"How young people look for information online: A survey of views in six European countries"

Between July 2010 and March 2011, YouthNet worked in partnership with 6 other European youth organisations on a networking project funded by Youth in Action: “European Digital Youth Information Project” (EDYIP).

This was a networking project on the theme of online information for young people. The aim was to share best practice and expertise on this theme, as online information is becoming increasingly important for young people across Europe.

Partners included:
YouthNet (UK)
Cyberhus (Denmark)
Spunout (Ireland)
In Petto (Belgium)
Xarxa Infojove (Spain)
National Coordination and Development Centre of Youth Information and Counselling Services (Finland)
Youth Agora (Belgium)

A part of this project was to carry out some joined-up research across all countries involved. The aim of the research was to provide insights into the issues that young people face when searching for online information in order to inform the development of good practice on how best to reach young people through the internet.

There were many interesting findings. To give you some examples:

- With the exception of English respondents, overall the majority of the young people surveyed were aware of the difficulty of finding accurate information online
- Generally the internet was the most likely source for information on a range of topics, especially on issues such as drugs (an average of 41% across the countries), sex (39%) and to a lesser extent alcohol (35%).
- Spanish respondents were the least actively engaged with the internet, with only 21% of them going online to share their experiences and 17% to give advice
-The main motivation for young people to go online is to look for information for their own use (an average of 81%).
- On average, English and Irish respondents seemed to be more concerned than others about their anonymity when talking about sensitive issues

I am happy to upload the final report here. Please feel free to read and comment!

Best wishes,

Jessamy Gould
YouthNet