scholarly journals Children’s Virtual Worlds and Friendships during the covid-19 Pandemic

2021 ◽  
Vol 5 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Gloria Quinones ◽  
Megan Adams

From March 2020 in Australia, the covid-19 pandemic resulted in regulations for social distancing, which meant that students were homeschooled. Social distancing exponentially increased the exposure of most young children to digital technology such as touchscreens (iPads) and digital flip cameras. This study focuses on two seven-year-old children who maintain their friendship during covid-19 by imaginary performances and playing virtual games. A cultural–historical approach is used in the study to analyze the children’s experience as they connect through virtual worlds and build imaginary spaces, contributing to sustaining their relationship during challenging times. Findings indicate that the children built a collective social situation of development integrating sophisticated imaginary, real and virtual worlds. The children’s perspective – their motive orientations and intentions towards a new social situation provided new opportunities for learning in a virtual imaginary world. The combination of a real, an imaginary and a virtual world supported the children to experience a range of emotions including joyous moments, empathy and attunement as they encouraged each other to participate.

2011 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 52-64 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca W. Black ◽  
Stephanie M. Reich

In recent years there has been a marked increase in the number of virtual worlds aimed at populations between the ages of 6 to14 years. This article examines the content and design of one such site, Webkinz World, as a sociocultural context for informal learning. Focusing on the design and activities of this site sheds light on the ways in which Webkinz World supports learning, especially for nascent users, and the apparent limits of these support structures as users gain more expertise.


2009 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Angela M Pereira ◽  
Paulo Martins ◽  
Leonel Morgado ◽  
Benjamim Fonseca

In this article, we present an exploratory study on the use of 3-D virtual worlds in entrepreneurship education for children of primary school in a virtual world from the Activeworlds Educational Universe: “Entrepreneurship in Basic Education – 1st cycle.” This study allowed us to identify a set of technological problems in the use of these environments for teaching entrepreneurship to children. It allowed us to define a range of requirements that must be fulfilled in order to provide a software system that supports these activities in virtual worlds.


Author(s):  
Rebecca W. Black ◽  
Stephanie M. Reich

In recent years there has been a marked increase in the number of virtual worlds aimed at populations between the ages of 6 to14 years. This article examines the content and design of one such site, Webkinz World, as a sociocultural context for informal learning. Focusing on the design and activities of this site sheds light on the ways in which Webkinz World supports learning, especially for nascent users, and the apparent limits of these support structures as users gain more expertise.


Author(s):  
Stewart Martin

Digital technology is able to modify deep-rooted views (Martin & Vallance, 2008) and facilitate identity articulation (Bers, 2001). During adolescence young people are developing their personal identity framed through the context of family, friends and cultural and religious inheritance. The complex dynamics between ’self,’ upbringing, cultural background, religious belief and social context may produce a sense of acceptance and welcome, feelings social engagement, or lead to anomie, social rejection, personal failure, disaffection or radicalisation. In multicultural, pluralistic democracies the emergence of trans-national political structures and the rise of international tensions have increased concerns about the nature of, and entitlement to, citizenship. This paper describes the Citizenship Project’s virtual world study of identity development in young people, using real-world scenarios to discover what values underpin engagement with political issues and citizenship, how they receive the concerns and values of others and how virtual worlds can promote social inclusion and cohesion.


2016 ◽  
Vol 13 (6) ◽  
pp. 624-644
Author(s):  
Sara M. Grimes

According to various media and academic sources, the virtual worlds landscape underwent a profound transformation in 2008, with the arrival of numerous new titles designed and targeted specifically to young children. Although a growing body of research has explored some of the titles involved in this shift, little remains known of its overall scope and contents. This article provides a mapping of the initial “boom” in children’s virtual worlds development and identifies a number of significant patterns within the ensuing children’s virtual worlds landscape. The argument is made that while the reported boom in children’s virtual worlds has been exaggerated, a number of important shifts for online gaming culture did unfold during this period, some of which challenge accepted definitions of “virtual world” and “multiplayer online game.” The implications of these findings are discussed in light of contemporary developments and trends within children’s digital culture and within online gaming more broadly.


Author(s):  
Chang Liu ◽  
Ying Zhong ◽  
Sertac Ozercan ◽  
Qing Zhu

This paper presents a template-based solution to overcome technical barriers non-technical computer end users face when developing functional learning environments in three-dimensional virtual worlds (3DVW). iVirtualWorld, a prototype of a platform-independent 3DVW creation tool that implements the proposed solution, facilitates 3DVW learning environment creation through semantics-based abstract 3DVW representation and template-based 3DVW instantiation. iVirtualWorld provides a wizard to guide the 3DVW creation process, and hide low-level programming and 3D design details through higher-level abstracts supported by pre-defined templates. Preliminary evaluation of the effectiveness of iVirtualWorld showed positive results. The contribution of this study is threefold: 1) It provides a paradigm for investigating and developing 3DVW building tools from end users’ perspective; 2) It develops a prototype of a 3DVW building tool, which gives educators a framework to easily create educational virtual worlds using domain-specific concepts; 3) It conducts empirical research and collected preliminary experimental data for evaluation.


