This paper assesses advertising effects on children and adolescents from a social learning theory perspective, emphasizing imitative performance of vicariously reinforced consumption stimuli. The basic elements of social psychologist Albert Bandura's modeling theory are outlined. Then specific derivations from the theory are applied to the problem…

Television has had a major impact on the reading habits and achievement of children. Preschool and primary students benefit the most from viewing but after age 12, students' total knowledge declines as they increase viewing. (Author/IRT)

Describes a 1981 study that compared uses of U.S. television by foreign children residing in the United States and American children in light of theories of acculturation, cultivation, and uses and gratifications. Children's television viewing is discussed, research methodology is described, and results are analyzed. (22 references) (Author/LRW)

Examines the parental disciplinary practices under which children's modeling of prosocial television portrayals are likely to be maximized and minimized. Two types of enduring parental styles of discipline--induction and sensitization--were used in gathering data from a field survey which employed mother-child pairs. (Author/DST)

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)

Recognizing that some of the lessons educational television teaches children are cultural--how to be members of their own cultural group, for example, or what other cultural groups are like--a study developed qualitative methods for the formative evaluation of the accuracy of an educational television program's cultural content with respect to the…

Interviews were conducted with 184 sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students to determine patterns of pastime activities that stand as alternatives to television viewing. In the first portion of the 35-minute interview, respondents were presented with a current daily television listing and asked to indicate which programs they normally watched. To…

In this study of children's television viewing, 105 junior-high-school students reported the television programs they watched, the amount of time they spent each day watching television, and their reasons for watching television. The following results are reported: sixth graders watch more television than do seventh or eighth graders; sixth-grade…

To provide information concerning television and its impact on reading, a study was conducted to determine if the programing on a commercial television network would reveal a low number of positive references to reading. Programing was observed from 3:00 p. m. until 9:00 p. m. daily and from 9:00 A. M. to noon on Saturdays for a period of three…

A survey was conducted to examine developmental changes in children's interpretations of their own television viewing, and the correlation between children's self reports and their mothers' estimates of the children's television viewing time. A total of 813 second, fifth, and eighth grade students were interviewed during one school year. These…

The eye movement patterns of good readers, poor readers and functionally illiterate children are discussed in relation to television and filmstrip viewing and comic book reading. Studies conducted since 1972 on the eye movement patterns of children between 9 and 11 years of age are described and the results discussed. Suggestions are presented…

Television teaches children gender-specific behaviors, attitudes, characteristics, and personality traits. Research indicates that by observing male and female characters on television, children learn to label certain characteristics and behaviors as masculine or feminine and to assign traditional sex-role stereotypes to careers. Content studies…

Television programming has long been recognized as an effective method of educating children. This paper investigated the degree of exposure an educational children's program, Sesame Street, gave to female and male characters and the extent to which these characters were stereotypically portrayed. Children's Television Workshop produces 110…

Designed for media specialists and educators, this issue contains four articles focusing on children and television. The lead article outlines major Australian views on television, analyzing how these concepts determine that country's use of the medium. The second article reviews international developments in children's television highlighted at…

This research project used a conceptual framework to study television viewing as a process of communication rather than as a one way transfer of information from the set to the person. Children's own definitions of experience of television viewing/behavior were used to shape the direction and concerns of the project. As background to, and in…