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Digital natives? : new and old media and children’s language acquisition Bittman, Michael, Rutherford, Leonie, Brown, Jude and Unsworth, Len 2012, Digital natives? : new and old media and children’s language acquisition, Family matters, vol. 91, pp. 18-26. Attached Files Name Description MIMEType Size Downloads rutherford-digitalnatives-2012.pdf Published version application/pdf 2.00MB 16 Title Digital natives? : new and old media and children’s language acquisition Author(s) Bittman, Michael Rutherford, Leonie Brown, Jude Unsworth, Len Journal name Family matters Volume number 91 Start page 18 End page 26 Total pages 9 Publisher Australian Institute of Family Studies Place of publication Melbourne, Vic. Publication date 2012 ISSN 1030-2646 1832-8318 Keyword(s) children and media language acquisition digital media use Longitudinal Study of Australian Children Summary The current generation of young children has been described as “digital natives”, having been born into a ubiquitous digital media environment. They are envisaged as educationally independent of the guided interaction provided by “digital immigrants”: parents and teachers. This paper uses data from the multiples waves of the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children (LSAC) to study the effect of various media on children’s development of vocabulary and traditional literacy. Previous research has suggested that time spent watching television is associated with less time spent reading, and ultimately, with inferior educational outcomes. The early studies of the “new” digital media (computers, games consoles, mobile phones, the Internet, etc.) assumed these devices would have similar effects on literacy outcomes to those associated with television. Moreover, these earlier studies relied on poorer measures of time spent in media use and usually did not control for the context of the child’s media use. Fortunately, LSAC contains measures of access to digital devices; parental mediation practices; the child’s use of digital devices as recorded in time use diaries; direct measures of the child’s passive vocabulary; and teachers’ ratings of the child’s literacy. The analysis presented shows the importance of the parental context framing the child’s media use in promoting the acquisition of vocabulary, and suggests that computer (but not games) use is associated with more developed language skills. Independently of these factors, raw exposure to television is not harmful to learning, as previously thought. Language eng Field of Research 200199 Communication and Media Studies not elsewhere classified Socio Economic Objective 970120 Expanding Knowledge in Language, Communication and Culture HERDC Research category C1 Refereed article in a scholarly journal ERA Research output type C Journal article HERDC collection year 2012 Copyright notice ©2012, Australian Institute of Family Studies Persistent URL http://hdl.handle.net/10536/DRO/DU:30049856 Document type: Journal Article Collections: School of Communication and Creative Arts Open Access Collection Related Links Link Description Connect to published version Go to link with your DU access privileges     Unless expressly stated otherwise, the copyright for items in DRO is owned by the author, with all rights reserved. Every reasonable effort has been made to ensure that permission has been obtained for items included in DRO. If you believe that your rights have been infringed by this repository, please contact drosupport@deakin.edu.au. Versions Version Filter Type Wed, 12 Dec 2012, 15:52:31 EST Wed, 12 Dec 2012, 16:10:54 EST Wed, 12 Dec 2012, 16:22:44 EST Thu, 13 Dec 2012, 09:02:19 EST Fri, 14 Dec 2012, 09:32:20 EST Mon, 14 Jan 2013, 14:26:53 EST Mon, 14 Jan 2013, 14:29:42 EST Wed, 16 Jan 2013, 11:01:57 EST Wed, 16 Jan 2013, 11:02:38 EST Tue, 12 Nov 2013, 14:38:46 EST Mon, 18 Nov 2013, 09:17:11 EST Filtered Full Access Statistics: 48 Abstract Views, 18 File Downloads  -  Detailed Statistics Created: Wed, 12 Dec 2012, 15:52:12 EST by Leonie Rutherford

Every reasonable effort has been made to ensure that permission has been obtained for items included in DRO. If you believe that your rights have been infringed by this repository, please contact drosupport@deakin.edu.au.