Reliability and validity of children’s advertising exposure measures

Purpose: First, three levels of content specificity for assessing children’s exposure to advertising were distinguished as follows: exposure to the medium, exposure to broad content and exposure to specific (i.e. commercial) content. Second, using longitudinal data from 165 children between 8 and 11 years old, the test-retest reliability and content validity of survey measures from all three levels were examined. Design/methodology/approach: Due to societal concerns about the effects of advertising on children’s well-being, research into this topic is expanding. To enhance knowledge accumulation and bring uniformity to the field, a validated standard survey measure of advertising exposure is needed. The aim of this study is to provide such measures for television and internet advertising. Findings: The findings suggest that all measures provided solid estimates for children’s television and internet advertising exposure. Yet, due to minor differences in reliability and validity, it may be concluded that television advertising exposure can best be measured by asking children how often they watch certain popular (commercial) television networks, either weighting or not weighting for advertising density. Internet advertising exposure can best be measured by asking children how often they use the internet or how often they visit certain popular websites, weighting for advertising density. Originality/value: The current measures for children’s advertising exposure through traditional media can easily be adapted to fit new media

Living with genital Pain: women's experience of treatment seeking

Female Genital Pain (FGP) is a sexual dysfunction that is difficult to diagnose and treat, which can make treatment seeking a distressing experience. In the present study the lived experience of women with genital pain as explored in order to develop a grounded model of treatment seeking for FGP. A constructivist lived experience perspective underpinned this research. Participants were 26 women with genital pain, specifically vaginismus (n=4) and (n=22). The average age of the participants was 27. Identified motivations for seeking treatment were the belief that they might have an infection, optimistic views about their health or an expectation that relationships include intercourse. Barriers occurred when they normalised or discounted their symptoms or held negative treatment beliefs. Unsurprisingly, the identified barriers were associated with delayed treatment seeking. The women described three agendas for their consultation with a health care professional (HCP) – validation of their symptoms, an informed HCP, and a strong HCP–patient alliance. Agendas that were met played a significant role in decreasing distress. Identified salient survivorship resources were a supportive HCP and personal agency. These resources encouraged consistent treatment seeking. The personal narratives that contributed to more consistent treatment seeking were personal agency, communion, redemption, creating meaning of suffering, positive sexual identity and positive resolution. Identities that were characterised by contamination and negative sexual self-schema were associated with no treatment seeking or delayed treatment seeking. The findings of this study allow HCPs and researchers to better understand the needs of women with genital pain. Furthermore, this research will help guide future research and the development of future initiatives to improve the treatment of genital pain conditions, thus improving the outcomes and quality of life for women with genital pain

Utility of Parental Mediation Model on Youth’s Problematic Online Gaming

The Parental Mediation Model PMM) was initially designed to regulate children’s attitudes towards the traditional media. In the present era, because of prevalent online media there is a need for similar regulative measures. Spending long hours on social media and playing online games increase the risks of exposure to the negative outcomes of online gaming. This paper initially applied the PMM developed by European Kids Online to (i) test the reliability and validity of this model and (ii) identify the effectiveness of this model in controlling problematic online gaming (POG). The data were collected from 592 participants comprising 296 parents and 296 students of four foreign universities, aged 16 to 22 years in Kuala Lumpur (Malaysia). The study found that the modified model of the five-factor PMM (Technical mediation, Monitoring mediation, Restrictive mediation, Active Mediation of Internet Safety, and Active mediation of Internet Use) functions as a predictor for mitigating POG. The findings suggest the existence of a positive relation between ‘monitoring’ and ‘restrictive’ mediation strategies and exposure to POG while Active Mediation of Internet Safety and Active mediation of Internet use were insignificant predictors. Results showed a higher utility of ‘technical’ strategies by the parents led to less POG. The findings of this study do not support the literature suggesting active mediation is more effective for reducing youth’s risky behaviour. Instead, parents need to apply more technical mediations with their children and adolescents’ Internet use to minimize the negative effects of online gaming

Shielding SNS content from parents: a survey investigating perspectives of emerging adults who have recently left the parental home

Emerging adults are increasingly “unfriending” their parents on Social Networking Sites (SNS). A survey among 300 emerging adults who recently moved out of the parental home investigated whether family communication patterns were related to shielding of SNS content from parents and whether perceived undesirability of privacy invasion mediated this relation. Structural equation modeling analyses showed that emerging adults from high conformity-oriented families reported higher perceived undesirability of privacy invasion, which related to higher shielding of SNS content. In contrast, emerging adults from high conversation-oriented families reported lower perceived undesirability of privacy invasion, which related to lower shielding of SNS content

Comparing the measurement of different social networks

__Background:__ Technological progress has enabled researchers to use new unobtrusive measures of relationships between actors in social network analysis. However, research on how these unobtrusive measures of peer connections relate to traditional sociometric nominations in adolescents is scarce. Therefore, the current study compared traditional peer nominated networks with more unobtrusive measures of peer connections: Communication networks that consist of instant messages in an online social platform and proximity networks based on smartphones' Bluetooth signals that measure peer proximity. The three social network types were compared in their coverage, stability, overlap, and the extent to which the networks exhibit the often observed sex segregation in adolescent social networks. __Method:__ Two samples were derived from the MyMovez project: a longitudinal sample of 444 adolescents who participated in the first three waves of the first year of the project (Y1; 51% male; Mage = 11.29, SDage = 1.26) and a cross-sectional sample of 774 adolescents that participated in fifth wave in the third year (Y3; 48% male; Mage = 10.76, SDage = 1.23). In the project, all participants received a research smartphone and a wrist-worn accelerometer. On the research smartphone, participants received daily questionnaires such as peer nomination questions (i.e., nominated networ