Introduction

Engaging with digital technologies is now part of many young children’s childhood (Edwards et al., 2020), with engagement beginning early and continuing throughout life (e.g., Graham & Sahlberg, 2021). While digital technologies afford many learning opportunities, there is an assumption that when young children engage with digital technologies, they will be isolated (Turkle, 2011); lacking in social interaction skills (Haughton et al., 2015); and, unable to communicate with others (Hark Söylemez, 2023). The study that is the focus of this paper concentrates on young children’s peer-to-peer interactions in Family Day Care settings (an approved form of childcare provided in the family day care educator’s home) while they are engaged with digital technologies to determine what characterises these interactions. It was guided by the research question:

  • What characterises this group of infants and toddlers peer-to-peer interactions while engaging with digital technologies in their family day care setting?

This paper proposes a broader conceptual understanding of the notion of interactions than what is traditionally understood in the literature around young children’s peer-to-peer interactions. What the data from this Australian Research Council funded study illustrates is how young children, when engaged with digital technology, can effectively interact with each other in ways that enable them to build relationships with their peers.

The literature relating to young children’s competency in peer-to-peer social interactions, drawing on the sociology of childhood paradigm, will be introduced first. A summary of Corsaro’s (2005, 2020) work on children’s creation of peer cultures is provided, followed by peer-to-peer social interactions, and young children’s engagement with digital technology. Next, the theoretical framing is outlined drawing from the work of Coleman (1988) and Putman (2000) and their conceptualisation of social capital. By blending the work of Coleman and Putnam and applying it to children, an expanded perspective on social capital is achieved. Following this section, the study’s design is described including the methodology, methods and analytical process. One case example is then presented to highlight and represent the coding analysis and key findings.

Young Children’s Competency in Peer-to-Peer Social Interactions

In Western cultures prior to the 1980s, children were seen as ‘passive recipients’ needing to be socialized into an adult culture (Dahlberg et al., 2007). However, since the 1980s, a challenge to traditional understandings of childhood and children appeared with the emergence of both the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) and the sociology of childhood paradigm (Dahlberg & Moss, 2005). Children were repositioned as ‘social actors’ actively engaged in the construction of their own lives (James et al., 1998). These contemporary understandings around the social positioning of children became evident in Corsaro’s (2000, 2005) research with children. More recently, Dalfidan (2023) also found children to be highly capable of creating their own culture, arguing that children’s agency is more about being ‘embedded in social relations and collective rather than the property of the individual child’ (p.449).

Children’s Creation of a ‘Peer Culture’ in Early Childhood Settings

Corsaro (2000) found that children often created their own peer cultures within early childhood settings; defining a peer culture as ‘a stable set of activities or routines, artifacts, values, and concerns that children produce and share in interaction with peers…’ (p. 92). Corsaro (2005) also found young children were capable of creating an underlife within their peer cultures, usually operating ‘under the gaze of adults’ wherein they actively worked to ‘achieve autonomy from the rules and authority of adult caretakers’ (p. 151).

Recently Corsaro (2020) extended his definition of children’s peer cultures and their underlife, specifically children’s peer relationships conceptualised as a ‘collective identity’ (p. 11). Viewing peer culture as emanating from children’s desire to do things together is now thought to lead to the creation and sharing of a peer culture strengthened through a collective identity.

Peer-to-Peer Social Interactions in Educational Settings

Similar to Corsaro, other researchers (cf.: Engdahl, 2011; Goodfellow, 2015; Pursi & Lipponen, 2020) have also observed young children during their peer-to-peer interactions using participatory observations and video recordings. For example, Engdahl (2011) found the toddlers in her study used ‘looking’ as a key form of interaction with peers and that ‘with the help of their eyes and gazes, there seem[ed] to be a silent negotiation going on’ (p. 1433). Similarly, Goodfellow (2015) found that infants commonly used strategies such as ‘eye contact, looking at the peer’s activity, offering and taking objects and smiling’ to assist in their successful peer interactions (pp. 203–204). Pursi and Lipponen’s (2020) study observing toddler peer group play, confirmed that toddlers’ capacity to enact ‘mutual gaze’ (turning towards the other child, gazes, smiling faces, observing the other child) was a dominant feature of quality interactions which enabled ‘sustained co-participation’ between peers (p. 108). While Li and Yu (2020) argue that peer-to-peer interactions observed in their study of young children were ‘usually subtle but imperative, to achieve quality play’ (p. 180); Keranen et al., (2020) claim that ‘touch’ was ‘a strong form of communication’ that should not be underestimated in interactions between young children (p. 89). From the literature, the notion of quality peer-to-peer interactions appears to primarily focus on the strategies and ways young children ‘look’ at each other as an integral element of social looking, joint attention, and engagement (Carpenter et al., 1998; Sumsion & Goodfellow, 2012).

