Digital Media Privacy Literacy Training

The Effects of Digital Media Privacy Literacy Education on Children's Autonomy, Decision-making and Privacy Awareness

The purpose of this randomized controlled experimental study is to evaluate the effects of digital privacy literacy education on children's autonomy, decision-making and privacy awareness.The hypotheses of the study are as follows; H1a: Digital privacy literacy education has an effect on children's autonomy. H1b: Digital privacy literacy education has an effect on children's decision-making.

H1c: Digital privacy literacy education has an effect on children's privacy awareness.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Autonomy; Student; Digital Health Literacy
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: Education

Detailed Description

The research will be conducted with 4th grade students (9-12 years old) who are receiving education in a primary school affiliated to Ağrı Provincial Directorate of National Education and who meet the inclusion criteria. Students will be divided into 2 groups as experimental and control groups by simple random method. Digital environment privacy literacy training will be provided to the experimental group, while no training will be provided to the control group. Data will be collected using "Child Information Form", "Autonomy Survey" and "Primary School Students' Privacy Consciousness Scale".

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 184
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• Turkey
  • Erzurum, Turkey
    • Ataturk University

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: Child
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: Yes

Description

Inclusion Criteria

• Being in the 4th grade of primary school
• Not being an inclusive student
• Parent's written consent to participate in the research
• Child's verbal consent to participate in the research

Exclusion Criteria

• Child/parent wants to leave the study at any stage
• Child does not attend the training sessions 2 or more times
• Child does not complete at least one of the pre-test and post-test data collection tools

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Health Services Research
• Allocation: Randomized
• Interventional Model: Parallel Assignment
• Masking: Single

Number of Arms

2

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm	Intervention / Treatment
Experimental: Education; Digital privacy literacy training will be provided in 8 sessions over a 12-week period.	Behavioral: Education; Students will be provided with digital privacy literacy training designed using the puzzle method, which will consist of 8 sessions over a 12-week period.
No Intervention: Control; No educational intervention

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Autonomy Survey	The survey was developed to determine the level of autonomy of 4th and 5th grade primary school students. The autonomy survey consists of 2 sections. The first section contains 20 items regarding children's decisional autonomy. The second section contains 19 items regarding children's behavioral autonomy. The survey is a four-point Likert-type scale and is scored as never: 1, sometimes: 2, often: 3, always: 4. There are no reverse-coded items in the survey. All items in the survey are collected according to their sections to measure the relevant autonomy. As the total score obtained from the survey increases, the level of autonomy also increases. Researchers found the Cronbach-Alpha internal consistency coefficient of the survey as .84. In this study, the first section of the autonomy survey, decisional autonomy, was used. Scores between 20 and 80 are obtained from this section.	1 weeks
Privacy Awareness Scale of Primary School Students	It was developed to determine the level of privacy awareness of primary school 3rd and 4th grade students. The scale consists of 4 factors and 16 items. These factors are; Personal Security, Sharing of Personal Information, Social Media Privacy, Parental Control. The scale is a 3-point Likert type and is scored as disagree: 1, undecided: 2, agree: 3. There are 2 reverse items in the scale (items 7 and 13). The score that can be obtained from the scale varies between 16 and 48 points. The sub-factors and total score in the scale are obtained by adding the item scores.	1 weeks
Introductory Information Form	The introductory information form, which was created by the researcher by scanning the relevant literature, consists of a total of 9 questions regarding the student's age, gender, mother's education level, father's education level, socioeconomic status, who owns the digital device he/she uses to access the internet, the frequency of use of digital devices, the purpose for which he/she uses the internet, and whether he/she has a social media account.	1 weeks

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Autonomy survey	The survey was developed to determine the level of autonomy of 4th and 5th grade primary school students. The autonomy survey consists of 2 sections. The first section contains 20 items regarding children's decisional autonomy. The second section contains 19 items regarding children's behavioral autonomy. The survey is a four-point Likert-type scale and is scored as never: 1, sometimes: 2, often: 3, always: 4. There are no reverse-coded items in the survey. All items in the survey are collected according to their sections to measure the relevant autonomy. As the total score obtained from the survey increases, the level of autonomy also increases. Researchers found the Cronbach-Alpha internal consistency coefficient of the survey as .84. In this study, the first section of the autonomy survey, decisional autonomy, was used. Scores between 20 and 80 are obtained from this section.	12 weeks
Privacy Awareness Scale of Primary School Students	It was developed to determine the level of privacy awareness of primary school 3rd and 4th grade students. The scale consists of 4 factors and 16 items. These factors are; Personal Security, Sharing of Personal Information, Social Media Privacy, Parental Control. The scale is a 3-point Likert type and is scored as disagree: 1, undecided: 2, agree: 3. There are 2 reverse items in the scale (items 7 and 13). The score that can be obtained from the scale varies between 16 and 48 points. The sub-factors and total score in the scale are obtained by adding the item scores.	12 weeks

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: Ataturk University
• Collaborators: Scientific Research Fund of Atatürk University
• Investigators: Study Director: Türkan Kadiroğlu, PhD, Ataturk University

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): October 10, 2024
• Primary Completion (Actual): December 20, 2024
• Study Completion (Actual): December 20, 2024

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: March 14, 2025
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: March 14, 2025
• First Posted (Actual): March 20, 2025

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): June 18, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: June 16, 2025
• Last Verified: June 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: children; decision making; autonomy; digital privacy literacy; privacy awareness
• Other Study ID Numbers: AtaturkU-RY-1

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No
• product manufactured in and exported from the U.S.: No