Reports a study of the ways young children view television. The more common style involves uncritical absorption which seems debilitating to the child, while the other style provides the viewer with skills for discovering meaning within the program and beyond. Suggestions are given for parents to encourage the more critical style of watching.…

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)

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

In an effort to identify critical evaluation skills, interview information is analyzed looking at four types of differences: differences between age groups, differences between children who did and did not change their attitudes after viewing an entertainment program, differences among those who ascribed varying degrees of credibility to…

The American public enjoys a greater degree of control over media content than any other national media system. Discusses four principles that support the American system of network television programming and six forces that show the American system of broadcasting is unique in the world. The intent is to illustrate that criticism leveled at…

VARIOUS POINTS OF VIEW ARE PRESENTED ON THE EFFECT OF TELEVISION UPON CHILDREN. CONTENTS--(1) TELEVISION, TIGER BY THE TAIL--ERNA CHRISTENSEN. (2) TELEVISION'S IMPACT ON THE CHILD--RALPH GARRY. (3) SOME RESEARCH ON TV--PAUL A. WITTY. (4) THE CURRICULUM CONTENT OF CHILDREN'S TELEVISION PROGRAMS AND COMMERCIALS--MARIE TOWNSEND MOORE AND JULIANA…

Two samples, the first consisting of 13 and 16-year-olds and adults, the second consisting of children from kindergarten, second and sixth grades, are interviewed to measure the cognitive processes used to evaluate the credibility of television content. Additional goals include measuring the relationship between the use of these cognitive…

The Look-Listen Opinion Project is an annual media literacy survey sponsored by the National Telemedia Council. The 1988-89 survey--the 36th--focused on the opinions of students at the elementary and secondary levels. Students were presented with guidelines for evaluating television programs and asked to select television programs to evaluate.…

Discusses the development of curricula to make children more critical evaluators of television content. Evaluates the extent to which children learned the content of the curricula, applied it to their reasoning about television programs, and used it to mediate between exposure to selected content and the effects of that content. (JMF)

A SURVEY MADE OF EMPIRICAL RESEARCH RELATED TO TELEVISION CONTENT AND EFFECTS ON ADULTS TURNED UP 39 PERTINENT STUDIES WHICH WERE ANALYZED USING FIVE CRITERIA OF ADULT MATURITY, GLEANED FROM THE LITERATURE. OPINIONS OF 44 AMERICAN UNIVERSITY ADULT EDUCATORS REGARDING PROBLEM AREAS NEEDING RESEARCH WERE SOLICITED. IT WAS CONCLUDED THAT TELEVISION…

While it may not be possible to change the content of television, it may be possible to modify its effects on children by making them more critical viewers. The objectives of this project are threefold: to identify processes children use, or can be taught to use, to discriminate the applicability to their own lives of varieties of television…

The purpose of this study was to investigate, in a broad sense, children's understanding of various types of people in two social domains: television and real life. Specifically, the study was designed to solicit information about (1) the physical and psychological abilities and vulnerabilities children would attribute to television characters and…

This collection of papers is from the first national conference of academicians, teachers, school administrators, parents, television industry specialists, and government agency personnel interested in children and television. The 23 papers are presented under the following topics: (1) development of receivership skills (skills required for the…

Recognizing that students spend more time before the television set than in school, this monograph evaluates television as a potential resource in the teaching of English. The nine articles in the collection (1) discuss the effect of massive television viewing on children in and out of the classroom; (2) examine the students' need to apply…

Television viewing by children is a major concern of parents, legislators, and educators in the United States today. By high school graduation a young person will have watched 15,000 hours of television as compared to 11,000 to 12,000 hours spent in school. Concerned groups fear a loss of reading ability, the development of a consumer mentality,…