Young Children’s Engagement With Digital Technology

While earlier research and debates around young children’s engagement with digital technology were fraught with scepticism, contemporary research has shifted towards understanding that technology is now a generally accepted part of children’s lives (National Association for the Education of Young children, 2012). This is evident in Wilson et al.,’s, (2023) statement that ‘digital technologies are reshaping childhood in new and exciting ways’ (n.p.). A range of factors have influenced this societal shift, such as, the intentional use of digital technology with children; the evidence of interactive relationships between children while using technology; and various socio-cultural aspects that can shape children’s use of digital technology.

Researchers investigating young children’s use of digital technology have found that ‘many children are growing up in media-rich homes’ (Scott, 2021, p. 2), and subsequently are capable of engaging with a variety of digital devices at home and in educational settings (Slutsky & DeShelter, 2016). This has led to young children ‘learning to use technology through play’ rather than just ‘playing with digital technology’ (Bird & Edwards, 2015, p. 1150). Research has shown that children do not separate their use of technology from their play (Edwards, 2020). Digital play, defined by Disney and Geng (2022) as ‘children’s active use of digital technologies within a play-based learning context’ (p. 1449), has become more commonplace in early childhood settings (Aarsand & Sorensseen, 2021; Nolan et al., 2021). For an intentional use of digital technology with young children, Edwards (2020) argues the key is to find the ‘most effective use of technology’ with children and then incorporate it into play-based learning (p. 55).

Furthermore, researchers have found that interactive, dynamic relationships are possible between children while they are engaging with digital technology. Donohue and Schomburg (2017) claim that young children’s use of digital technology ‘should invite and enhance interactions and strengthen relationships with peers’ (p. 76). This was evident in research where children were seen to scaffold each other sitting around a computer (Moore & Adair, 2015); and, where co-participation between young children was established during their use of digital technology, even ‘beyond speech’ and without each child being the ‘actual player’ (Disney & Geng, 2022, p. 1457). Similarly, Aarsand and Sorenssen (2021) found the position of the preschool child (as the ‘owner’ or ‘spectator’) holding and/or using the digital device was not the only important aspect, but the ‘moral order relating to turn taking’ is highly influential in children’s social interactions during digital play (p. 19).

However, it should be noted that conflicting sociocultural aspects can shape children’s use and engagement with digital technology. For instance, Slutsky and DeShelter (2016) claim young children are being increasingly targeted as consumers of digital technology. In contrast, Donohue and Schomburg (2017) propose that children’s interaction with digital technology is ‘moving from consumers to creators’ (p. 76); while Edwards (2020) asserts there are challenges around children’s ‘consumption’ of digital technology in the home environment compared to the expectation of ‘productive digital practices’ by children in educational settings (p. 58).

Theoretical Framework: Young Children’s Use of Social Capital

To further understand young children’s social interactions from a theoretical stance, we have drawn on the work of two key theorists, Coleman (1988) and Putnam (2000),who extended Bourdieu’s concept of social capital to show how individuals build relationships and interact within their social networks. Moving beyond Bourdieu’s (1986) original notion of social capital as defined by social exclusion and hierarchical division, Coleman and Putman’s conceptualisation of social capital takes a more positive stance. Leonard (2005) explains this positivity as ‘imbued with positive connotations, in particular, the importance of social networks and trust in promoting a sense of belonging and well-being’ (p. 605). This positions social capital as emanating from quality relationships between people and acts as a resource ‘that individuals can utilize in their relationships with others’ (Leonard, 2005, p. 605).

