Reviews three books concerned with the effects of television advertising upon children and their parents: "Television Advertising and Children," edited by June Esserman; "Children and the Faces of Television," edited by Edward Palmer and Aimee Dorr; and "The Effects of Television Advertising on Children," by Richard Adler and others. (JJD)

Discusses research focused on characteristics of children's TV commercials, the relationship between commercials and children's learning and reasoning, and effects of commercials on children's language, attitudes, and beliefs. (Author/RH)

Argues that television has unique educational characteristics that separate it from other media and have implications for teaching and learning. Discussion of distributional and social, control, and symbolic (audiovisual) characteristics is based on published surveys and on research carried out at the Open University. Thirteen references are…

Reviews studies of the relationship between television viewing and children's interest and achievement in reading; points out that the relationship is complex and that further research studies using more sophisticated measures of viewing and reading behavior need to be conducted before conclusions are made. (ET)

Discusses differences between the primary functions of the cerebral hemispheres, notes differences between conscious and subconscious responses of subjects in several research studies, and stresses the need for a whole series of questions (so far largely unasked) about how unconscious meanings are made from media. (GT)

This study analyzed four characteristics of political commercials to determine their impact on television viewers' reactions: (1) issue versus image strategies; (2) attack versus support appeals; (3) presence and absence of music; and (4) visual content, either with families or in professional campaign settings. Memory measures and attitudes are…

Conflicting findings on television's impact on reading achievement suggest a need for more sophisticated measurements and methodologies in media research. D. L. Moldenhauer and W. H. Miller's survey of 78 seventh grade students showed no relationship between television viewing and reading skills. These findings were similar to those of J. T.…

A review of 19 studies in 17 articles on sex-role stereotyping and television has revealed some common characteristics. Three types of research can be classified: content, effect, and correlation. Content analysis was the most popular. Even though various types of TV programs were studied, each research study investigated only one type of program…

Ways in which instructional design specifications for television production may be extended into a more precise domain, where forms of representation may be cataloged and culturally defined, are suggested in this study. Differences between film and television are discussed, and a distinction is made between format codes (i.e., culturally and…

Recent research has focused on the faulty implications emitted by factual television accounts of real events, while television news has been described as a pseudo-reality created from the ongoing flow of events. Furthermore, the convenient metaphorical language of television news often creates images of reality in such a way that the reality and…

Intended for students in the social sciences, this book assembles and evaluates the main findings of recent work on television and sex role acquisition, points out gaps and limitations in present inquiry, and sketches a framework around which future research might usefully address some of the remaining questions. The seven chapter topics are as…

Because of the limitations of previous related studies, this analysis was undertaken to examine in greater depth the relationship between television viewing, reading performance, and related reading activities. A synthesis of eight statewide assessments and an analysis of the 1984 National Assessment of Educational Progress were designed to…

Based on the conviction that research findings on effective design of educational television programs may have useful lessons for designers of educational computing software, this paper reviews research on children's educational television and discusses ways in which the findings can be applied. The paper divides the research findings into the…

This subcommittee hearing report presents testimony of television network officials, academic researchers, and consumer representatives concerning the social and behavioral effects of portrayed violence on television, especially as it relates to children. It also provides documents used as attachments to the oral testimony and written statements…

There are benefits to be gained by integrating social cognition research with communication research, especially with regard to the effects of television viewing on child development. Social cognition brings innovative theoretical and methodological approaches to the field of communication, permits a more complete characterization of the child in…