Parents’ Understanding of Children’s Digital Traces : A Qualitative Study in Sweden

Sammanfattning

Children’s everyday use of digital platforms creates digital traces through visible actions, such as posts, comments, messages, and shared content, as well as through less visible processes, such as tracking, platform storage, recommendations, and data collection. These traces can persist, accumulate over time, and contribute to a broader digital footprint. While previous research has examined children’s digital privacy, online risks, and parental mediation, less is known about how parents themselves understand digital traces in everyday parenting contexts. This study explored how parents in Sweden understood children’s digital traces in relation to everyday platform use. The study was based on semi-structured interviews with twenty parents of children aged 11–14, and the data were analysed using reflexive thematic analysis. The findings showed that parents most clearly understood digital traces through visible and intentional actions, such as posting, messaging, commenting, and sharing content. Less visible traces, including data collection, search history, platform storage, and algorithmic recommendations, were also recognised, but were often described in broader and more uncertain terms. Parents understood that digital traces could remain online, be combined over time, and potentially affect children in the future, but they often found it difficult to explain how these processes worked in practice. The study suggested that parents’ understanding of digital traces was shaped by visibility, perceived control, and everyday experience. It also highlighted a gap between parents’ general awareness of digital traces and their ability to reason about less visible and long-term data processes in concrete parenting situations.