Teens’ online and offline lives: how they are experiencing their sociability

Abstract

In a deeply mediatised age that embeds media within everyday life, it is particularly important to examine how digital and online media contribute to teenagers’ sociability. There is a lack of detail around how media impact upon the ways teens communicate and create relationships with others. Based on studies of sociability, teenagers and media, and on the media practices of a sample of Portuguese teenagers, research demonstrates that teenagers’ technology use profoundly mediates sociability. Digital media practices blur the lines between teens’ offline and online experiences, as Floridi predicted when introducing the concept of “onlife”, which frames this chapter.