15% Of Maltese Youth Communicated Online With Adults They Never Met

According to a new report titled ‘Children & The Impact of Technology On Their Wellbeing’, 15.5% of respondents reported communicating online with adults they had never met.

The survey, which collected valid responses from over 1,900 children aged 7 to 15 living in Malta, showed that 8.6% of those who communicated with strangers online arranged face to face meetings.

Younger children were more likely to have arranged such meetings.

Meanwhile, a majority of respondents encountered harmful material, with 68.2% encountering violent content and 61.2% scary or upsetting videos.

50.4% encountered bulling or mean comments, 34.3% content showing harm to others, 21.7% self-harm content, and 17.3% sexually explicit material.

When encountering upsetting material, 52.3% ignored it, 17% felt confused and 13.5% felt curious.

10% felt unaffected by it and 5.8% felt scared. Older adolescents often ignored or were curious about the content.

Help-seeking behaviour was limited: 36.4% said they would tell no one, 36.3% would tell a parent, 18.8% would confide in a friend, and 6.3% would tell a sibling.

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