“Sometimes people on YouTube are real, but sometimes not”: Children’s understanding of the reality status of YouTube

This study describes how 3- to 8-year-olds’ justifications for their reality status judgements about people on YouTube relates to their age and previous YouTube watching experience. Using a within-subjects design, children were asked about their beliefs regarding the reality status of a purported Yo...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inE-Learning and Digital Media Vol. 20; no. 6; pp. 618 - 630
Main Authors Hassinger-Das, Brenna, Dore, Rebecca A
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published London, England SAGE Publications 01.11.2023
Subjects
Age Differences
Beliefs
Childrens Attitudes
Deception
Mass Media Use
Media Literacy
Social Media
Video Technology
Young Children
Early childhood
YouTube
reality status
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Summary:This study describes how 3- to 8-year-olds’ justifications for their reality status judgements about people on YouTube relates to their age and previous YouTube watching experience. Using a within-subjects design, children were asked about their beliefs regarding the reality status of a purported YouTube video and provided justifications for their responses. Caregivers provided information about children’s home media use and children were asked about their favorite YouTube videos. Results suggest that increased age—and not amount of experience with YouTube—relates to a more nuanced understanding of YouTube as evidenced by a consideration of the medium in justifying reality status judgments.
ISSN:2042-7530
2042-7530
DOI:10.1177/20427530221140679