While the work of Coleman and Putnam has key tenets that are fundamentally aligned, each has some analytically different elements in their social capital theories (Stjernqvist et al., 2019). For instance, Coleman’s concept of social capital is focused on the ‘shared norms and expectations’ of the adult community; the ‘provision of information that is important in everyday interactions’; and the ability of social capital to ‘provide access to resources [people] can use to achieve their interests’ (Bessell & Mason, 2014, p. 61). Mikiewicz (2021) describes this process of accessing and using social capital as a resource by suggesting that if people ‘work together, they create social structures that help them meet their own needs’ (p. 3).

Notably, Coleman’s theory of social capital includes the notion of closed communities. Bessell and Mason (2014) explain this as ‘one’s associates are known to each other, forming a closed social network’ which promotes a trusting social structure (p. 61). Taking Coleman’s conceptualisation of social capital and closed communities further, Tuominen and Haanpaa (2022) contend that a ‘true closure provides a protected setting for making favours that can be expected to be returned, and where joint rules and norms can easily be agreed upon’ (p. 619).

Extending on Coleman’s work, Putman (2000) described social capital as a ‘collective relational resource’ with ‘features of social life – networks, norms and trust’ (Stjernqvist et al., 2019, p. 36). Additionally, Putman’s definition of social capital also included the ‘norms of reciprocity and networks of bonding, bridging and linking social capital’ (Stjernqvist et al., 2019, p. 36). Explaining the use of these terms in Putnam’s work, Stjernqvist and colleagues (2019) state that bonding social capital refers to ‘ties among [people] who shared similar identities’; linking social capital refers to ‘ties between unequal identities’, such as children and adults; while, bridging social capital relates to ‘ties among [people] who know they are not alike’ (p. 40).

By blending the work of Coleman and Putnam, an expanded perspective on social capital can be achieved that is applicable to this study. However, it should be noted that although recent studies have incorporated children’s use of social capital into their work (e.g., Bessell & Mason, 2014; Leonard, 2005; Stjernqvist et al., 2019), neither Coleman nor Putnam believed children were capable of creating their own social networks (Bessell & Mason, 2014; Stjernqvist et al., 2019). Given what we now know about young children’s capacity in creating their own peer cultures (Corsaro, 2005), we have extended Coleman and Putnam’s conceptualization of social capital to intentionally include children’s use of social capital within their social networks – that is, their peer cultures. In relation to this study, further theorisation of Coleman’s notion of ‘closed communities’ and Putman’s idea of ‘bonding social capital’, we believe, informs the social capital elements of social networks, trust and reciprocity that were evident within the children’s social interactions with each other during their engagement with digital technologies. For example, ‘closed communities’ could be seen as the well-established communities of the family day care settings where long-term relationships had been formed between children (and parents, educators); and, ‘bonding social capital’ is the acknowledgment of similar identities formed by the small group of young children attending their family day care setting over a long period of time.

The Study: Methodological Approach

The corpus of data informing this paper is from a larger project funded by the Australian Research Council (LP190100387) - Young children in digital society: An online tool for service provision. The aim of the main project was to identify the practices enacted and shared amongst young children, their families and educators in digital society to inform the development of a new online tool for sharing exemplar practices.

This larger project incorporated four separate research investigations that matched four areas identified as important in the Early Childhood Australia (ECA) Statement on Young Children and Digital Technologies (2018) - relationships, health and wellbeing, citizenship, play and pedagogy. The Statement was developed ‘in response to an identified need for guidance for early childhood professionals on the role and optimal use of digital technologies with, by and for young children’ in early childhood settings (ECA, 2018, p. 2). The relationships investigation is the focus of this paper.

The relationships investigation employed a qualitative approach exploring what characterises infant and toddler peer-to-peer interactions when engaging with digital technologies. The project involved five Family Day Care educators (holding a Certificate III qualification as a minimum) and 23 children aged 8 to 36 months (approximately 5 per educator), from diverse backgrounds over a three-year period from one Australian state. This small sample size is not uncommon for qualitative research where the information richness of the cases, coupled with the researchers’ capabilities, are more important than the sample size (McMillan & Schumacher, 2006). Consent for their children to participate was gained from the parents/carers along with educator consent. Data collection methods included video recordings of the young children using digital technologies during their time in care taken by the research assistant (RA), professional development in the form of workshops, and interviews with the educators, together with data collected by each educator when providing their choice of experience involving digital technology for the children within their program. The educator generated data comprised of photographs, documents outlining the intent of the experience, and self-recorded videos of the children interacting with each other during the experience.

