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Teaching children about online manipulation without creating a paranoid world view subject to manipulation? (sh.itjust.works)

submitted 1 year ago by phase_change@sh.itjust.works to c/asklemmy@lemmy.ml

27 comments fedilink hide all child comments

Ok, this is not going to be a well formulated question, because the concerns behind it are nebulous in my own head.

Some assumptions I have, that clearly inform the question that follows: I believe commercial, state, and others have sophisticated methods of influencing what I see on social media and thus, in part, what I think. I also believe that someone more willing to believe in the types of conspiratorial beliefs I’ve just expressed are more likely to be manipulated by information they’re exposed to. And, yes, I fully appreciate the irony of those beliefs.

My child is adult enough that belief patterns I encourage are very unlikely to become deep patterns. That is, I’d have to work to indoctinate my son, and he’d actively resist if my indoctrination was outside of societal norms.

He didn’t grow up exposed to the social media I suspect children do now.

How does a parent inoculate a child to the influence of social media without also creating a mindset willing to believe in a nebulous “them” that controls things—a mindset, I believe, that makes a person more likely to be controlled?

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[–] Kyle@lemmy.ca 1 points 1 year ago

I have no experience in teaching kids these concepts but I'm interested in them.

The key concepts to look at are information literacy, media literacy and when it comes to online things it's dark patterns when it comes to user interfaces. https://youtu.be/kxkrdLI6e6M

I have read that Estonia has started "inoculating" kids in school against misinformation, this article touches a bit on some strategies. https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20220128-the-country-inoculating-against-disinformation

What I have found is that there are a lot of really good paid magazines and blogs that are really fun to read and are full of lots of accurate information instead of, well, you know. When I was a kid my dad would subscribe to discover magazine, popular science, popular mechanic, and national geographic and I would eat them all up, a lot of those stories have shaped me as an adult.

I wonder if I was in your position if I would gift my child whatever paid subscriptions were reasonable for magazines or blogs that encompasses their interests. My local library actually gives me most of these magazines in digital format for free and I still like reading them on my tablet. I suppose more modern versions of this would be. If you want to replace YouTube, I would look into giving them a nebula subscription and they'll never have to hear another ad again.

Good luck, I remember being a teenager and I remember hating almost everything my parents proposed so I hope you can find a way to inspire your children and I don't think it'll be easy.