GUEST EDITORIAL TEAM
Prof Helena Sandberg, University of Lund, Sweden
Prof Olu Jenzen, University of Southampton, UK
Dr Tessa Lewin, IDS, University of Sussex, UK
BACKGROUND
Recent developments aimed at restricting children’s access to digital and social media across the globe, including Australia, Europe, China, and some parts of the US for example, open upquestions about the social constructions of childhood. Such policy changes have a direct and, in some cases, profound impact on children’s life experiences and abilities to exercise their
rights in the digital environment, including engaging in public life and seeking information, and their rights to culture, leisure and play, to mention a few. In response to these developments and calls for more child-centric research, we propose a Global Studies ofChildhood themed issue on ‘Children as rights holders in the digital world’. Digital and social media use is almost ubiquitous among teenagers. Nearly all US teens (96%) report using the Internet daily (Faverio and Sidoti 2024), and globally approximately 30% of
Internet users are children, with an even higher proportion of child users estimated in the Global South (Ghai et al. 2022). Young people continue to make up the highest proportion of social media users.
In Sub-Saharan Africa, children make up the majority of mobile users, although digital media use and access to devices among children and youth vary significantly across diverse settings. We also see increasing use of smartphones and tablets in early childhood globally, and although the use of social media is still limited among toddlers and preschoolers (0-4 years
old) 16% of Swedish children aged 5-8 see their friends online regularly (Andersson 2023:9).
In their annual study of children’s relationship with the media and online worlds, Ofcom (2024) recently reported that use of social media and apps among 5-7-year-olds in the UK has increased year-on-year. For many children, measures such as lockdowns and school closures, introduced during the COVID-19 pandemic, meant that even more of their daily lives moved online.
Recent Developments and Children’s Digital Worlds
Recent public debate across several international settings focuses predominantly on the risks and perceived harms associated with children’s digital screen and social media use. Governments and policymakers have advocated for implementing new age restrictions and other restrictive measures, such as restricting children’s use of smartphones. Most social media platforms require users to be 13 or older to have a user account. However, age limits are regulated differently across different countries, and recently, we have seen some rollback of younger teenagers’ access to social media, such as Australia’s social media ban for under 16-year-olds; France’s lobbying for an EU-wide policy, modelled on French law, requiring parental authorisation for children under 15 to use a social network service; mirrored by a similar call for a 15+ age limit by Denmark’s Prime Minister; Instagram’s introduction of a ‘teen’ (parental control) version in the UK; and several other countries implementing restrictions aimed at limiting social media use for teenagers under 16 (Livingstone and
Sylwander 2025). The Australian social media ban is seen as a test case keenly observed across the globe by those actors seeking to advocate for regulatory interventions.
Accountability in a highly commercialised online environment is paramount, and making social media platforms, apps, and other online services more responsible for user safety is important. Policies aimed at strengthening children’s rights in online environments concerning datafication, privacy, and consent are positive developments. However, debates
on the ‘banning of’ or introducing new restrictions to children’s access to digital and social media are dominated by deficit approaches and relatively narrow protectionist perspectives, with the view to protect children from various harms and risks, either as mediated through social media platforms (e.g., bullying, exploitation, ideological influencing) or as associated
with the use of devices (e.g., screen time) or the techno-social dimension of platforms (e.g., ‘addiction’, social pressures). Increasingly, evidence is emerging on how simplistic approaches to limiting children’s time spent on screen-based media have proven ineffective. However, more importantly, little attention has been given to the impact on groups of marginalised
children and young people for whom the digital connections offered by social media and other internet-based platforms are vital. The impact of restrictive approaches, for example, on refugee and migrant young people, LGBTQ+ children, and children with disabilities, as well as other invisibilised groups (Jordan and Prendella 2019), is not greatly understood and notably absent from both policy and public discourse. Furthermore, little attention has been given to
the role of digital and social media in children’s political discourse and civic participation, which may be impinged upon following rollback measures.
Why a themed issue on children as rights holders in the digital world
This themed issue addresses a significant yet underexplored aspect of children’s digital cultures and online experiences, which the debates outlined above have brought into focus: that across scholarship (Lundy and McEvoy 2011), policy and public discourse, children’s rights perspectives are not sufficiently considered. To do so requires interdisciplinary approaches, not limited to techno-social or psychological concerns. Considering children as diverse and rights-holding users of digital and social media will be of increased importance in light of the evolving role of AI in society and children’s lives. Many digital inequalities affect children, and with digital research dominated by majority and mainstream representations, a children’s rights perspective may be leveraged to address inequalities and redress the under-representation of those child populations. It may also present a vital and novel avenue for strength-based approaches to children’s digital practices.
