (selected from the MCS Series Access web page). The Millennium Cohort Study, Sweeps 3-6, 2006-2015: Banded Distances between Home and School study provides banded straight-line distances between the address at interview and the school attended by each cohort member for MCS3-MCS6 inclusive. Distances were calculated in a SIR database environment using the co-ordinates (eastings/northings of the British National Grid) of the unit postcode centroid of the address at interview and the unit postcode of the school attended, using the Pythagorean Theorem.