EDUCATING PARENTS WITH

CHILDREN WHO USE THE INTERNET

:KOREA-SPECIFIC APPROACH

Kyunghwa Lee, Ph.D

President

Parents’ Union on Net

Date: May 16, 2012

Venue: Golden Bay Beach Hotel,

Larnaca, Cyprus

PREVALENCE OF INTERNET USE IN KOREA

World ranking 2nd (ITU, 2010)

Average connection speed 1st (www.pingdong.com)

98% of teens are internet users (2011)

Approximately 78% of the Korean population use

the internet (KISA, 2010)

Teens are 10% of all smart phone holders (about

2 million teens)

AT RISK TEENS(1)

10% of school-aged teens: internet game

addiction (KADO, 2011)

Adult sites are a means for vulnerable teens’

sexual violence (Daegu, 2008)

-In 2008 a central city in Korea, Daegu, experienced 8

3rd graders being sexuall attacked by several 6th

graders. The attackers stated to the police that they

just copied the obscene acts that they saw online.

AT RISK TEENS(2)

Partners for one night stand is found at chatting

café (Association of Women, 2008).

Runaway teens are involved in sex trafficking for

money, either alone or co-ed

Negative reply is related to suicide

Cyber-bullying is taking place on online cafe

Anti-café about mom, teachers

‘Your mom is bad because she likes money’

‘Get together if you want to kill your homeroom

teacher’

AT RISK TEENS (3)

IT makes it possible for teens to be the victim or the

offender

Sexual harassment, sex trafficking

IT makes teens illegal users

Illegally downloading music, movie, and games

IT makes teens abuse parents’ ID

Parents allow kids to use their ID

Kids have access to inappropriate contents, regardless of

ratings put in place to protect them

IT makes teens addicted.

Online games, chatting

Recently teens who are member of ‘ocult’ club killed a

young man because of different views(2012.5)

PARENTS’ BELIEFS REGARDING IT

Parents’ beliefs:

technology is a convenient tool for child’s social

relations, daily schedule and for catching the social

flow.

Smart phone is the best gift.

Technology is doubtful for studying.

Kids’ environment:

- TV watching and internet games are fun

- Afterschool programs focus on studying only

- Have easy internet access at home.

BACKGROUND OF PARENT EDUCATION

Parent education programs containing well-known

good parenting ideas are not adequate in an IT

environment

Parents have poor IT utilization skills

Stress about childrearing

Parents have no knowledge about the traits of the

internet

- Kids’ stress from item theft or event fraud

- Free game programs have adult site ads.

- Parents’ ID enables kids to have access to improper games.

- Parents are embarrassed of cell phone data usage

overcharge

BACKGROUND OF CHILD PROTECTION

Beliefs that encouraged Child Protection

Internet is a sea of obscenity.

Internet is a hot bed of sex trafficking.

Internet is an illegal tool to download or upload

music, movies, and games

Internet is insulting words,

Internet is an uncontrollable tool.

So, internet requires timely parenting as well as

policies

CHILD PROTECTION POLICY: GOVERNMENT

Manufacture filtering software and disseminate to home PCs for free. Block obscene webs and blogs

- 100~200 sites per month

Install ‘shut down’ software on home PCs & cyber cafés by law - Prevention of Game addiction

- Education for kids and parents

Attendance of education programs: parents’ participation gives their children’ volunteer work credit .

Request account deletion

Trial and error case: awards were given to those reporting illegal and harmful to minors information(2003-2005)

This program is not implemented any more

CHILD PROTECTION POLICY:

ENTREPRENEURS

Operation of Report center

Keep Appointee for child protection by law

Portal sites were held responsible to protect children. They were expected to keep an appointee who was in charge of this.

Educate cyber ethics for parents & teens

Operate Teens’ Zones

Manufacture filtering software

Use ‘adult authentication’

Under age 19, they need parents’ consent before they have access to adult sites

PARENTS’ UNION ON NET (P.U.N.)

The only NGO which has been established under the purpose for online child protection in Korea.

- Number of staff: 5(full time), 2(part time)

- Number of regional staff: 30

Cooperating with government and industry for funding in addition to donation

Yearly budget: 150,000Euro +

3 directions:

Monitoring

Educating

Cultivating

Major themes: cyber ethics, childrearing techniques, sound behaviors

MAJOR ACTIVITIES OF P.U.N

Information Communication Ethics

- Guide installment of filtering software

- Inform parents of item fraud, identity theft

Educate parents about prevention skills of game

addiction

Support “shut down” software which stops game playing

from midnight to 6 AM.

Global parenting network

Humanity Forum for parents

Global leadership training for teens in regional

child center.

WHAT P.U.N. DO

Watch PUN’s video

In 2011

PARENT EDUCATION ACTIVITIES OF P.U.N.

P.U.N. implements giving lectures, both large-

and small-sized (# of persons in a class: 10 to 400)

- Themes: cyber ethics, prevention of game addiction,

danger of adult sites

- Personal information protection, copyrights, and

internet fraud such as item, giveaways, phishing

P.U.N. implements monitoring smart phones,

websites, TVs, and internet games

Violence, obscene, game rating, compliance of

shutdown program

KOREAN PARENTS’ SPECIFIC PARENTING(1)

IT is just a tool for reduce kids’ stress

- For instance, game playing, chatting and surfing

Parents design a full studying climate, sending

kids either to private learning center or local

child center.

kids stay there until late night

parents allow kids online access in spare time

KOREAN PARENTS’ SPECIFIC PARENTING(2)

Parents are reluctant to communicate with kids

to resolve conflict when parents encounter

excessive or improper use of IT .

Instead they prefer technological regulation, filtering

software

Even when they communicate with kids, it is

perceived as nagging.

FUTURE DIRECTION FOR

PARENT EDUCATION

Parent education for housewives needs to be

expanded for low-SES parents and parents who

work full-time.

Fathers should be educated

Parent education needs to emphasize the value of

learning skills

Currently, learning for divergent thinking is not

encouraged, only studying for high academic grades.

Variety of learning skills can give teens global

leadership awareness.

CONTINUED

Parents need to be taught characteristics of IT

Korean parents underestimate effect of IT utilization.

Parent education needs to include humanity

issues.

Concepts like digital native, prosumer which are

imposed on teens can make teens be inhumane or

technology dependent.

Side effects: isolation, covert relation, power bloggers’

unethical business, information overload, ceaseless

surfing

Help parents raise kids as sound humans who can

control technology as well as use it properly.