Screen Rites: a study of Swedish young people´s use and meaning-making of screen-based media in everyday life

Abstract: We are all aware of how many different media have become a familiar equipment in the home, perceived as any other furnityre. The media have become more or less unconsciously intertwined in everyday routines. As the media environment is continously in a phase of transformation, it is crucial to gain knowledge about children´s and adolescents´own understanding and interpretation of their mediarelated practices and how media use is integrated in everyday life. The author discusses Swedish young people´s use, perception, and meaning-making of the screen-based media - televison and computer (in terms of computer games and Internet) - in the circumplex of day-to-day mediated and non-mediated events in their leisure time. The research focus of the thesis is placed on the home per se, as this is the place where young people have most of their media activities. For computer games the ages 8/9 and 12/13 are considered, while the age groups 12/13 and 15/16 are of interest for television and Internet.