Health, Wellbeing, Creativity and Belief

Do shared digital media experiences enhance children’s learning? - Dr Jamie Lingwood

Young children are increasingly engaging with digital media, from television and online videos to interactive games. Research on global screen time guidelines has found that around 75% of children aged up to two years use some form of digital media daily, and 64% of children aged two to five years use it for more than an hour a day. Although concerns about screen time often dominate public debate, this research shifts the focus toward what happens during screen use rather than simply how long children spend on devices.

Recent research led by Dr. Jamie Lingwood, Senior Lecturer in Psychology, has investigated how adults using digital media with children aged up to six affects children’s ability to learn from digital media. We carried out a meta-analysis, a wide-ranging examination of existing research studies, to identify trends and themes. We found that, overall, parent-child co-use is helpful for supporting young children’s learning from digital media. Adults using digital media together with children can help them understand and relate to the digital content better. Our research chimes with other studies which suggest that, for instance, parents using digital media with children can boost language skills.

The findings challenge deficit narratives around screen time and encourage a more balanced, evidence-based perspective. Crucially, the project demonstrates that the quality of interaction is as important as the quantity of screen use. These insights have informed public engagement activities, including an invited article for The Conversation aimed at helping families navigate digital life in practical, developmentally supportive ways. This case study highlights how research can shape public understanding and contribute to healthier, more informed family media practices, aligning strongly with the University’s aims around wellbeing, community engagement, and impact beyond academia.

Research article: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1747938X2400023X?via%3Dihub 

The Conversation article: https://theconversation.com/if-your-child-is-watching-tv-and-playing-online-games-you-should-do-it-with-them-heres-why-238615

Creativity and Playfulness in Liverpool and beyond - Dr Wing Kai Fung

Play is widely recognized as children’s basic needs and rights. Despite the widespread recognition of the importance of play, its implementation in childhood education and care (ECEC) still faces various obstacles and there is a lack of evidence convincingly demonstrating how play benefits children’s learning and development. As an individual factor governing children’s play styles, playfulness offers us an alternative lens to examine the relationships between children’s play and development from a psychological perspective.

Dr. Wing Kai Fung in the Faculty of Education and Social Sciences has conducted a series of international collaborative research projects with Professor Kevin Kien Hoa Chung of the Education University of Hong Kong. The results were published widely in high quality journals with international standing including Psychology of Aesthetics, Creativity, and the Arts, Journal of Creative Behavior and Thinking Skills and Creativity, demonstrating how playful children can develop better social-emotional competence and creativity, which are two important 21-century skills that enable them to achieve academically and reach fullest potential.

Turning research evidence into impacts for ECEC stakeholders, Dr Fung has secured internal and external fundings to conduct various knowledge exchange activities. In 2022, collaborating with Dr Clionagh Boyle, the team developed and implemented a multi modal toolkit with children in 5 Liverpool children’s centres to understand their perspectives concerning play. In 2023, the team examined parents’ perspective through a survey circulated through the five Liverpool children’s centres. Dr Fung and the Trafford Hongkongers CIC also succeeded in applying for government funding to run a series of children’s play workshops and parental seminars to foster UK BN(O) Hongkongers’ wellbeing, benefitting 60 families in Trafford, Preston, Lancaster, Bury, and Warrington. A Raising Liverpool event was conducted in June 2024 with early years practitioners from the Rainbow Multi Academy Trust and five Liverpool day care centres, informing their daily practice concerning play and creativity.

• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2025a). Interrelationships among parental play support and kindergarten children’s playfulness and creative thinking processes. Thinking Skills and Creativity. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tsc.2025.101907
• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2025b). Playfulness and longitudinal development in creative thinking processes and academic skills among kindergarten children. Journal of Creative Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.70074
• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2024a). Playfulness and Kindergarten Children’s Academic Achievement: Executive Functions and Creative Thinking Processes as Mediators? Journal of Creative Behavior. https://doi.org/10.1002/jocb.654
• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2023a). Overexcitabilities and the Bidirectional Development in Playfulness and Creative Potential among Kindergarten Children. Psychology of Aesthetics Creativity, and the Art. https://doi.org/10.1037/aca0000633
• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2023b). Playfulness as the antecedent of kindergarten children’s social competence and school readiness. European Early Childhood Education Research Journal. https://doi.org/10.1080/1350293X.2023.2200018 
• Fung, W. K., & Chung, K. K. H. (2022). Parental play supportiveness and kindergartners’ peer problems: Children’s playfulness as a potential mediator. Social Development. http://doi.org/10.1111/sode.12603