Teenagers are avid users of Discord, a fast-growing platform for synchronous communication where they often interact with strangers. Because Discord combines private DMs, semi-private voice channels, and public servers in one place, it creates a hybrid environment that can produce complex—and underexplored—safety risks for teenagers. Drawing on 16 interviews with teenage Discord users, this study examines their strategies for navigating risky social interactions in the platform. Our findings reveal that when teenagers encounter risks during social interactions, they exercise vigilance by evaluating suspicious interactions before forming friendships, using safety tools, and engaging in controlled risk-taking to safeguard their privacy and security. At the community level, they mitigate risks through selective participation in servers, a practice supported by vigilant governance structures. We discuss how vigilance enables teenagers to act during risky encounters to protect themselves, advancing understanding of teenagers’ agency in risk navigation and informing teen-centered designs for safer online environments.

Gaming is a meaningful part of children’s lives, yet its safety has drawn increasing concerns from scholars and the public. On platforms like Roblox, children may encounter extremist roleplay, scams, or virtual rape. Prior research has emphasized technical interventions that address risks after they occur and ethical frameworks for game design, but children’s perspectives on safety design remain missing. To address this gap, we conducted a cooperative inquiry study to co-design safety mechanisms with 22 children aged 7–12. Children proposed designs emphasizing transparent information about games and purchases, community accountability through reporting and reviews, player empowerment to manage social boundaries and engagement, and age-appropriate game navigation. Our findings extend safety-by-design research by foregrounding children’s perspectives, showing how they envision safety mechanisms across both game and platform design, while enjoying safe play through risk exposure, allocating trust, and balancing platform support with agency.

Computer-supported cooperative work (CSCW) researchers have studied how teenagers experience safety risks such as cyberbullying and scam, but little attention has been paid to gambling. While teenagers’ access to traditional gambling, such as casinos, has been tightly regulated, internet technology has given rise to emergent forms of online gambling, which increasingly permeate teenagers’ everyday lives and exposes them to safety threats and gambling-related harm. Addressing this issue requires a deeper understanding of teenagers' risk perception of gambling, as it not only shapes individual decision-making but also influences societal behaviors and informs policies aimed at mitigating its harmful effects. To understand how teenagers perceive and deal with gambling risks, we analyzed how teenagers engaged in collective sensemaking of gambling in the r/teenagers subreddit, one of the largest online communities on Reddit for teenagers. Our findings revealed various gambling risks perceived by teenagers, the strategies they adopt to mitigate them, and the strong sense of agency they demonstrate in engaging with gambling-related content. Based on these findings, we propose gambling intervention recommendations targeting teenagers, as well as implications for platforms and policymaking.

Women’s participation in competitive gaming continues to grow. Despite growing attention to women’s presence and challenges in gaming, research has largely overlooked their unique experiences with toxicity in competitive environments. Our study addresses this gap by examining the perspectives of 28 women who play competitive games at varying levels. Through reflexive thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews, we discovered how women are being harmed by gendered toxicity and desire for justice. We present two key findings: 1) the forms of gendered toxicity women perceive in competitive gaming and 2) how women respond to their experiences with gendered toxicity. Using women-centered perspectives, our research deepens the understanding of how gendered toxicity marginalizes women and highlights confrontational strategies that seek justice and drive change. We demonstrate that gendered toxicity sustains a sexist meritocracy and exposes the limitations of existing interventions and mitigation strategies. Our findings encourage game developers and industry practitioners to design more inclusive moderation systems and competitive gaming events.