Youth, Citizenship and Media: An Exploration from the Social Representations Perspective

Following the social representations perspective, this paper explores how young people represent citizenship in relation to their media use practices. Four hundred and eighty two students in secondary education completed a free association word task to the stimulus "Citizenship" and provided a self-report questionnaire on their use of different media. The results suggested that the field of representation is organized according to the criteria of inclusion/exclusion. Accessible citizenship is defined by social norms and judicial factors, whereas exclusion is predominantly based on geographical provenance. Media use is linked with the traditional perspective of partisan and monitorial citizens. Surprisingly, internet users shared a conservative representation of citizenship. This study provides public agencies with an insight into promoting young people's active citizenship.