Digital participation for the next generation

The project contributed with input to those interested in developing interaction design and participatory news media for the online public sphere.

The focus groups discussions and design workshops were valuable methods both for learning more about everyday media use and for participatory design. Thus the project did generate knowledge about media use as well as design ideas.

23 high school students participated. The method consisted of both an interview session and a method of mapping media usage such as practices, attitudes, feelings and ideas using various creative tools to describe a news usage situation and what media channels were included and what interaction was done with media applications and other people. The entire workshop took 2.5-3 hours. The material for analysis thus consisted of five recordings of group discussions on media use and 23 surveys of media consumption documented on what we call "event maps" (A3 templates).

The method of analysis was to qualitatively analyze the material to find 1) patterns of a process for media and news consumption, 2) ideas and themes regarding interaction with news and media content in general 3) understand challenges and opportunities for developing future interaction with media content as would facilitate an engaged citizen and media user online.

The results show a process for news usage, sharing, source review etc. and indicates a picture that young adults are very careful about contributing content in social media. Facebook was the primary source of news consumption in the surveyed group during this period (autumn 2016).