- 10.00 – 10.45: Trial lecture. Title: “Discuss the construction of the child and childhood in public and scientific discourse and analyze the implications of these constructions for research practice, knowledge development, and methodological choices.”.
- 12.00 – 16.00: Public defence
The trial lecture and public defence will also be streamed live:
- Webinar ID: 659 3666 2774
- Passcode: 2026
Ordinary opponents:
- First opponent: Professor Bente Halkier, Department of Sociology, University of Copenhagen, Denmark
- Second opponent: Associate Professor Thomas Enemark Lundtofte, Department of Design, Media and Educational Science, University of Southern Denmark, Denmark
- The chair of the committee: Professor Marit Haldar, Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Social Work, Child Welfare and Social Policy, OsloMet
Leader of the public defence: Dean Laurence Habib, Faculty of Technology, Art and Design, OsloMet
Main supervisor: Anita Borch, SIFO, Centre for Welfare and Labour Research, OsloMet
Co-supervisor: Henry Mainsah, SIFO, Centre for Welfare and Labour Research, OsloMet
Co-supervisor: Mikko Laamanen, SIFO, Centre for Welfare and Labour Research, OsloMet
Abstract
Doing belonging: Children’s sociodigital practices
Belonging has become an increasingly important research topic. Nevertheless, researchers argue that the concept needs further clarification. Young people grow up in a world shaped by digital technologies, where their data is used for commercial purposes in so-called datafication processes. Young people try to find their places in society, to belong and feel at ease. Feeling like they do or do not belong can have a big impact on children’s relationships later in life, which makes children’s sociodigital belonging an important research topic.
To study children’s belonging in their everyday digital lives, I chose the Norwegian capital, Oslo. Many young people use the Internet, making it a high-use case. I pose the following research question: How do children aged 10-13 in Oslo perform belonging in the context of social media platforms?
I interviewed 40 children aged 10-13 in Oslo about their everyday digital lives and conducted three focus group discussions. Talking with children instead of talking about children takes their perspectives and voices seriously. This work is situated between the sociology of childhood, the sociology of consumption, and digital sociology, and the broader fields of interdisciplinary consumption studies, media and communication studies, and childhood studies.
This work consists of three articles. The first article starts with an analysis of the social media trend of shipping (a wordplay on relationship). The second article is about children’s practices to be recognized and seen by their peers to belong, which form their digital economies of dignity. The third article is more theoretical and analyzes how children’s practices are organized by dimensions of practice and which role AI-powered algorithms play.
Contributions
Conceptually, I combine sociological concepts of belonging, as outlined by May (2013) and Pugh (2009), with social practice theories (Shove et al., 2012; Forno et al., 2022). This contributes to a better understanding of how children perform belonging and addresses the earlier call for better conceptualization. I expand Pugh’s (2009) framework to the digital realm, the digital economy of dignity. This dissertation contributes to social practices in the digital realm that have recently gained more attention (Schatzki, 2025; Southerton and Halford, 2025). I do so by:
a. showing how children’s (non)-digital lives are connected
b. highlighting how children’s practices are linked, organized, and held together by practice dimensions
c. exploring the role of AI-powered algorithms (non-human) and their agency in theories of social practice
d. emphasizing the role of digital economies and the role of digital consumption
e. discussing how children’s identities are performed in and as practices
f. reflecting on children’s unique (peer) cultures and how they are linked to society at large.
The policy implications of this work are to consider children’s perspectives and voices for a better understanding of the challenges they face, their social norms, and peer cultures. Children’s experiences can inform policymakers can provide insights into regulatory grey zones, such as the current lack of regulation of user-targeted advertising through recommender systems promotion of influencer marketing.
