Parents’ discursive constructions of digital play during the COVID-19 pandemic

This article analyzes parents’ discursive constructions of their children’s digital free play during the COVID-19 pandemic. Drawing on interviews in the United States with 21 parents who had children ages four to 11, the article first identifies characteristics of play that are evident in parents’ descriptions of their children’s digital play. These characteristics indicate parents’ shifting understanding of digital play under the conditions of the pandemic, particularly ways digital play responded to the social and emotional needs of their children. The analytic discussion which follows complicates two dominant discourses parents employ: digital play as social and safe, and digital play as less valuable than non-digital play. The analysis indicates that during the pandemic, parents considered risks and benefits of children’s digital play, and they resisted characterizing digital play as either positive or negative. Moving beyond binary characterizations assuaged parents’ feelings of guilt about time spent on screens, which was particularly important in the pandemic context. However, parents also drew on dominant discourses that favor non-digital play, unsurprisingly given the amount of screen time families experienced during the pandemic. This highlights the importance of analyzing data within relational contexts.