Abstract
Background: Young adults’ connectedness with and independence from parents have important implications for both their development and family relationships. Although technology plays an increasingly important role in these dynamics, there are few direct observations of how connectedness and independence unfold in the digital world. Little is known of between- and within-person differences in these dynamics. Purpose: This study uses Screenomics to directly observe smartphone interactions between young adults and their parents, and discover whether and how dimensions of connectedness and independence manifest in these interactions at multiple timescales. Research Design, Study Sample, and Data Collection: Screenshot sequences were collected from 10 ethnically diverse young adult (50% female) participants’ smartphones every 5 seconds for up to 1 month (total of 457,905 screenshots). We identified 1413 interaction instances between young adults and their parents (including 359 calls, 1032 messages, and 10 other communication instances). Analysis and Results: Digital ethnographic analysis of screenshots revealed multiple themes related to connectedness (emotional support, logistical and financial support, consistent communication) and independence (parent fostering independence, parent intrusiveness/overinvolvement, and young adults’ psychological separation). Quantitative descriptions at different timescales (week, day, hour, moment) revealed within-person and between-person differences in active engagement, reciprocal communication, consistent communication, parent intrusiveness, young adults’ reliance on parents’ support, and young adults’ psychological separation. Conclusion: Findings highlight the need to examine family digital interactions at multiple timescales and the utility of temporally dense and comprehensive Screenomics data in studying social relations.
| Original language | English (US) |
|---|---|
| Pages (from-to) | 1126-1150 |
| Number of pages | 25 |
| Journal | Journal of Social and Personal Relationships |
| Volume | 40 |
| Issue number | 4 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Apr 2023 |
Bibliographical note
Funding Information:The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the The Cyber Social Initiative at Stanford University, the Stanford University PHIND Center (Precision Health and Integrated Diagnostics), the Stanford Maternal and Child Health Research Institute, the Department of Pediatrics at Stanford University, the Knight Foundation (G-2017–54227), and the Stanford Data Science Scholarship.
Funding Information:
We gratefully acknowledge the support provided by the Cyber Social Initiative at Stanford University, the Stanford University PHIND Center (Precision Health and Integrated Diagnostics), the Stanford Maternal and Child Health Research Institute, the Department of Pediatrics at Stanford University, the Knight Foundation (G-2017–54227), and the Stanford Data Science Scholarship. We thank the participants for contributing data for this study. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the funding organizations.
Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2022.
Keywords
- Screenomics
- connectedness-independence
- intensive longitudinal data
- multiple timescales
- parent-young adult smartphone interactions