Browsing by Author "Lazareva, Tatjana"

Aims. The use of digital media by adolescents is diverse and different from previous generations. Knowledge on the relationship between the use of digital media and gender or well-being is still relatively limited. This study investigated what kind of user groups of socio-digital participation exist among high school students, and whether these user groups vary in gender, excessive internet use, life satisfaction, school engagement, school burnout, and symptoms of depression. Methods. The study questionnaire (N = 1108) was collected as a part of the Bridging the Gaps project in the Spring 2018 from the second-year high school students of 12 different high schools in Helsinki. Of the respondents, n = 614 (55.9%) were girls and n = 393 (35.8%) were boys. The rest of the respondents stated that they were gender-neutral or did not answer the gender question. The user groups of socio-digital participation among high school students were examined by two-step cluster analysis, gender differences were examined by cross-tabulation and x^2 independence test. The differences between user groups in well-being and excessive internet use were examined by using Multivariate Analysis of Covariance, where gender was controlled. Results and conclusions. Five different socio-digital participation user groups were found among high school students: 1.) mainly engage in gaming, 2.) knowledge-oriented, 3.) leisure users, 4.) active players and creative participants and 5.) active social networkers and knowledge builders. Boys were more likely to be in game-oriented groups than girls, and girls more likely to be in social networking activity groups than boys. In addition, the adolescents who had used socio-digital devices on average or less reported less compulsive use of the Internet. User groups varied in well-being. The knowledge-oriented users reported partially better well-being compared to other user groups, but the connection was not linear. The differences between the other groups were less clear. Because the effect sizes of the differences between the groups were small, the links between well-being and the use of smart devices were also weak. Based on the results, it seems that mere active socio-digital participation or individual socio-digital activity is not related to well-being and there is a more complex connection in the background. In the future, it would be important to study more closely the use of smart devices among adolescents and their connection with well-being by looking not only at screen time, but also socio-digital activities.