This NatCen report provides an overview of available evidence on the risks to children from harmful content and activity on services in scope of the Online Safety Bill. This included a synthesis of evidence on the definition, prevalence and impacts of harmful content and activity, as well as any variation amongst different groups of children.
The review focused on harmful content and activity, the scope of which was guided by the harms listed in the Online Harms White Paper. This included cyberbullying, pornography, violent content, pro-self-harm content, pro-suicide content, and content which could give rise to eating disorders. It also focused on emerging or lesser researched harmful content and activity.
Research that focuses on ‘emerging harms’, such as content and activity that promotes alcohol consumption, dangerous stunts and challenges, and misinformation within scope of this review is limited, and in its infancy. This is largely due to the evolving nature of the harm itself.
The review also identified that the evidence base has several methodological limitations. These limitations includes a lack of consistency in the definition of content and activity being investigated; a lack of consistency in the measurement of prevalence and impact; variable definitions of children and young people; a lack of distinction regarding the platforms under investigation (often exploring children and young people’s use of “social media” or participation in “online spaces” generally); and frequent coverage of illegal content and activity.
Emerging harms, in particular, are in need of much more thorough investigation. Here, there is a need to better understand the mechanisms that lead to content and activity being harmful and impact on different groups of children.