About the project

The DigiLitA projects aims to provide scientific answers to questions about the specific circumstances of growing up during middle childhood in the contemporary world, as well as the effect of environmental factors on children’s wellbeing, measured as life satisfaction, executive functions, academic achievement, physical and mental health (Newland, 2015). To the best of our knowledge, there are no such studies in Croatia.

While recent studies continue to point to the trend of prolonged us of digital technology among children (Ofcom, 2023) there is still a lack of consensus regarding the relationship between digital technology use and different well-being indicators. For example, while some studies show that there is a positive relationship between digital technology use and development of prereading skills and literacy (Castles, 2013; Flewitt et al., 2014)., some studies point to a negative relationship (Kotrla Topić et al., 2020), and in some studies more digital technology use in middle childhood is also related to obesity, sleep problems and depression (Strasburger et al., 2010), lower health assessments (Perković Kovačević et al., 2019) and weaker observed self-regulation (Munzer et al., 2018). To researchers, the increase in digital technology use in children during middle childhood is interesting in relation to increased concerns regarding neglection of other, more “traditional” games and activities due to digital technology use.

One set of such activities is regarding nurturing literacy environment in children’s lives through joint book reading, library visits, buying books etc. and the other set of activities is engaging in physical activity, sports activities and playing outside. As for the importance of literacy environment, studies point to a positive relationship between literacy environment and vocabulary development in middle childhood (McNally et al., 2023; Sénéchal & LeFevre, 2002), with emergent literacy and children's language, reading, and spelling achievement (Duursma et al., 2008; Kotrla Topić et al., 2020; Mol & Bus, 2011), as well as with later academic achievement (Shahaeian et al., 2018), which is considered as important predictor of well-being and mental health. Some aspects of literary environment are related to children’s cognitive development (Kalb & Van Ours, 2013), with joint reading of parents and children activating brain areas for understanding mental imagery and narrative comprehension (Hutton et al., 2015). Finally, when it comes to physical activity and neuromotor maturity, studies show that a significant percentage of children in schools shows undeveloped motor skills and postural instability (Goodard Blythe, 2005), which are often a result of prolonged primitive reflexes. Research points to a direct relationship between immature motor skills and academic achievement, as well as between practicing sports and better executive functions in children (Montalva et al., 2022). Furthermore, studies show that there is a negative relationship between smartphone use and graphomotor skills in preschool children (Kotrla Topić et al., 2019), which can lead to poorer academic achievement and have a negative effect on children’s wellbeing.

Based on all this, we feel there is a need for further investigation of digital environment in middle childhood, but with respect to other environments, such as digital literacy environment and an environment that encourages physical activity, which enables us to identify the unique contribution of digital technology use in predicting children’s well-being. Beside the scientific contribution, the DigiLitA project aims to raise awareness about the importance of adequate use of digital technology in middle childhood, as well as importance of literacy environment and physical activity for the well-being of children. This project aims to develop guidelines for parents and educators, as well as interdisciplinary teams of experts.

The project consists of three independent studies that, using different methodologies and samples of participants, attempt to empirically verify a conceptual model of the possible effects and mechanisms of influence of children's digital environment on their well-being, by simultaneously considering other characteristics of their environment, such as a literacy environment and an environment that encourages physical activity. Thus, the studies are conceptualized to enable the determination of unique contributions of using DT in predicting children's well-being.

The creation of the environmental factors in middle childhood depends on the parents, therefore the first study (S1) uses qualitative methodology to examine the perception and attitudes of parents regarding the creation of the developmental environment.

The second, longitudinal study (S2) with three measurement points over two years, examines the possibility of predicting different indicators of child well-being based on different environmental factors. The participants are first-grade children who are individually assessed at the start of the first grade and the end of the first and second grades of elementary school, while their parents use questionnaires to provide various assessments of the children's well-being and information on environmental factors.

Finally, the third study (S3) is a questionnaire study to check the same constructs, but on a larger sample of parents of children with normal development and children with special needs.