AVG’s Digital Diaries is a comprehensive study, which looks at how children of different ages are interacting with technology, how this is affecting their childhood, and the broader implications of this social shift. 

Here, we focus specifically on behavior trends amongst children aged between 0 and 9 year olds.

AVG’s Digital Diaries research unearths the following key findings:

Digital Birth: 0-2 years old

• A child is digitally ‘born’ on average at the sixth month of pregnancy: Nearly a quarter of children are actually 'born online' first, as a result of parents uploading baby scans onto their social media profiles.

Digital Skills: 2-5 years old

• More small children can play a computer game than ride a bike:  58 percent of children aged 2-5 know how to play a ‘basic’ computer game. Of this same age group, more kids can play with a smartphone app (19 percent) than tie their shoelaces (9 percent).

Digital Playground: 6-9 years old

• Nearly half of 6-9 year olds talk to their friends using the Internet. 58 percent of parents admit they don’t understand their children’s social networks. Only just over half of parents surveyed were certain their family computer has parental controls in place.

For each phase of this research, over 2,000 parents with Internet access were surveyed in the US, UK, Canada, France, Czech Republic Germany, Spain, Japan, Australia and New Zealand.

The next instalment of Digital Diaries research, which will draw on older children and teenagers aged between ten and 17, will be posted on AVG’s Featured Wall next week.

For more information on the different stages of Digital Diaries research, visit: http://www.avgdigitaldiaries.com/