The portrayal of reading, writing, and other selected behaviors on prime-time network television was examined in this two-part study. First, an interest inventory was administered to a sample of 301 elementary students (i.e., grades 1-5) in South Carolina, Virginia, and Pennsylvania to determine their favorite television shows, books, and school…

The studies reported in this book are content analyses of children's television and attendant advertising. Following an introductory statement, chapters present data about children's commercial television on the weekends, children's commercial television after school, and the seasonal variations in television advertising to children. A concluding…

A study proposing reality and fantasy discrimination of television content as a classificatory ability sought to identify differences between subjects who were able to make sophisticated reality-fantasy judgements and those who were not, and factors which might contribute to a subject's sophistication in discrimination. Open-ended and structured…

Children's learning from television was studied in 343 fourth, sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students who viewed an edited version of a television program and took a posttest. It was hypothesized that children would learn more plot-relevant information (central learning material) as they moved from concrete operational to formal operational…

This study attempted to determine whether television viewing amount independently affects school performance. The television viewing amount and school grades of 43 male and 47 female middle class subjects from three age groups (6 to 7, 8 to 9, and 10 to 11) were measured twice, 18 months apart. Cross-lagged panels were tested using correlations…

Examines the research on the effects of television advertising on children and discusses an experiment which studied children's vulnerability to television commercials. (MB)

Discusses two studies to teach children to be more critical of commercial appeals by showing them instructional films that teach how commercials attempt to persuade. Indicates that those who view the most television gain most from the films. (JMF)

Discusses the conceptualization of television viewing as a learned activity by highlighting the interrelatedness of children's linguistic, cognitive, and perceptual skills for accurate comprehension of temporal sequencing based on a study of five-year-old gifted, learning disabled (LD), and gifted/LD students. (references) (LRW)

Offers an analysis of 10 "Sesame Street" episodes, revealing that the literacy messages conveyed on the program do not reflect current understanding of the process of becoming literate. Shows that hardly anybody reads on "Sesame Street." Discusses why Ernie can't read and how to help him read. (SR)

Concludes that children who watched crime shows identified with the television character but that attitudes toward the police were influenced more by attitudes of friends and family. (RB)

This report describes a follow-up study of the persistence of the effects of the FREESTYLE experiment, which had indicated that this television series was capable of bringing about large changes in the sex role orientation of 9-to-12-year-olds. Designed to determine whether the effects associated with a 4 month media intervention could be found to…

By filming and coding the eye movement patterns of poor readers, the effectiveness of various experimental segments of "The Electric Company" to draw attention to printed material on screen was tested. Twenty-two segments of the program were shown to 30 nine to eleven year olds divided into poor readers and non-readers. Analysis of the…

To test the proposition that television content can teach sex-typed behaviors and attitudes, this study presented children of two ages (third grade and eighth grade) with one of two sets of television commercials. The first set contained women engaged in nontraditional occupations outside the home. The second set showed traditional women in their…

Descriptions of television's typical good and bad guys as seen by first, third, and fifth graders demonstrate that television offers a limited repertoire of good guy characteristics, and indicate important age related differences in judgments on television characters. Emphasizing relationships could provide more multidimensional information on…

Concludes that the social reality effects of television viewing are strongest for elementary school children who are least able to make inferences. (FL)