Overall, there were three phases of the project that employed a Participatory Design/Redesign methodology (as described in Table 1).

Table 1 Three phases of the participatory design/redesign methodology
Full size table

The following (Table 2) outlines the contexts and timing of the video segments when the children were engaging with their peers using digital technologies in all participating family day care settingsFootnote 1.

Table 2 Family day care educators video details – context and time
Full size table

For this paper, the emphasis is on one case, Cherri, and her family day care setting videos, as representative of the key findings. The video data relating to Cherri was closely analysed over a period of months and consisted of a total of 47.43 min of researcher (RA) recorded videos and 33.18 min of Cherri’s self-recorded videos of the young children interacting with experiences involving digital technologies.

Analysis of the Video Data

The authors of this paper developed a coding framework from a close reading of the literature related to infant/toddler interactions and relationships (e.g., Goodfellow, 2015); family day care settings (e.g., Stratigos et al., 2014); and young children’s social and emotional development (e.g., Davidov et al., 2020). The main aspects identified within the literature were then distilled and further refined as they were applied to the video data (See Nolan & Moore, under review, for further details of the coding framework). The two constructs that related to children’s peer-to-peer interactions – social looking and enactment, and emotional communication, were the focus of the data analysis for this paper (See Table 3).

Table 3 Coding framework – social looking & engagement, and emotional communication
Full size table

The coding was conducted on the Vosaic platform, that enables customised video tagging and coding where the user can identify specific moments useful to the research process and assign a code. Video data timelines, annotations, and reports can be generated and exported for further analysis assisting in the identification of patterns and trends. The process began with the initial coding framework being applied individually to each video, followed by a meeting between the researchers to identify any ambiguities which were then viewed, discussed and revisions made to the coding framework to accommodate any agreed upon changes. This meant returning to the data many times to check interpretations and ensure a detailed and explicit definition of each code was reached (Pyett, 2003). Once all child behaviours could be assigned to a code, it was considered that the researchers had reached verification, comprehension and completeness (Morse et al., 2002).

One Case Example: Young Children’s Interactions During Digital Play

In this section we feature one case example with the children in the same setting over a period of two years to represent our proposition towards broadening the understanding of young children’s peer interactions while engaged with digital technology. Here we are not tracking each child’s development over time but rather the type and frequency of their interactions. Overall, the data analysis and video snapshots presented are representative of other examples in the corpus of data where young children sat side-by-side and interacted with each other in different, but equally valuable and socially positive ways, while engaged with digital technologies.

The children in Cherri’s family day care setting were introduced to us through videographic data when they were young infants and toddlers, with no digital technology present in their family day care program. Initially, there were two toddlers (Eric and Vien) and an infant (Peter) in the program, with another young child (Lily) included in the second year of the project. A close peer-to-peer relationship was evident in the pre-technology engagement videos through the children’s desire to seek each other out for friendship and assistance when needed. For example, in one of the earlier videos, infant Peter was plaintively calling for Vien when his mother left for work; toddler Vien responded by trying to distract and care for Peter, who was in the sandpit outdoors, by sprinkling sand close by him. Following the project’s Design (Phase 1) and later, Re-design (Phase 2) workshops, the subsequent videos demonstrated Cherri gradually introducing digital technologies into her educational program. In line with Wilson et al.’s, (2023) findings that educators are often hesitant to include digital technology into their programs due to a lack of information on how best to introduce digital technology to children, Cherri became increasingly confident with the assistance and resources from the research team. This assistance included informal conversations with the videographer (the RA), initial and follow up interviews with the chief investigator and informative workshops with the research team, industry partners (Raising Children Network, and Early Childhood Australia) and the other family day care educators involved in the study.

Across the two years of data collection, multiple videos were recorded by the educator and RA of the four young children in Cherri’s family day care program interacting with each other while engaging in experiences incorporating digital technologies. While there are examples of Cherri directly instructing and manipulating young children’s hands on the mouse or stylus pen and telling them what to do, she also encouraged periods of exploratory play for the children using iPad apps and games without an adult present. These times of exploration in conjunction with peer-to-peer interactions were important to capture on video that may not otherwise have been seen, identified or valued as significant by adults.

