부산대학교 도서관

Drawing on actor–network theory (ANT) pioneered by sociologists, such as Latour, this study aims to propose a framework for elucidating the relationship between children and digital technologies. The theory employs a methodology that perceives social phenomena as associations between humans and nonhuman elements. Analysis was undertaken using video-recorded vignettes of the daily life of a family consisting of parents and a nine-year-old male child. Analysis focuses on instances in which the subject interacted with a voice recognition technology to turn a ceiling light on. We describe these scenes as collaboration between the digital technology, which considers human voices and ambient sounds as equal inputs for its voice recognition function, and the human counterpart, who could eliminate the electrical supply to the light to interrupt the automatic functioning. The scenes can be described as associated actors assigning a new meaning to each other. Lastly, the study discusses the developmental and psychological implications of delineating these associations between children and digital technologies based on ANT.