Norway

In brief: Norwegian findings from EU Kids Online 2020

Most Norwegian children experience the internet as a positive social environment and feel safe online. Ninety-six per cent own their own mobile phone with internet access. On average they use the internet for a little less than 4 hours a day; 40% of 9- to 17-year-olds say they have rules about how long or when they are allowed to be online. This is interesting since we know that over half of the Norwegian parents generally express significant concern or worry about the amount of time their children spend online – 54% (70% of parents under the age of 40) say they worry ‘a lot’ that their child spends too much time on their phone, and 49% say they worry ‘a lot’ that their child is spending too much time playing video games.

Interestingly, we found that when controlling for factors such as age, gender, socio-economic status, emotional and peer problems, the amount of time children spent online positively influences self-reported wellbeing. Norwegian children are understood to have a high risk of encountering sexual messages – 32% of those aged 11 to 17 have received such messages. Fewer of the younger group have received one or more sexual messages during the previous year (7% of 11- to 12-year-olds). At all ages, girls are significantly more upset than boys on receipt of sexual messages, although this decreases with age.

Norwegian national report: Staksrud, E. & Ólafsson, K. (2019). . EU Kids Online and the Department of Media and Communication, Olso: University of Oslo
The use of mobile phones in schools is a controversial topic in Norwegian public discourse. Our data shows that where teachers are either positive towards or allow mobile phone use at school, children experience a higher degree of self-reported wellbeing.
Too much focus on risk among researchers, government authorities, politicians, parents and teachers can have an alienating effect for children who experience the internet as a positive social arena. We need to think about how we can ensure that those who experience risk get the help and support they need, without detracting from the positive experiences of internet use.

Elisabeth Staksrud is a Professor at the Dept. of Media and Communication at the University of Oslo, researching digital risks, rights and regulations. She has a long international track record in practical policy, awareness and dissemination work on Internet safety, and has coordinated several EU-funded awareness projects. .

Jørgen Kirksæther is a games researcher, and has worked on Internet Safety and electronic media policy issues for the last 15 years through the Norwegian Media Authority and the SAFT, Awareu and NONO projects. He is currently an adviser to the University of Oslo, on EC policy and project management.

Tijana Milosevic is a Marie Sklodowska-Curie Elite-S research fellow jointly appointed with Dublin City University’s Anti-Bullying Research and Resource Centre (ABC) and ADAPT SFI, focusing on artificial intelligence-based cyberbullying interventions on social media platforms and their policies, digital media and the implications for children’s wellbeing. Tijana is the PI on a Facebook-funded project looking into proactive cyberbullying moderation on Instagram and Facebook; and she is also working on the European Commission's Joint Research Centre's Kids' Digital Lives in Covid Times project. She previously worked as a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Media and Communication at the University of Oslo. Tijana’s written a monograph on social media platforms’ anti-bullying interventions (Protecting Children Online? Cyberbullying Policies of Social Media Companies, MIT Press 2018). Her works have appeared in the Journal of Children and Media, The International Journal of Communication and New Media & Society, among others. She holds a PhD in Communication from American University’s School of Communication; and an MA in Media and Public Affairs from the School of Media and Public Affairs, both in Washington DC, where she studied and worked for six years.

Niamh Ní Bhroin is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo and Graduate of the BSc in Film and Broadcasting from the Dublin Institute of Technology (2004). She is interested in the relationship between media innovations and social change and is currently working with a number of projects that explore how children use new media, with a particular focus on how they acquire digital media literacy to interact socially and participate in society.

Ekaterina Pashevich was born in Yekaterinburg, Russia, in 1991. She is currently a PhD candidate in Media Studies at the Department of Media and Communication (IMK), The University of Oslo (UiO), Norway, where she also in early 2018 completed her master thesis on automated journalism. She is a part of the EU Kids Online project in Norway and is researching the market of artificial intelligence toys, their design and regulation. Prior to arriving in Norway in mid-2015, Ekaterina obtained a bachelor degree (2013) and a master degree (2015) in international journalism from Moscow State University of International Relations, Russia.

Khalid Ezat Azam is a PhD researcher at the Department of Media and Communication at the University in Oslo. His research project focuses on public concerns and parental mediation of video games in the Nordic countries. Prior to this, he worked within the field of audiovisual media regulation as an advisor for the Norwegian Media Authority.

