Week 1 09 09 2014 8 26 Course Intro Child at different ages will learn differently interpret differently Adults older o Able to engage talk bc they put things together in terms of motive Kids o Shiny visual images violent imagery is potent 8 28 A Brief Review of The Research on Children s Media Habits Introduction Definition of children 2 18 before b c of media 0 18 broad why just kids Habits and thoughts originate Perceive children to be most vulnerable to effects Why study mostly television Largest medium of choice Social science approach So we can feel comfortable making generalizations Types of effects Behavioral Most common change in overt response o Aggression 9 11 Attitudinal Inconvenient truth global warming attitude changes Cognitive informational Learning English barney blue s clues Emotional Positive o Music Negative o 9 11 scary movie Health does SpongeBob cause ADHD Obesity advertising Characteristics of effects short term vs long term short o brother wrestling long o eating disorder hard to research singular vs cumulative exposure singular o short term cumulative exposure o long term TMNT over over direct vs indirect direct o immediate impact rare o 9 11 effect everyone indirect o mass media effect depends on viewer sociological low income houses environmental how much attention you pay hardest effect to access Emotional o Everyone feels differently hard to express Cognitive o Appropriate s per child Attitudinal o Social desirability desire to please not answer honestly 100 of time History of research Development of new technologies Funding o Parents are worried Explains research agenda today o New technology public debate research agenda The Research Cycle Film Era Payne fund studies o How content affected kids o Major finding was the affects depended Radio Era war of the worlds o people thought aliens were real 1 million people Television Era parents were worried about how much time they we watching Internet Era privacy carpel tunnel surgery up 35 keeping marketers from soliciting information prevent sexually explicit images online predators o whitehouse gov Social Media Recurring Issues Use of the medium time Use Displacement effect o Different devices Physical effect Effect on attitudes and behavior change T317 Week 2 09 09 2014 9 2 Children s Media Habits Media Use 8 18 Average child spends 7 hours and 38 minutes with the media each day TV still dominates o 4 28 kids are working overtime only 16 min of time spent with internet is for homework How are kids able to spend so much time with media Reason 1 Mobile media o 66 of 8 18 own a cell phone Reason 2 kids are using more than one media at once o known as media multitasking o if you account for multitasking then kids are actually viewing with over 10 hours of media content in that 7 hour window of exposure Reason 3 parents have few rules about media o 50 tv is on most of the time o 64 tv is on during meals o 71 kids have tv in their room differences by race ethnicity African Americans and Latinos spend more time with the media than Anglo Americans Over 4 hours more per day Mobile media Bedroom ownership of media TV centric homes Uses and gratifications Differences by SES Lower SES kids spend more time with the media Lower SES children more likely to more media in their bedrooms o pass back phenomenon diversity of content does increased access use of technology lead to greater diversity of content for kids childhood some scholars argue that childhood is disappearing in today s modern society o do you agree o do you think the media is responsible for this phenomenon imagination creative play creative play fosters the development of thinking skills helps with fantasy reality distinctions delayed gratification verbal ability creative play is in danger because Too much access to screen media The restaurant example o Looking at screens instead of environment for stimulation o Expectation for entertainment o Eating is something you do while you are doing something else Repeated viewing The princess example o Kids rely on scripts instead of their own imagination What can parents do Surround your child with open ended toys that need creativity to be fully imagined Limit time with screen media If a child wants to see a movie based on a book read book first Make time for play 9 4 Researching Kids The Scientific Perspective What is science the exploration for a generalized understanding of a specific phenomenon using systematic methods and procedures Non scientific ways of knowing personal experience intuition custom tradition you re apart of Problems not generalizable not objective Characteristics systematic o set of rules that must be followed replicable o can repeat the findings again in another study published o shared with other researches students and the public The scientific process many researchers begin by personal observations watching kids aggression while playing in the park can really start at any point in the cycle Theory Hypotheses Observations Generalization Accessing knowledge the hierarchy of published science peer reviewed journal articles peer reviewed conference papers books web sites mainstream press etc where to find it www google com www iub edu how to read it generating knowledge content analysis uses o describe messages o make comparisons over time between groups to reality advantages when done well o systematic and replicable standard set of procedures when studying media messages o unobtrusive does not requires participants o easy to make comparisons limitations o no info about processes or effects can t make any claims about effects survey uses o describe characteristics of a population o examine relationships between variables time spent playing video games vs success in school advantages when done well o representative usually a couple hundred people taking part in the study o naturalistic people don t have to be in a lab limitations o cannot establish causation perhaps kids doing poorly in school seek out video games to forget about it video game play academic achievement o parent involvement experiment uses o isolate effect of specific variables study not only blood vs no blood in video game also study effects of color of blood green does not have as much of an impact as red o establish causality basic design o x M1 treatment group treatment group gets exposure to whatever you are studying o M1 control group Does not get any exposure Advantages when done well o Control Limitations o