Date of Award:

8-2026

Document Type:

Dissertation

Degree Name:

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD)

Department:

Computer Science

Committee Chair(s)

Mahdi Nasrullah Al-Ameen

Committee

Mahdi Nasrullah Al-Ameen

Committee

Shuhan Yuan

Committee

Steve Petruzza

Committee

Shah Muhammad Hamdi

Committee

Kelli Munns

Abstract

As children and teenagers spend increasingly more time online, digital devices have become a major source of family friction. Disagreements frequently arise over privacy boundaries, and online activities. When these conflicts are unresolved, they often lead to broken trust and secretive behavior, leaving children vulnerable to digital harms like cyberbullying, toxic content, or account hacking. Therefore, it is important to create a safe and open environment for children where in order for them to share their feelings with parents. This dissertation investigates the human and technological dynamics of parent-child interactions, developing new ways to support collaborative conflict resolution and online safety through four distinct research phases. The first phase explores how to empower young children with digital safety skills. By using relatable digital storytelling, this research shows how abstract concepts like password security can be transformed into engaging, everyday habits. The second phase investigates how parents and teenagers conceptualize a “safe space”, and highlights the communication gap between a parent’s intent and a teen’s need for privacy, identifying the mechanisms required to facilitate open communication about online risks, particularly those involving social media friends. The third phase focuses on designing and evaluating technological tools to de-escalate parent-child conflict, and regulate emotions. The study shows that design features supporting privacy negotiation, designated downtime for emotional regulation, and structured feedback fosters healthy conflict management. The fourth phase explores the emerging role of Artificial Intelligence (AI) in helping parents navigate emotionally-charged moments with their teenager in the realm of conflict management. This research highlights the key tension centered on whether AI can reliably support conflict management while preserving genuineness of the parent-child interaction. Together, these studies offer various design implications and empirical insights. By shifting the focus from monitoring to empowerment and emotional support, this research provides a roadmap for designing technology that helps families manage conflicts, and safely navigate the digital world together.

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Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

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