Photographic evidence for this paper has been provided as a series of five still photographs taken from video excerpts with the four children from the family day care setting: the first two excerpts with Eric, Vien and Peter were taken during the first year of the project (Phase 1); with video excerpts three and four from early in the second year of the project (Phase 2). The final video excerpt was taken towards the end of the second year (Phase 2), with Vien and Peter and another three-year-old child, Lily, who had recently joined the family day care service. All of the still photographs have been re-created into pencil sketches through varying levels of computerized artistic effects to ensure participant anonymity and abide by the ethical parameters of the study.

In the following section, a contextual description is provided for each of the five video excerpts, interspersed with data analysis through the lens of social looking and enactment and emotional communication coding, simultaneously overlayed by elements of social capital, peer culture and social interaction theories.

Video Excerpt One

Leaning against each other on a couch, two-and-a-half-year-old toddlers, Eric and Vien, were engaged together with a digital game on an iPad that Cherri had arranged for their use (Fig. 1). The iPad was resting on a pillow in front of them providing easy access. Both children appeared comfortable with their ‘ownership’ (Aarsand & Sorenssen, 2021) of the iPad and the game, seen through the positioning of their bodies in relation to the digital device, with both children calmly touching the screen at the same time. This positionality and calmness could be seen to embody their well-established peer culture (Corsaro, 2005) that had been evident in earlier non-digital play videos (not part of this paper). Here, the norms and expectations of behaviour within their peer culture appear to be focused on sharing practices. As Aarsand and Sorenssen (2021) suggest, this relates to children’s understanding of the ethics of turn taking; and demonstrates the trust and social network operating within the children’s closed community (Coleman, 1988).

Even though Cherri had set up this exploratory play experience for these two children, their arms and bodies surrounding the device showed it was clearly something just for them to manipulate themselves. Given the close peer relationship that was previously evident, it is perhaps not surprising that this excerpt illustrated a strong ‘bonding social capital’ between the two toddlers who knew and trusted each other (Putnam, 2000). Rather than witnessing limited sharing and increased negative affect in the play due to the introduction of something ‘new’ (the digital device), these two children were positively interacting with each other, closely positioned side-by-side, displaying positive body movements, such as jiggling feet, slight touches to each other’s hands, and barely audible vocalisations (positive affect). While ‘joint attentional engagement’ (Carpenter et al., 1998, p. 2) with the children focused on the iPad was clearly identified in the coding analysis, no ‘mutual gaze’ towards each other was seen or coded at this time (Pursi & Lipponen, 2020, p. 108).

Fig. 1
figure 1

Two young children (Eric left, and Vien, on the right) engaging side-by-side with digital game

Full size image

Video Excerpt Two

On another occasion, Eric and Vien were engaging with digital technology with a younger child, two-year-old Peter (far-left side of the group) (Fig. 2). Clearly relaxed within this closed community (Coleman, 1988), Peter can be seen watching the iPad screen from a side view. Sumsion and Goodfellow (2012) suggest in their work with infants and toddlers’ social interactions that ‘observation and listening-in’ is often ‘a prelude to joining in and participating in a shared endeavour’ (p. 317). Indeed, a little later, Peter repositioned his body to be alongside the other two children, so he was able to touch the iPad screen as well. With their heads bent, sitting closely together and focused on the same object, a strong sense of belonging to a group appeared to be an intrinsic element of the social capital created in this play scenario (Putnam, 2000). This excerpt’s data analysis strongly aligns with Corsaro’s (2005) peer culture research where he suggested children work hard to belong to the security of a group, with Peter taking time to move into the side-by-side position with the other two children. Once again, joint attentional engagement (Carpenter et al., 1998) was present in the children’s focused attention on the iPad and the digital game they were playing, with each of the children appearing to understand how to socially interact without the need to look at or verbalise with each other during this interaction. Similar to Disney and Geng’s (2022) argument that social interaction can be ‘beyond speech’, we propose that positive social interaction does not necessarily require direct eye contact when children are sitting side-by-side in their digital play together (p. 1457).

