Development and Validation of the Parental Media Motivations (MEMO) Scales for Child and Parent Media Use in the United States.

Abstract

Parental motivations for their own and their child's media use may shape the quality of media experiences and ultimately child development and family well-being. However, validated scales are lacking. The current paper describes scale development and validation of the Media Motivations for Child (MEMO-C) and Parent (MEMO-P) in 501 parents with young children (2-5 years old). The MEMO-C measures motivations for children's media use, while the MEMO-P measures motivations for parents' own use, emphasizing parents' regulatory and relational goals. Each scale had a three-factor structure (MEMO-C: Regulate, Occupy, Connect; MEMO-P: Regulate, Relax Alone, Connect). These factors demonstrated strong psychometric properties including high reliability, convergent validity, and incremental validity, uniquely predicting child- and parent-related constructs. By measuring parental media motivations through a regulatory and relational lens, these scales enable researchers to more closely examine how family media use is associated with child development and family members' well-being.