Eine Studie untersucht, wie taiwanesische Kinder das Internet sehen anhand eines neu entwickelten T5-Modells:

• Tool: Internet als Werkzeug
• Toy: Internet als Spielzeug
• Telephone: Internet als Kommunikationsmedium
• Territory: Internet als Ort der Selbstdarstellung
• Treasure of Information: Internet als Informationsquelle

The present study re-investigates young students’ attitudes on the basis of a 5-T framework: Tool, Toy, Telephone, Territory, and Treasure of Information. To this end, we developed a related attitude scale based on this 5-T framework. In this study, the Internet as a Tool helps people performvarious tasks (e.g., helping to do homework, learning/using applications); the Internet as a Toy enables users to play (online) games; the Internet as a Telephone enables users to communicate with other users; the Internet as a Territory allows users to present themselves online, and the Internet as a Treasure of Information represents the collection of online information.

The purposes of this study are to investigate fifth-graders’ attitudes toward the Internet based on the 5-T framework (Tool, Toy, Telephone, Territory, and Treasure of Information), and to understand whether gender makes any difference in their attitudes. The data were obtained from 2,253 Taiwan fifth-grade students. Through a confirmatory factor analysis, the 5-T model was validated and can be used to explain the corresponding five-factors which constitute Internet attitudes. According to the results, the students perceived the Internet mainly as a useful and powerful tool for their academic work and daily lives. More- over, students strongly considered the Internet a toy, which is somewhat indistinguishable from the role of Tool. The students acknowledged the role of the Territory that they can demonstrate themselves by writing and sharing personal information online. Therefore, the Internet is good for both reading and writing information. The least weighted factor among 5-Ts student recognized is the role of Telephone. Gender differences exist in the subscales of Tool, Toy, Treasure of Information, and Telephone, but not in the Territory subscale of the Internet attitudes scale. This study further discusses and presents impli- cations of the findings for teachers, parents, and future studies.