Fig. 2
figure 2

Eric and Vien engaged with iPad on the couch, with younger child, Peter, joining them in their digital play

Full size image

Video Excerpt Three

One year later, these same three young children (Peter, Eric and Vien), now as three-year-olds, were recorded on a different couch, playing a Playschool Art Maker game on an iPad in Cherri’s family day care setting (Fig. 3). In this excerpt, the youngest child, Peter, was crouched very closely to the other two children, using his body, hands and fingers to join in with the game. As a group of three peers, the children’s social relationship had clearly built to be even stronger over the time they had all attended the same family day care program. This was seen in the children’s increasingly close proximity side-by-side to each other during their digital play; an apparent understanding around peer culture norms (Corsaro, 2005) and social capital expectations in their trust of each other (Putnam, 2000) to share the iPad and the space together rather than push the other away; and, a belief that reciprocal help was available if needed (Putman, 2000). Similar to when infant Peter had called out to Vien for help, Eric asked Vien for help with the digital game in this play. Vien’s prompt assistance confirmed the inbuilt reciprocity that appeared a feature of the children’s social capital they had created within their group (Putnam, 2000).

In the coding analysis of this video, very high instances of ‘positive affect’ (Tronick, 1989, p. 113), including facial expressions of happiness, giggling, laughing, and exaggerated body movements; together with high instances of ‘communicative gestures’ (Carpenter et al., 1998, p. 42) such as happy vocalisations, repeating the words from the digital game, and shouts of joy, were jointly identified. Also, during this analysis, Peter was noticed closely watching the (hand) actions of the other two children playing on the iPad, which was coded as ‘attention following’ to ‘determine what the others were doing’ (Carpenter et al.,1998, p. 9); and ‘imitative learning’ to then ‘follow the behaviour of the others’ (Carpenter et al.,1998, p. 9). Again, there was no direct eye contact between the children detected in the coding analysis of this segment.

Fig. 3
figure 3

Peter, Eric and Vien one year later playing a digital game together on an iPad

Full size image

Video Excerpt Four

In this fourth video excerpt, Eric and Vien were recorded sitting side-by-side again on the couch playing another digital game on the iPad (Fig. 4). They are in close physical proximity, heads touching and relaxed body positions, with their apparent understanding and trust of each other tangible in their peer culture (Corsaro, 2005) within this closed community space (Coleman, 1988). In the past, this form of social interaction captured here between Eric and Vien may have been described in Parten’s developmental terms as ‘parallel play’ (cf.: Treasure, 2018, p. 13), or as ‘joint attentional engagement with a peer’ (Carpenter et al., 1998, p. 5); however, we believe this example of young children’s social interactions while engaged in digital play is much more agentive, nuanced and embedded in active peer culture than these earlier terms imply. In close analysis of the video data, we have identified discreet and sometimes barely visible forms of social interaction such as a slight ‘touch’ (Keranen et al., 2020), minimal body language, quietly audible and ‘subtle’ (Li & Yu, 2020, p. 180) visual signs of positive affect, such as smiling. In other video data where the educator was present, the children were often seen to look to the adult for assistance and reassurance on how to respond or react to a new situation or ‘novel’ equipment, which we had coded as emotional communication. Clearfield et al. (2008) refers to this phenomenon as ‘social referencing’, considered a common response in children’s social interactions with others (p. 298). However, in our data, we did not see or record evidence of social referencing in the children’s peer-to-peer social interactions while engaged in digital play; nor did we see children consistently needing to directly look at their peers to negotiate ‘what happens next’. It is not surprising then that educators may miss these more subtle forms of quality social interaction between peers if they are only looking for more overt, traditional forms of interaction, such as, direct eye gaze, constantly turning towards each other in their play, and distinctive vocalising.

Fig. 4
figure 4

Eric and Vien again, side-by-side, on the couch with another digital game on the iPad