The kinds of questions and topics we invite contributions to
We invite theoretical and empirical contributions addressing children as rights holders in relation to—but not limited to—their rights to development, identity, maintaining personal relationships and contact with parents, freely expressing their views on matters that concern them, and seeking, receiving, and imparting information and ideas of all kinds through any
media. Additionally, we welcome discussions on their rights to association and assembly, culture, leisure and play, as well as access to information and materials from diverse sources, particularly those promoting social, spiritual, and moral well-being, as well as physical and mental health. These aspects are especially relevant in how they intersect with and shape
children’s experiences in digital culture and social media.
Potential contributions could respond to what consequences policy-based restrictions or algorithmic steering of content have on diverse children and their rights. We also invite critical and human-centred (child-centric) approaches to children’s lived experiences (including but not limited to having their activities tracked, harvested for data, and monetised) in relation
to the child as a rights holder. Contributions may also explore how children’s participation in decision-making, knowledge production (incl. research) and policy development can produce different outcomes than a focus on controls and monitoring. We would seek contributions from different contexts and geographical settings.
POTENTIAL RESEARCH QUESTIONS
• What consequences do policy-based restrictions or algorithmic steering of content have on diverse children’s digital lives and their rights?
• How can children’s rights support children’s digital civic engagement?
• How do children understand, experience and voice their opinions on surveillance and tracking technologies and/or the harvesting and monetisation of their data?
• How will AI impact child rights and how can child rights be considered in AI
development?
• How do children engage in issues around their future with AI and how will children’s
voices be incorporated?
• How are children’s interests and desires informing technology development?
• How do children mobilise and use digital media for social change or become activists to promote issues they care about?
• How can invisibilized children be considered and included in decision-making and knowledge production?
• What does children’s creative use of digital media look like?
• How do children build digital cultures and communities?
KEYWORDS AND TOPICS
We welcome submissions adjacent to (but not limited to) the following thematic areas:
● Digital childhoods
● Social media
● Media regulation and policy
● Digital media industry
● Datafication, tracking and privacy issues
● Social media, child labour and the commodification of childhood
● Children’s digital culture and community building
● Rights, participation, citizenship, and activism
● Access to information
● Gender and sexuality
● Ableism and health inequalities
● Help seeking
● Catastrophes and preparedness
● Migrant children’s use of digital media
● Ethnic minority children
● Social class
● Urban and rural childhoods
● Digital exclusion and poverty
● Creativity, art, music and play
● School, leisure and family life
● Children as researchers and research with children
● Methodologies and ethics in researching digital childhoods
We welcome contributions from both academic and non-academic authors. Academic papers up to 6,000 words (excluding references) and other work up to 3,000 words are considered.
EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST
Please email an abstract of 500 words (250 words for non-academic work) and a short bio of each author to guest editors by September 30th at gscspecialissue@gmail.com
Please feel free to direct any queries to the editorial team: gscspecialissue@gmail.com
TIMELINE
Abstracts Due: 30 September 2025
Invitations to submit full papers will be sent by: 30 November 2025
First Draft Due: 15 March 2026
Themed Issue editors review and provide feedback to authors: 15 June 2026
Authors submit articles to Global Studies of Childhood: 15 September 2026
Peer review and revisions: September 2026 – November 2026
Feedback / Acceptance November 15 2026
Anticipated submission date for the Themed Issue: 15 March 2027
Please Note: all accepted articles can be published online first with SAGE Journals and provide authors with an accepted reviewed paper at that time with all scholarly attributes awarded.
REFERENCES
Andersson, Y. 2023. Småungar & Medier. Statens Medieråd. https://mediemyndigheten.se/globalassets/rapporter-och analyser/ungar-och- medier/smaungar-och-medier-2023_anpassad.pdf
Faverio, M. and Sidoti, O. 2024. Teens, Social Media and Technology 2024, Pew Research Center. https://www.pewresearch.org/wp-content/uploads/sites/20/2024/12/PI_2024.12.12_Teens-Social-Media-Tech_REPORT.pdf
Ghai, S. et al. 2022. Social media and adolescent well-being in the Global South, Current Opinion in Psychology, 46:101318
Jordan, A. and Prendella, K. 2019. The invisible children of media research, Journal of Children and Media, 13(2), 235-240.
Livingstone, S. and Sylwander, K.R. 2025. There is no right age! The search for age-appropriate ways to support children’s digital lives and rights, Journal of Children and Media, DOI: 10.1080/17482798.2024.2435015
Lundy, L. and McEvoy, L. 2011. Children’s rights and research processes: Assisting children to (in)formed views. Childhood, 19(1), 129-144.
Ofcom. 2024. Children’s Media Lives 2024. https://www.ofcom.org.uk/siteassets/resources/documents/research-and-data/media-literacy-research/children/children-media-use-and-attitudes-2024/childrens-media-lives-2024-summary-report.pdf?v=367549