Abstract

Digitalization, in the form of ubiquitous media and communication technologies at home, is forcing families with children to face an increasing number of choices regarding how they spend time together. The new combinations of people’s embodied presence and digital worlds are altering family interactions and collective family time in the home, including the socialization of children. This chapter investigates the manifestations of these new ways of being together under the social contract the authors call ‘together individually’. According to this contract, joint social time at home is complemented with ICT and digital content by mutual consent. Using selected instances recorded from videotaped family interactions involving the use of ICT at home, the authors analyse the new ways of spending time together individually and the ways in which children are being socialized according to this contract.