Kinder und Medien in der Covid-19-Krise. Österreich im internationalen Vergleich

This article focuses on changes in the lives of children (9 to 13 years) during the first period of the Covid-19 pandemic, particularly their media use. It analyses the Austrian data from the worldwide study “Children, Covid-19 and Media” in comparison to the international data from the same study. The results show that children in Austria were confronted with a number of challenges during this time, ranging from practical to emotional ones. To cope with these challenges, they made use of media, for instance to stay in contact, to manage home schooling, to regulate their mood, or to keep informed. This led to an increase in media usage, making the regulation of media time more important. In this context, parental mediation played a major role. However, children themselves also applied a number of strategies to balance media usage and other activities.