November 4, 2025
Time:
6:00 PM
VC Faculty Lounge, Academic Block, LUMS
The Saida Waheed Gender Initiative (SWGI) is pleased to announce Beyond Screen Time: Mother–Child Digital Interaction and Gendered Caregiving, an insightful talk by Dr. Neelma Bhatti.
Screen-based media and devices (SMDs) are now deeply woven into the fabric of family life, often shaping children’s experiences before their first birthday. For many families, SMDs have become an essential part of parenting practices. This talk explores the gendered dimensions of parenting in the digital age, drawing on cross-continental research with caregivers of young children in Pakistan and the United States.
Focusing on mothers as brokers of technology use, the talk introduces the concept of Value-Driven SMD Use—how mothers navigate, appropriate, and resist digital technologies as part of their caregiving repertoire. It examines how mothers use digital childcare tools and how technology acts as a value-added service, enhancing their caregiving capacities while reflecting broader social expectations around motherhood.
By exploring mothers’ preferences for different platforms and content, and highlighting how these preferences are shaped by cultural values, family norms, and local media ecologies, the talk moves beyond simplistic notions of “screen time.” It instead situates mother–child interactions with SMDs within the broader context of gendered caregiving, revealing how mothers’ digital choices both facilitate and complicate emotional and social connections with their children.
About the Speaker:
Dr. Neelma Bhatti is a Visiting Assistant Professor of Computer Science at Habib University’s Dhanani School of Science and Engineering. A Fulbright scholar with a PhD in Human–Computer Interaction from Virginia Tech, she has over a decade of research and teaching experience in the US and Pakistan, investigating how families use technology for caregiving and early childhood learning. Her work focuses on Parent–Child Computer Interaction (PCCI) and the design of culturally grounded, developmentally supportive experiences with technology, with particular attention to multilingual and cross-cultural settings.
This event is open to all. External participants are requested to email their full name and CNIC numbers to gender@lums.edu.pk and bring their original ID cards on the day of the event for entry.
We look forward to your participation!
