A tech-savvy generation of children are said to be subverting traditional hierarchies as they take control of elements of home life using smart technology. They might order takeaways through voice assistants like Alexa, get around parental controls, or switch off location tracking on their devices.
Individual families will all have different stories to tell about how they benefit from, or feel challenged by, these changes. That’s why researchers at the Smart Living project are looking for families to take part in a study on how smart technology is changing family dynamics.
The Smart Living project
Initial research on the impact of smart technology focused on individual technologies, with researchers giving people devices and studying their first responses to them, almost like an experiment. The Smart Living project, part of the work going on at the ESRC Centre for Sociodigital Futures (CenSoF) at the University of Bristol, aims to capture the full stories of a diverse range of families that use smart technology every day.
We know that both parents and children have a lot of concerns about the habits certain apps instil. Parents may well be grappling with their own relationship with ‘closing their rings’ on their Apple Watch at the same time as they’re trying to stop their teenagers from feeling pressured by TikTok videos of extreme workouts.
The project is interested in how all this fits together in the domain of everyday family life, as one piece of the puzzle of a sociodigital era in which various claims about the future are being made. Often, hype from big tech companies overlooks the habits, values and desires of ordinary people who actually buy and use their products. These issues are key to CenSoF’s mission to examine who and what is driving sociodigital change.
Get involved
The Smart Living project aims to represent contemporary family life in all its diversity. The research team are looking for families of all backgrounds in the southwest of England where parents/carers live together with their children all or much of the time, with or without partners and other family members, in whatever living arrangement they define as the family home.
Right now, they’re particularly looking for families that actively use a voice assistant like Alexa or Google Home and/or have a family chat group. If this sounds like your family, get in touch with Dr Nicola Horsley at nicola.horsley@bristol.ac.uk to find out more about how you might take part in this exciting study.
Findings from the Smart Living project will be shared with participants, as well as stakeholders in government and the tech industry. They will help uncover the everyday needs of diverse families, who are often overlooked when a shiny new product is designed and put on the market. This research is vital to ensure that real families are recognised and heard at a time when smart home and communication technologies are having a major influence on our culture.