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Ask Parry! is a service where Parry Aftab, noted online safety and privacy expert, and Executive Director of WiredSafety.org can answer your questions about online safety, privacy and security, and help you with problems you encounter online. Anything from help finding a safe chat room for your teens, to knowing what to do if the item you bought at auction doesn't arrive as promised.
What kinds of things are teens really doing online?
We conducted a survey in 1998 that us getting lots of recent attention. In late 1998 I met (I actually only virtually met them, since we haven't met face-to-face but only online) two remarkable academics from the University of Southern Florida, Dr. Michael Berson and Dr. Ilene Berson. They, too, are experts in the field of online safety, and have written many of the leading articles and performed many leading studies in this area. We decided to collaborate on a series of surveys of teenagers themselves, and approached Seventeen Magazine online to host the survey for us. The results were remarkable, although they mirrored what I had been hearing for years and what we have confirmed with large groups of teens since.
The Survey
About half of the group surveyed reported that they were fourteen or fifteen years old, and in ninth or tenth grade. A further 32 percent were evenly split between thirteen-year-old eighth graders and sixteen-year-old eleventh graders. All of them said they were girls.
This is what we learned:
- Sixty percent have filled out a questionnaire or form online and given out personal information (name, address, date of birth, phone number, or school name).
- Twelve percent have agreed to meet in person with someone they have met online.
- Forty-five percent have told someone they met online personal information, such as their real name, age or date of birth, address, phone number, or school name.
- Sixty-one percent have received pictures from someone online.
- Twenty-three percent have sent pictures to someone that they have met on the Internet.
- Fifteen percent have received suggestive or threatening e-mail messages that have made them feel uncomfortable.
- Three percent have sent suggestive or threatening e-mail messages that have made them feel uncomfortable.
- Thirty percent have been in a chat room where the discussion made them feel uncomfortable.
- Two percent have explored a bomb-building site on the Web.
- Thirty percent have read hateful messages on the Web.
- Fifteen percent have read messages on the Web that have threatened violence.
A vast majority said that their parents had discussed online safety with them (70 percent), with the next-largest percentage representing the number of teenagers who said that their teachers discussed online safety with them (35 percent). And about half the teenagers said that their parents sit with them occasionally when they are surfing, and check their screen occasionally or always, to see where they are surfing. About 60 percent of the teenagers reported that their parents, caretakers, or teachers discuss their online activities always or occasionally. One of the most interesting early correlations we discovered is that teens whose parents spent time surfing with them didn't engage in cybersex, while almost 60 percent of the teenagers in general reported engaging in cybersex (without defining what that means).
Also, 65 percent of the teens reported that their parents haven't installed filtering software, and another 20 percent didn't know if their parents had or not. More than 70 percent said their parents used the Internet at home.
More teens reported using instant messaging most (over 60 percent), with the closest other activity being surfing for new things (at 12 percent). (Only 1.5 percent reporting visiting game sites as what they did most, but a survey of boys probably would have disclosed a much higher percentage of gaming activities.)