Pandemic Parenting in the Metaverse

• In Event: Dreams for Digital Spaces: What Shapes the Worlds of Children, Educators, and Researchers?

Abstract

A case study of the metaverse as a virtual site of research, this presentation showcases a Mozilla Hub created through an engagement with pandemic parenting data. We invite the audience to immerse themselves in a video walk-through of a virtual gallery and consider the possibilities that arise from expanding what counts as research dissemination.

The pandemic parenting research project, formally known as ‘Children, Media, and Parenting in the COVID-19 Pandemic’ is a transglobal study led by Professor Rebekah Willet from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and supported by the ARC Centre of Excellence for the Digital Child. The project investigated families’ experiences of screen media use during the COVID-19 pandemic. It involved 140 participants who each engaged in an online interview and a collaborative search for an image that resonated with their experiences of the pandemic. The showcase provides an immersive experience of multimodal data in the form of a virtual research exhibit built in Mozilla Hubs. The carefully curated data featured in the exhibit draws out onto-epistemological issues connected with interview methods including what gets lost in transcriptions, interstitial moments, and the affective intensity of online interviews. At the same time, the creation of the Mozilla Hub becomes a method to document and generate new insights into a transnational dataset and create a virtual site for engaging diverse publics. Crucially, it makes it possible for researchers to provide an account of the research to participants who may not be interested in reading academic publications. We argue this is significant because it provides a way to democratise research and elicit critical feedback that crosses geographical and temporal boundaries.

Authors

• Xinyu Zhao, Deakin University
  Presenting Author

• Jessica Laraine Williams, Melbourne Graduate School of Education, The University of Melbourne
  Non-Presenting Author

• Sarah Healy, University of Melbourne
  Non-Presenting Author

• Rebekah Willett, University of Wisconsin - Madison
  Non-Presenting Author