Examines four individual differences--sensation seeking, religiosity, hostility, and family cohesion--as correlates of drug use and television viewing, to test four corresponding models of addiction: medical/disease, moral, compensatory, and enlightenment. Concludes that models emphasizing personal control and responsibility are more appropriate…

The main purpose of this study was to evaluate the opinions of parents of pre-school children about children's programmes on TV. The study had two phases: In the first step "The Evaluation Scale for Children's Programmes" was translated into Turkish, the reliability and validity of the scale was tested through analyzing of the data…

To integrate empirical findings concerning the impact of leisure time television viewing on student achievement in grades K-12, 274 correlations were assembled from 23 studies. The effects were slightly positive for up to 10 hours of viewing a week, but beyond 10 hours the effects are negative and increasingly more deleterious. (Author/BW)

Reports on a survey of 78 seventh-grade students, conducted to investigate the relationship between television viewing and reading achievement. Notes that good readers' viewing habits were not significantly different from those of poor readers. (JT)

Reports on the results of three studies that investigated whether three- and four-year olds interpret television images as mere pictorial representations of objects or as real physically present objects. Children's developmental differences are discussed, and a developmental sequence of understanding television reality is presented. (28…

Examines the relationship between victimization of characters in television drama and susceptibility to the viewers' cultivation of a sense of personal risk in the real world. Found that viewers whose fictional counterparts are more likely to be shown as victims show stronger associations between viewing and perceived vulnerability. (PD)

Reports and discusses the findings of a study which analyzed the relationships between the television viewing, IQ (intelligence quotient), and academic achievement of 625 students in the sixth through ninth grades of a public school in suburban-rural New Jersey. Statistical data are tabulated. (Author/JD)

Reports results of study using mass observation and survey data to determine who is responsible for selection of television programs at home, how program selection processes occur, and how roles of family position and family communication patterns influence these activities. Research methodology and dominant selectors of television programs are…

Presents findings of two studies that sought to clarify the issue of the comparative effectiveness of two different methods of prosocial teaching for the very young: depicting the desired behavior in a totally prosocial setting v depicting the desired behavior as a strategy for resolving an explicitly portrayed conflict situation. (Author)

This study explored patterns of pastime activities that stand as alternatives to television viewing among middle school children. Findings are compared with those of Robinson's study (1981) for alternative media, video games, and sleeping variables, as well as dichotomous measures for group membership, playing a musical instrument, and hobbies.…

Discussion of children's comprehension of television focuses on a study in the United Kingdom that examined whether a successful course of television literacy could be developed for use with students from 5 to 12 years old. Treatments of experimental and control groups are explained, and correlations to other media are examined. (29 references)…

Describes a study of media deprivation which analyzed data on 215 adolescents collected during a Swedish television strike in 1980. Notions of dependency/affinity with the medium, functional alternatives to media consumption, and motives for using television were investigated. (MBR)

Interview data from 336 mothers of elementary school children were used to examine the relationship between mothers' comments to children about the content of television programs and family communication styles (emphasis on free inquiry and expression for all family members vs. emphasis on family harmony and obedience to parental authority). (PD)

Finds that, among 168 Mexican and Puerto Rican children in grades two, four, and seven, television viewing was positively related to reading comprehension and vocabulary scores, but the relationships differed by ethnicity, grade, level of English proficiency, and time of day of television viewing. Contains 17 references. (SV)

Describes a study of 460 second, sixth, and tenth graders that was conducted to explore the effects of content and development on children's perceptions of the social reality of television series featuring families with children and teenagers. Hypotheses tested are explained, measures used are described, and future research is suggested. (42…