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About 55% of Nigerian parents have conflicts with their children because they spend too much time on the phone, a new report by Kaspersky has shown to reveal growing digital misunderstanding underscored by generation gaps.
The report proved an already known fact: Not all the parents keep up with current trends online and have enough knowledge about content that their children prefer.
Conflicts are inevitable between a new and growing Internet generation largely influenced by social media and web contents versus an older more conservative generation of parents battling with dizzying transitions of modern living.
Modern parents have to constantly educate themselves and keep up to date when it comes to the Internet trends. There is a strong reason for it – their children. If parents do not know what is popular on the Net, they can have misunderstandings or even conflicts with their children. It turns out, not all the parents keep up with current trends online and have enough knowledge about content that their children prefer.
According to the recent survey*, 27% of Nigerian parents do not watch video blogs and are not sure what is popular among modern kids. However, the kids themselves are interested in watching such content: one third of children in Nigeria watch video blogs, including those dedicated to games and toys (60%), movies (51%), music (43%) and computer games (32%).
It goes on with video games that are one of the most popular pastimes among kids and teenagers – 85% of Nigerian children play video games, 20% involving in multiplayer ones where they are able to communicate with other people participating there. A child’s digital life can also be the reason for a family conflict, with 55% of parents claiming that their child spends too much time on the phone or doing nothing useful (27%).
“Being digitally educated and involved in social media activities is a must-do for a parent nowadays as the lack of knowledge in this field can trigger some conflicts in the family. In order to understand your child, to be able to communicate with them and discuss certain modern trends of the evolving world, you have to read more and be present on the Net. It can possibly save the parents a lot of trouble and make their children respect them,” said Andrey Sidenko, Lead web content analyst at Kaspersky.
To successfully maintain a friendly relationship with your children and be aware to which things they dedicate their free time to, Kaspersky recommends following these steps:
- Educate yourself. Read more on the topic of the Internet trends, challenges, video games and new technologies – not only will it better your conversations with children, but also keep you informed.
- Communicate with your child, ask them about their digital hobbies and problems, help if it is needed.
- Install a reliable security solution such as Kaspersky Safe Kids to know about the interests of your child in the digital world.
Reference:
*The “Responsible Digital Parenting” survey was implemented in conjunction with Toluna research agency in the end of 2019 – beginning of 2020. 5000 respondents from META region and Baltic states participated in the survey.
