Raising risk awareness and changing unsafe behavior on social network sites: a design based research in secondary education

Because of the increasing popularity of social network sites, the meaning of media literacy education has evolved. Indeed, in the 21st century, one of the important aspects of media literacy became to know how to behave safe online. However, most educational packages on the topic of e-safety are developed without any theoretical base (Vanderhoven, Schellens, & Valcke, 2014). Moreover, a systematic review showed that almost none of these packages has been empirically evaluated (Mishna, Cook, Saini, Wu, & MacFadden, 2010). The few evaluation studies that have been done, show that an increase in internet safety knowledge is often obtained, but that changes in unsafe behaviour are much more difficult to achieve (Mishna et al., 2010). As a reaction to these objections, the current research applies a design based research approach (Phillips, McNaught, & Kennedy, 2012; The Design-based Research Collective, 2003) to develop effective e-safety interventions. This methodology bridges theoretical research and educational practice, and has been defined by Wang and Hannafin (2005) as “A systematic but flexible methodology aimed to improve educational practices through iterative analysis, design, development, and implementation, based on collaboration among researchers and practitioners in real world settings, and leading to contextually-sensitive design principles and theories”(p. 6-7). The output of design based research includes not only an increase of theoretical knowledge, but also a societal contribution, such as school programs (Reeves, 2006). In the current research, it was aimed to develop effective educational materials to teach children of secondary education (aged 12 to 19 years) how to behave safe on SNS, that is to increase awareness and to change unsafe attitudes and behaviour. By analysing the practical problem in three studies, developing solutions based on existing knowledge and improving these solutions in 5 iterative cycles of implementation, evaluation (i.e., pretest-posttest quasi experimental studies) and revision, this research results not only in effective practical solutions, but also in a prototheory, describing context-specific design guidelines that can be used by future researchers, practitioners and educational developers.