Hi dad, welcome to Facebook : how the intimacy of a parent-child relationship is affected when both are users of Facebook.

Abstract

This exploratory study investigates how the intimacy of a parent-child relationship would be influenced via communication on Facebook. It also examines how Facebook would influence the way both parent and child interact with each other. 17 parent-child pairs were interviewed. Parent and child were interviewed separately. Findings reveal that intimacy was positively affected by factors such as a new range of common topics, mutual engagement of activities, online disclosure of information, as well as opportunities to communicate affection. Parent and child related to each other positively because of a deeper mutual trust, a connection of the two generations, equality, as well as a lack of policing behaviour by parents. Two new predictors of intimacy, online disclosure and transparency, were proposed. This led to a new perspective of intimacy, in that intimacy can still increase even in the absence of physical interaction between parent and child. Facebook was found to be a useful tool for parents to keep in touch with their children’s life without intruding on their privacy. Overall, findings suggest that the internet has become a new way for families to connect with each other as well as spend time together. The cues filtered out approach from the field of computer-mediated communication (CMC) explains how Facebook promotes a positive development of a parent-child relationship. The lack of nonverbal cues takes away feelings of awkwardness and facilitates communication of affection. This study further proposes that the equalization phenomenon can be applied to a parent-child relationship, and can be used to explain how communication on Facebook results in equality in the relationship. This is because the lack of social status cues propels both parent and child to communicate with each other as equal-leveled individuals on Facebook. This improves their relationship.