Section I - Overview

The purpose of this content analysis is to examine the coverage Canadian newspapers assign to issues concerning the Internet and its effects on children and families. The content analysis seeks to provide data in comparison to a recent American study by The Annenberg Public Policy Center on press coverage of the Internet and families. Canada's Children In A Wired World: The Parents' View, is a project of the Media Awareness Network, funded by Industry Canada, Health Canada and HRDC. Data collection was done by Environics Research Group. One of the findings was that of all the parents surveyed, only 15 per cent felt that their views regarding Internet issues are influenced by the media. This tendency increases among less affluent parents and those parents who consider themselves to be Internet beginners.

Generally speaking, messages about the Internet presented by the Canadian press are mixed, although more articles focus on the negative rather than the positive aspects of the Internet.

• Overall, the press presented the Internet as a place where more problems (almost 60 per cent) than benefits (almost 40 per cent) exist.
  
  
• The majority of articles focused on problems such as child pornography (31 per cent), online crime (13 per cent) and pornography in general (13 per cent).
  
  
• The benefits of the Internet described in the articles included educational value (43 per cent), social uses (29 per cent), and e-commerce benefits (17 per cent). Only eight per cent of articles talked about the Internet in terms of recreational use or entertainment.
  
  
• Privacy issues (11 per cent), marketing to children (nine per cent), and hate sites (eight per cent) were other problems mentioned in the articles.
  
  
• Nine per cent of the articles cited health issues as a problem area.
  
  
• Only six per cent of the articles questioned the value of the Internet, examining its use by children and in schools in a critical light.
  
  
• Only ten per cent of the articles provided Internet resource guides or tip sheets for families.
  
  
• Only five per cent of the articles critically looked at Internet use and participation by children and young people in relation to "digital divide" issues.
  
  
• Only two per cent of articles mentioned the lack of francophone content on the Internet as a problem.
  
  
• The articles were most likely to quote industry sources (24 per cent). Educators (15 per cent), youth (13 per cent) and parents (12 per cent) were the most cited non-industry groups. Government, law enforcement and public interest groups were cited equally (nine per cent).
  
  
• Articles were found most often in the news section of the newspaper (43 per cent), while the business section ranked second (16 per cent). Technology supplements (13 per cent) were also a place for articles to be found, and often these were attached to the business sections.