YouTube is the platform preferred by teenagers for learn all sorts of things, from learning to play guitar how to solve math equations. This is revealed by a study led by the Communication professor at the Pompeu Fabra University (UPF) in Barcelona, Carlos Scolari.
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In addition, the study underlines that there teens using videos as tutorials “to resolve difficulties with a computer program or when they don’t know how to use software”.
The work, in which researchers from the University of Barcelona (UB) and the Autonomous University of Barcelona (UAB) have also participated, has determined that thevideo platform It is the most used by adolescents who also use it as leisure option.
“I learn more math on YouTube than at school, because you can repeat the video as many times as you want”, affirms one of the students who has participated in the study, which has surveyed young people from 11 to 19 years old. Zack, for example, explains that he searches on YouTube ” the specific issue I’m having in the game and click on whatever comes up first.
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YouTube use reveals new learning trends among young people
“These examples show the learning trends among the new generationsin which free platforms, instructive and filled with diverse content, such as YouTube, are fundamental in their learning processes”, according to the authors of the study, which is published in the journal ‘Convergence’.
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“There is a learning trend among the new generations, where free, instructive platforms filled with diverse content are essential in learning processes”, highlight the authors of the work, which has observed that gender roles and stereotypes persist in the habits of use, consumption and production of media content by adolescents.
The work has determined three specific areas of interest for the YouTube platform: such as using YouTube to study for examsmeet new school-related subjects and understand content covered in class.
Another area is video game learning or the development of technological knowledge imitating the steps of a tutorial to pass a level in a video game or find a solution to a computer problem. And the third area detected is YouTube as a form of cultural expression linked to leisure.
The study ensures that users come to this platform to learning about crafts, cooking, or playing instrumentsamong many other similar topics and that they do it for “the ease of users to imitate and learn through repetition”.
It also helps that it is a platform to which any user can upload content of all kinds.
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Stereotypes on YouTube: Men in video games, women, beauty and books
The study confirmed the existence of a sphere for male use and another for female use, and specifically on YouTube has detected that some learning areas and environments are predominantly masculine and others feminine.
For example, thevideo game area is a masculinized space in which the presence of girls is exceptional, the opposite of the field of beauty or videos about bookswhere they have a practically hegemonicwith some exceptions in sports and music.
The researchers now want to expand their study by considering the conditioning of the use of YouTube according to social class, which would explain the increase in users who cannot pay for private classes or non-curricular training.
