Small Screen Technology Use Among Indigenous Boarding School Adolescents from Remote Regions of Western Australia

Abstract

active researcher and her work has appeared in a number of international journals. Her research focuses on studies of second language acquisition including large scale studies on International and Indigenous university students, and on migrant and Aboriginal children acquiring ESL/ESD. Small Screen Technology Use 3 AbstractThe uptake of small screen technology by adolescents is widespread, particularly in industrial nations. Whether the same is true for Australian Aboriginal youth is less clear as there is a dearth of research in this regard. Therefore in this exploratory study the use of small screen technology by Indigenous students was examined. Twenty-four Aboriginal adolescents (mean age 16.4 years) attending a boarding school in a remote region of Western Australia participated in individual and in depth structured interviews that queried their use of: 1) television, 2) video games, 3) computers, 4) the internet, and 5) mobile phones. The results showed that mobile phones were the most frequently used and the most popular (i.e., they were nominated as first choice in a hypothetical scenario), followed by the internet, whereas television, video games and computers were used less often. It did appear that mobile phones were used by participating Aboriginal adolescents in ways similar to non-Indigenous adolescents (e.g., not only to make phone calls, but also to send text messages and access the internet). However, their mobile phone use did reflect differences based on their cultural values and identity and also reflecting their physical distance from their family (i.e., because of their enrolment at a boarding school). This study supports anecdotal evidence of a rapid up-take of mobile phones by Indigenous adolescents. It also suggests that as the small screen technology of choice, they have the potential to be utilized for educational opportunities. (Gentile, Choo, Liau, Sim, Li, et al., 2011). Almost half of British teenagers (47%) own a smartphone with more than half of these having acquired one during the past year (Ofcom, 2011). This rise in ownership and use of smart phones is particularly noteworthy: in recent times the cost of mobile phones has made them accessible to adolescents from a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds (Hampton, 2010;Jansen, 2010;Smith, 2012;Wei & Blanks Hindman, 2011). Thus the aim of this study is to provide a description of patterns of use and perceptions of small screen technology among Indigenous adolescents in remote regions of Australia as this will assist our understanding of the effect of improved digital infrastructure. In particular, this study explores their television viewing, video gaming, use of computers with and without internet connectivity and mobile phone use. It also examines whether patterns of small screen technology use are related to Indigenous adolescent age and gender. MethodCollecting data from Indigenous Australian adolescents can be difficult because the population is transient and obtaining parental permission for children to participate in res...