Parenting, Studying and Working at Home in a Foreign Country: How International Student Mothers in the US Use Screen Media For and With Their Young Children

Abstract

The struggle to thrive as a productive student researcher, an attentive parent, and a caring partner can be difficult, particularly for international student parents who are far from home and also possibly burdened with complex cultural expectations, interpersonal dynamics, and institutional biases. Using uses and gratifications theory as a framing mechanism, we describe interviews with twelve international student mothers in the United States who are primary caregivers of children between six months to five years old, focusing on the context of their use of screen media content and devices, the gratifications they seek from their children's use of screen media devices, and the differences in their perceptions about the use of screen media as an educated, non-US parent. Our findings give an initial account of the role of screen based technology in their domestic life with young children, and the limitations of their technological experience. We present four opportunities for designing for this population including technologies for positive distraction, interactive language aids, playful acquaintance tools, and anonymous peer networks for parent support. We conclude by formulating future promising avenues of research in this design space.

Integrating Social Media into the Design Process

“…Social media has become a ubiquitous part of our daily lives. People use social media to communicate with others beyond geographical borders [5], share information, form networks of relationships, discuss common interests [11], and express their opinions. Hence, there is a lot of information from various demographics with different perspectives worldwide on social media platforms.…”