A new study by
Ofcom, the UK regulatory agency, has discovered that a third of UK children believe search engine listings are ranked by their truthfulness.
The UK Children's Media Literacy Report asked a range of minors about their internet use and search engines habits. It was discovered that while 95 per cent of 12-15-year-olds had experience of using websites like Google or Bing, 32 per cent thought listings were ranked on how truthful websites were.
Thirty seven per cent of those asked believed that results were ranked on their usefulness and relevance to the search query, while 14 per cent said that websites paid money to rank highly in natural results.
Some 18 per cent of participants said they didn't how search engines ranked results.
Greg Sterling, contributing editor at Search Engine Land, said the results were interesting, although lacked real exploration in children's attitude towards search engines and SEO.
He said:
"It doesn’t appear there was much detailed questioning around sponsored vs. organic results and definitions or explanations of each category. Consequently it’s not clear to me if the kids are referring to paid results in their statements about relevance or truthfulness."
Minors and social media
The Ofcom report also examined children's use of social media on sites such as Twitter and Facebook. Protecting their data was a strong issue for many of the respondents and 69 per cent of 12-15-year-olds said they restricted who could access their information.
Social sites Facebook, YouTube and Bebo were the sixth, eighth and 48th most popular websites for minors aged six to 11. Google, Google Search, MSN, BBC and Windows Live Messenger were the top five most visited websites for children in this age group.