2020 ◽  
Vol 14 (2) ◽  
pp. 313-320
Author(s):  
Colti Sistiarani ◽  
Bambang Hariyadi ◽  
Saudin Yuniarno ◽  
Endo Dardjito

The rapid development of technology makes it easier for mothers to provide stimulation related to growth and development using gadgets. However, parental knowledge is needed about the safe limits of using a gadget in early childhood. This study aims to determine the perspective and behavior of mothers about the use of gadgets in toddlers. The method used is quantitative research with a cross-sectional approach. The participants of this study were thirty-one mothers who have early childhood and who are empowering family welfare. The inclusion criteria were mothers who agreed to be respondents, the exclusion criteria for mothers who did not have gadgets. This study uses a questionnaire measurement instrument for data collection. Data analysis was performed univariate and bivariate using the chi-square test. The results of the study concluded that the mother's knowledge regarding the safety of using a gadget was still lacking, with a value of around 54.8%, while the mother's behavior related to the same thing was better, which was around 58.1%. The relationship test shows that there is a strong enough relationship between maternal knowledge and maternal behavior in introducing or using gadgets in toddlers.  Keywords: Early Childhood, Mother Perspective, Gadget Safeness  References Appel, M. (2012). Are heavy users of computer games and social media more computer literate? Computers and Education, 59(4), 1339–1349. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2012.06.004 Bandura, A. (1977). Social learning theory. Prentice-Hall. Cingel, D. P., & Krcmar, M. (2013). Predicting Media Use in Very Young Children: The Role of Demographics and Parent Attitudes. Communication Studies, 64(4), 374–394. https://doi.org/10.1080/10510974.2013.770408 Connell, S. L., Lauricella, A. R., & Wartella, E. (2015). Parental Co-Use of Media Technology with their Young Children in the USA. Journal OfChildren and Media, 9(1), 5–21. https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2015.997440 Haines, J., O’Brien, A., McDonald, J., Goldman, R. E., Evans-Schmidt, M., Price, S., King, S., Sherry, B., & Taveras, E. M. (2013). Television Viewing and Televisions in Bedrooms: Perceptions of Racial/Ethnic Minority Parents of Young Children. Journal of Child and Family Studies, 22(6), 749–756. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10826-012-9629-6 Jones, I., & Park, Y. (2015). Virtual worlds: Young children using the internet. Young children and families in the information age. Educating the young child (Advances in theory and research, implications for practice) (I. K. Heider & J. M. Renck (eds.); Volume 10). Springer. Lauricella, A. R., Wartella, E., & Rideout, V. J. (2015). Young children’s screen time: The complex role of parent and child factors. 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Young children’s initiation into family literacy practices in the digital age. Journal of Early Childhood Research, 15(1), 47–60. https://doi.org/10.1177/1476718X15582095 Mifsud, C. L., & Petrova, R. (2017). Young Children (0-8) and Digital Technology. In JRC Science and Policies Reports. Nevski, E., & Siibak, A. (2016). The role of parents and parental mediation on 0–3-year olds’ digital play with smart devices: Estonian parents’ attitudes and practices. Early Years, 36(3), 227–241. https://doi.org/10.1080/09575146.2016.1161601 Nikken, P. (2017). Implications of low or high media use among parents for young children’s media use. Cyberpsychology, 11(3 Special Issue). https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2017-3-1 Nikken, P., & de Haan, J. (2015). Guiding young children’s internet use at home: Problems that parents experience in their parental mediation and the need for parenting support. Cyberpsychology, 9(1). https://doi.org/10.5817/CP2015-1-3 Piotrowski, J. (2017). Media exposure during infancy and early childhood: The effect of content and context on learning and development. In I. R. Barr & D. Linebarger (Eds.), The parental media mediation context of young children’s media use.(pp. 205–219). Springer International Publishing. Plowman, L., Stevenson, O., Stephen, C., & McPake, J. (2012). Preschool children’s learning with technology at home. Computers and Education, 59(1), 30–37. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compedu.2011.11.014 Rasmussen, E. E., Shafer, A., Colwell, M. J., White, S., Punyanunt-Carter, N., Densley, R. L., & Wright, H. (2016). Relation between active mediation, exposure to Daniel Tiger’s Neighborhood, and US preschoolers’ social and emotional development. Journal of Children and Media, 10(4), 443–461. https://doi.org/10.1080/17482798.2016.1203806 Smahelova, M., Juhová, D., Cermak, I., & Smahel, D. (2017). Mediation of young children’s digital technology use: The parents’ perspective. 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Author(s):  
Stefan Bittmann

Virtual reality (VR) is the term used to describe representation and perception in a computer-generated, virtual environment. The term was coined by author Damien Broderick in his 1982 novel “The Judas Mandala". The term "Mixed Reality" describes the mixing of virtual reality with pure reality. The term "hyper-reality" is also used. Immersion plays a major role here. Immersion describes the embedding of the user in the virtual world. A virtual world is considered plausible if the interaction is logical in itself. This interactivity creates the illusion that what seems to be happening is actually happening. A common problem with VR is "motion sickness." To create a sense of immersion, special output devices are needed to display virtual worlds. Here, "head-mounted displays", CAVE and shutter glasses are mainly used. Input devices are needed for interaction: 3D mouse, data glove, flystick as well as the omnidirectional treadmill, with which walking in virtual space is controlled by real walking movements, play a role here.


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