Navigating Digital Challenges: The Role of Digital Parenting in Child Protection and Mental Well-being

Digital technologies are evolving in many aspects of children’s life such as in learning methodologies, communication, and social skills which simultaneously increasing their exposure to cyber-social risks such as cyberbullying, online grooming, digital exploitation, privacy breaches, and harmful online content. This conceptual paper examines the role of digital parenting in enhancing child protection and promoting children's mental well-being in the digital era. Through a synthesis of existing literature, the paper integrates three interconnected domains: digital parenting, child protection, and mental well-being. Digital parenting is conceptualized as a multidimensional construct encompassing parental mediation, monitoring, communication, emotional support, guidance, digital literacy, supervision, and collaborative engagement in children's digital activities. Protection Motivation Theory (PMT) is employed to explain how parents' awareness and perceptions of online risks motivate protective behaviors that enhance children's online safety. In addition, Seligman's PERMA framework is adopted to explain how protected and positive digital experiences contribute to children's mental well-being through positive emotions, engagement, relationships, meaning, and accomplishment. The paper proposes a conceptual framework in which effective digital parenting strengthens child protection mechanisms, reducing children's vulnerability to cyber-related harms while fostering resilience, emotional stability, social connectedness, and overall psychological well-being. The framework contributes to the literature by integrating digital parenting, child protection, and mental well-being into a unified model and highlights digital parenting as both a protective and developmental process. The study also supports the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, particularly SDG 3 (Good Health and Well-being), SDG 4 (Quality Education), and SDG 16 (Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions), by promoting children's safety, digital resilience, and positive development in digital environments.

Digital parenting; child protection; mental well-being; cyber-social risks; Protection Motivation Theory (PMT); PERMA framework; SDGs.

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