According to the latest research by the British media regulator OFCOM, 86 percent of children between the ages of nine and seventeen spend between four and seven hours a day on the Internet.
This information was announced today, Thursday, by Slavica Trifunović, assistant to the Ministry of Culture and Information, at the conference "Digital Immunity - Media Culture in the Digital Age" in Belgrade.
According to the same survey, 99 percent of children aged three to 17 used social networks last year: 89 percent of them YouTube, and even 50 percent TikTok. A third of parents of five- to seven-year-old children confirmed that their children have profiles on social networks.
The negative impact of excessive use of social media, Trifunović claims, causes changes in the behavior of children and young people and leads to cognitive and emotional problems such as anxiety and attention disorders.
By the way, in Europe, Serbia leads the way in terms of the number of children under the age of 13 who use social networks, the research showed Children of Europe on the Internet conducted two years ago in 19 European countries, the latest on the subject.
A significant number of children, 45 percent, between the ages of 9 and 11 use social networks every day. In Germany, only 11 percent.
At the same time, in Serbia, 60 percent of children and young people never use the Internet for creative purposes, according to the report for Serbia.
Due to the large number of hours that children and young people spend using the Internet, it is thought that they do not read books. However, there is no relevant research in Serbia that would confirm or refute that thesis.
One of the few studies that dealt with the attitude of young people towards reading books, "Youth in Serbia", was conducted by the German Friedrich Ebert Foundation three years ago. The results showed that 29 percent of them often read books, 57 percent do so sometimes, while only 14 percent of young people never read. Among the respondents, a quarter of young people grew up surrounded by a large number of books.
According to research conducted last year by the publishing house "Laguna" in its 50 bookstores across Serbia, young people between the ages of 15 and 30 make up about a third of the total visitors. They are particularly interested in manga (comics and animated books), epic fantasy, screened books, as well as literature that is recommended on social networks.
S.Ć./FoNet/BBC/Danas
Read daily news, analysis, commentary and interviews at www.vreme.com
