Cooperation, combat, or competence building : what do we mean when we are ‘empowering children’ in and through digital technology design?

Abstract

<div lang="en" class="abs"><p class="abs_header">Abstract</p><p>This paper contributes by offering a refined understanding of what empowerment means in today’s digital technology design context. Research on children and digital technology design often calls for children’s empowerment, while little attention has been paid to discussing what empowerment of children really means. Information Systems research offers useful points of departure for scrutinizing the concept. We maintain that also Information Systems researchers and practitioners should see empowering of children in digital technology design as one of their tasks, while we also show that this empowerment can be achieved in a variety of ways. Our results bear relevance to the concept of empowerment in more general, not only regarding children.</p></div>