Abstract
In the last decade, interactive touchscreen devices have become ubiquitous in young children, and toddlers first experience touchscreen technology before two. Although parents have a vital role in developing the home environment as a stimulus for development, they also have conflicting views on the appropriateness of using apps to deliver educational content for assorted reasons. The purpose of the study was to reveal various aspects of children’s smart mobile use at home, such as the frequency of mobile device usage, preferred app types, and parent strategies on apps acquaintance. Three hundred twenty-five parents of kindergarten children took part in this study. The present study revealed that Greek homes are ‘media rich’ homes and that parents seek to support their children’s learning at home via mobile devices. Furthermore, parents lack knowledge about app developmentally appropriateness and need further guidance. We expect the present study’s findings to serve as a reference for researchers leading to better information for parents and creating apps with real educational value for children.
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The authors report financial support was provided by Greece and the European Union (European Social Fund- ESF) (MIS 5048168).
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Papadakis, S., Alexandraki, F., Zaranis, N. (2022). Greek Parents’ App Choices and Young Children’s Smart Mobile Usage at Home. In: Auer, M.E., Tsiatsos, T. (eds) New Realities, Mobile Systems and Applications. IMCL 2021. Lecture Notes in Networks and Systems, vol 411. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-96296-8_4
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