Full size image

Video Excerpt Five

In this final video excerpt, Peter and Vien were joined by a new child to the group, Lily, in their digital play with a mathematical app, a digital number recognition game (Fig. 5). Different to other play episodes, the iPad was intentionally positioned by Cherri on an upright stand on a table in front of the children. In this excerpt, all three children were still positioned side-by-side, and much closer to the iPad screen than had previously been seen. However, it appeared that Lily was a little further to the back of the group than Peter (on the left) and Vien (on the right). What we may be witnessing here is an example of a ‘bridging social capital’ situation, which Putnam (2000) defines as ‘ties among [people] who know they are not alike’ (Stjernqvist et al., 2019, p. 40). This may have been due to Lily’s new-comer status, or perhaps that her ethnicity was not the same as the other three children in the group. Nonetheless, Lily’s inclusion as a member of their peer culture (Corsaro, 2005) was embraced by each of the children in this digital play interaction and in later play episodes. As previously seen, Vien was regarded by the other children as the person who not only knew how to play the digital games but could also provide help to others when needed. In terms of social capital resources, Vien’s social interaction skills provided elements of reciprocity (Putnam, 2000) and useful information (Coleman, 1988) to achieve common interests (Coleman, 1988) within the children’s social network group (Coleman, 1988; Corsaro, 2005). Vien’s assistance was evident when she said to Peter, ‘Do this’ when he appeared unsure of how to play the game. Interestingly, Peter was blending his digital engagement with non-digital dramatic play by wearing a ‘pig-snout’ mask and speaking in ‘pig-oinks’ during this play with Lily and Vien. Some may assume that Peter’s blended, and at times non-focused play, would trigger frustration in Vien and Lily’s responses to his attempts to play the digital game, however, high levels of positive affect (such as laughing, smiling and giggling) and emotional communication (such as caring acts) were evident in the coding of this video episode. While the children’s agency in enacting social interaction practices side-by-side as a closely bound group was clearly evident; direct eye contact with each other was once again not apparent during this digital play interaction.

Fig. 5
figure 5

Peter, Lily, and Vien positioned very closely together at a table with an iPad on a stand in front of them

Full size image

Viewing Children’s Relationships Through a Social Capital Lens

From our fine-grained analysis of the video data through a social capital lens, we propose broadening the notion of peer-to-peer interactions when young children engage with digital technologies. If we consider peer culture as young children operating under the gaze of adults through subtle peer-to-peer interactions that culminate in a sense of belonging to a group within a closed community, then this redirects our attention. It encourages adults to look further than children’s eye gaze, head turning to face each other, and explicit vocalisations as indicators of social interactions. Instead, it tunes us into more nuanced and subtle behaviours that can easily go unnoticed by adults who sit outside of the children’s closed community. These behaviours include body positioning such as peers sitting side-by-side with bodies touching, gentle hand and arm movements to guide the behaviour of others, expressions of delight in the situation including vocalisations and body movements, and the use of vocal sounds that may or may not be decipherable. We hope this awareness can act as a stimulus for further reflection by educators on young children’s peer-to-peer interactions when engaging with digital technologies to broaden what they are currently seeing as positive social interactions that lead to relationship building.

Conclusion

From a Western perspective, ‘quality communication’ is said to involve eye gaze, turning to and/or gesturing towards the other person (cf.: Pursi & Lipponen, 2020), which were rarely observed during children’s peer-to-peer interactions in this study. Therefore, we propose broadening the notion of peer-to-peer interactions when young children engage with digital technology, repositioning these interactions as occurring within a peer culture created by the children. In doing this we begin to notice subtle behaviours that sit outside of eye gaze and face-to-face communication, and focus more on reciprocity, trust, values, expectations, norms, participation and agency. This prompts educators to think a little differently about young children’s peer relationships and interactions.

While we acknowledge the limitations of this study – limited number of family day care settings in one Australian state, only qualitative data used, localised nature of the findings resulting in limitations to the generalizability of the findings, we are excited about the possibilities that lie ahead. We see potential for a larger study to test the findings, as well as accounting for the age, dispositions, previous experience interacting with digital technologies, and number of children attending early childhood settings.

By promoting an expanded definition of young children’s peer-to-peer interactions when engaging with digital technologies we hope to encourage educators to see the richness of peer cultures along with the social and emotional behaviours of the children, as subtle as they may be, to reconceptualise relationships in a new, more holistic way. This supports educators to include experiences involving digital technologies into their programs knowing that such experiences can support children’s social development. Viewing children’s behaviours through a social capital lens adds to educators’ understanding of each child as a social being and how they build relationships with others. This information is important in planning and strengthening the social and emotional learning of young children. Current policy documents in many Western countries position children as capable and confident actors in their worlds, this research adds evidence to this sentiment.