The Archive & The Studio

What happens when the technologies designed to keep children safe also change the way families care for and relate to one another?

Jun Zhao from the London School of Economics explores family surveillance and the ways technology mediates relationships between adults and children. Using a qualitative and multi-method approach, Jun combines interviews, video recordings, and ethnographic observations to examine how children aged 8–12 respond to being monitored through home camera technologies.

Her work investigates how wider public conversations around technology influence its use within the home, and how these technologies shape everyday family dynamics and care practices.

The conversation also explores the broader social implications of digital surveillance, including different forms of caregiving such as solo parenting and transnational care arrangements in China.

Jun reflects on the methodological challenges of researching intimate family spaces and her hopes that the project will encourage greater awareness of how technology influences real-life relationships and experiences of care.

This is a Research Podcasts production. 

You can access a transcript of this conversation here.

Episode Credits:

Presenter and Producer: Catherine McDonald, Research Podcasts

Guests: Jun Zhao, London School of Economics and Political Science

Editor: Anton Jarvis, Research Podcasts

Music: Podcast Interview Intro Music by Dmitrii Spis, Pixabay