Parents, Privacy Concerns, and Social Media
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2024-07-01
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en
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The term “sharenting” is an emerging phenomenon in the last decade gaining attention from popular news articles to describe a shift in modern parenting. Sharenting refers to parents posting personal details about their children on social media. However, in the last few years, a more recent trend among parents has been exercising extreme caution regarding sharenting. The findings suggest that this is especially evident from the newer generation of parents and enables interdisciplinary theoretical implications for both privacy and sharenting theory. Drawing from privacy theory and adopting the practice theory lens from the Consumer Culture Theory domain, this research provides empirical knowledge into the meanings parents attribute to sharenting. This research addresses key limitations in prior privacy and sharenting literature by including the empirical study of parents’ subjective experiences towards privacy, where privacy is conceptualized as an enacted practice instead of a cognitive concept that only exists in the minds of consumers. Using data from in-depth interviews and netnography, this research identifies a three-phase process illustrating the factors behind parents’ privacy concerns regarding sharenting. The findings show that parents are becoming more aware of the permanence of online content and the dark side of social media (phase 1). This awareness leads to concerns and fears about the impact of sharenting on their children (phase 2), encouraging them to modify their sharenting behavior (phase 3). This study empirically shows that privacy concerns towards sharenting apply to consumer culture contexts. Finally, this study reveals how sharenting is perceived by parents, leading to practical recommendations for policymakers, marketers, and social media companies.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen