Children and media

Abstract

Looks at recent research into children’s media consumption, highlights the importance of media literacy, and reports on an industry‐related media education programme; the research is tending to show that children are deciding what and when they watch television and other media. Develops, on the basis of these findings, a model of self‐supervised media engagement which is characterised by a lack of adult mediation. Argues that media literacy is important because it helps children become critical viewers of advertising and programming on their own; media literacy involves information processing skills and as such may be the most important life skill in the age of the internet. Introduces the UK Media Smart programme, which is industry funded and since 2002 has provided educational materials to help children think critically about advertising and other media issues.

Commercial Media Literacy: What Does It Do, to Whom—and Does It Matter?

“…Armstrong and Brucks (1988) note that, even for those whose cognitive development would allow them to retrieve prior knowledge if given a reminder of it, there is little likelihood of this occurring through the intervention of parents, given that children"s media consumption environment is largely unsupervised. Muto (2004) suggests up to 85 per cent of children"s viewing in multi-set households is unsupervised. Further, she notes (2004, p. 38) that 79 per cent of British children aged 10 -15 years and 58 per cent of children aged 4 -9 years have television sets in their bedrooms.…”

“…In terms of available evidence regarding the effectiveness of general media literacy programs, the extant literature reports, largely uncritically, on a range of media literacy resources for school students (Junion-Metz 2004;Muto 2004) and a Google Internet search reveals that there are numerous tertiary education courses offering a range of perspectives on the subject. There is a small amount of empirical research assessing interventions in terms skills in identifying persuasive techniques (Hobbs and Frost 2003).…”

“…They use material similar to, and in some cases, adapted from, the CCA program and report use in some 20 per cent of British primary schools, with a target of 40per cent penetration (Muto 2004). As noted earlier, the program is being extended across a number of European countries.…”