Kjartan Ólafsson is a lecturer at the University of Akureyri in Iceland where he teaches research methods and quantitative data analysis. He is a member of the International Advisory Panel of the EU Kids Online project and was active in designing the methodologies used in that project. He has been involved in various cross-national comparative projects on children.

Summary of findings

resources in Norway

Selected Publications 2020

Barbovschi, M., & Staksrud, E. (2020). TEU Kids Online and the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo.

Barbovschi, M., & Staksrud, E. (2020). EU Kids Online and the Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo.

Smahel, D., Machackova, H., Mascheroni, G., Dedkova, L., Staksrud, E., Ólafsson, K., Livingstone, S., & Hasebrink, U. (2020). EU Kids Online.

Staksrud, E. (2020). S In L. Green, D. Holloway, K. Stevenson, T. Leaver, & L. Haddon (Eds.), The Routledge Companion to Digital Media and Children (pp. 549-561). Routledge. ISBN: 9781351004107

Machackova, H., Blaya, C., Bedrosova, M., Smahel, D., & Staksrud, E. (2020). EU Kids Online

Mikuška, J., Smahel, D., Dedkova, L., Staksrud, E., Mascheroni, G., & Milosevic, T. (2020). International Journal of Public Health, 65, 1289–1297

Staksrud, E., & Ólafsson, K. (2020). In L. Tsaliki & D. Chronaki (Eds.), Discourses of Anxiety over Childhood and Youth across Cultures (pp. 323-345). Palgrave Macmillan

Staksrud, E., Olafsson, K., & Milosevic, T. (2020). , Nordic Journal of Human Rights, 38(2), 159–173.

Selected Publications 2019

Staksrud, E. & Ólafsson, K. (2019). . EU Kids Online and the Department of Media and Communication, Olso: University of Oslo
Summary in English.

Staksrud, E, Ólafsson, K. (2019) . EU Kids Online and Institutt for medier og kommunikasjon, Universitetet i Oslo

Kofoed, Jette, & Staksrud, Elisabeth. (2019). ‘We always torment different people, so by definition, we are no bullies’: The problem of definitions in cyberbullying research. New Media & Society, 21(4), 1006-1020. doi: 10.1177/1461444818810026

Milosevic, T, Dias, P, Mifsud, C, Trueltzsch-Wijnen, C. (2019) Medijske studije/Media Studies 9(18)

Milosevic, T, O'Neill, B, Staksrud, E. (2019) “Narratives of Industry Responses to Cyberbullying: Perspectives on Self-regulation from and About the Industry” in H. Vandebosch, L. Green (Red.) Narratives in Research and Interventions on Cyberbullying among Young People 229-243 Springer Nature ISBN 978-3-030-04959-1

Smahel, D, Milosevic, T, Livingstone, S, Staksrud, E, Kalmus, V, Mascheroni, G, Izrael, P, Hasebrink, U. (2019) Press Release, EU Kids Online and Institutt for medier og kommunikasjon, Oslo

Selected Publications 2018

Livingstone, S, Mascheroni, G, Staksrud, E. (2018) New Media & Society 20(3) 1103-1122 doi: 10.1177/1461444816685930

Nilsen, L.G, Hafstad, G.S, Staksrud, E, Dyb, G. (2018) Computers in Human Behavior 5632(84) 285-294 doi: 10.1016/j.chb.2018.03.006

Ólafsson, K, Green, L, Staksrud, E. (2018) New Media & Society 20(4) 1360-1379 doi: 10.1177/1461444817691531

Ní Bhroin, N, Rehder, M. M. (2018) EU Kids Online

Toft Nørgård, R, Ess, C.M, Ní Bhroin, N. (2018) “Robot-Teachers and Phronēsis: Designing Signature Pedagogy with Robots” in M. Coeckelbergh, J. Loh, M. Funk, J. Seibt, M. Nørskov (Red.) Envisioning Robots in Society: Power, Politics and Public Space 187-198 Amsterdam: IOS Press doi: 10.3233/978-1-61499-931-7-187

Staksrud, E. (2018) . Aftenposten September 2018

Staksrud, E. (2018) Aftenposten Junior September 2018

Department of Media and Communication, University of Oslo, PO Boks 1093, Blindern, 0317 Oslo

Email: elisabeth.staksrud@media.uio.no

EU Kids Online homepage

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Norway

In brief: Norwegian findings from EU Kids Online 2020

Highlights

Norwegian Team

Links

Publications

Selected Publications 2020

Selected Publications 2019

Selected Publications 2018

Contact

EU Kids Online homepage

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