Notes

Hi, good morning. Good to see you’re all here so bright and early. I think you’ll enjoy
today’s lecture because it’s on a topic most of you know about and are part of. It’s
new trends in children’s media use. And why is this an important topic to discuss, you
may be asking yourself? Well, let’s start by thinking about your day so far. What
media have you used? Hum. How many different types of media have you used since
waking up and coming to this class? Did you check your e-mail? Did you turn on the
television as you were getting dressed or eating breakfast? As you were traveling
here, did you have some kind of music playing in your car? Hum. Or did you use your
iPod on the bus? Did you read a newspaper? How many different types of media have
you used already today?
OK. So now let’s think. How is your experience different from, say, 50 years ago?
What are some of the key changes? Well, in the middle of the 20th century, people in
the U.S. had only TV, radio, records, movies, and print media. Today, early in the 21st
century, we have many more options. Let’s see. There’s both a larger variety of
technology available. That is, the number of different devices and types we use is
greater. We have VCRs, DVRs, CDs, DVDs, computers. And we also have online
activities now—e-mail, gaming, music streaming, just to name a few.
And it is also constantly changing. And the rate of the change is getting faster. OK.
And technology is getting cheaper, too. It’s less expensive now, so more people can
own it. It’s also getting more portable. OK. So you can carry it around and have
access to it, use it, in more places. And lastly, with the Internet and cable/satellite
technology, people now have more sources. OK. More places you can get
entertainment and information from.
Overall, media use is just getting more convenient. Just look at that list. It’s amazing,
isn’t it, how our lives are becoming increasingly full of media. That means that
today’s children are growing up in an increasingly media-rich environment.
So, today we are going to look at some new trends in media use, and talk about some
of the more surprising results of this. Let’s start by looking at the overall amount of
media exposure and use today.
Now a 2004 study by the Kaiser Family Foundation found that, on average, a child—
kids between the ages of 8 and 18—spend nearly 6.5 hours a day outside of school
doing media related activities, using media. Think about that. That’s more than most
adults spend in a full time job! But what’s more interesting is that children have
exposure to 8.5 hours of media per day.
OK. I can see the wheels turning. You’re thinking, “Wait, how can they have 8.5
hours of exposure if they only spend 6.5 hours a day with media?” Well, what we can
conclude from these numbers is that children are using several types of media
concurrently. They’re using different types of media at the same time. This is one of
the new trends in media use—multitasking.
So, for example, while they are listening to music, they may also be playing a video
game or reading, or they may be surfing the Internet and watching television at the
same time. So, we can infer that today’s youth are becoming more skilled at paying
attention to more than one thing at a time—OK—at doing more than one task at a
time.
Or is the opposite true? Maybe all this media is just making it harder for them to focus
on one thing. They get bored more easily if there isn’t a lot of stimulation from
different sources. The truth is we’re not sure. We’re not sure exactly what the positive
and negative impacts will be at this point. What’s interesting is that, even though
children are using many more types of media, they’re spending about the same
amount of time with media as children did five years ago. This means that children
can’t really fit any more media time into their average day. They’ve hit a media-time
ceiling. But they can use media more intensively by increasing their multitasking.
Now as it turns out, that’s exactly what they’re doing. For example, one recent study
suggests that twenty-six percent of media time is spent using two or more types of
media concurrently, on multitasking.
Another interesting trend is the number of children who have access to media in their
bedrooms. OK, so let me back this up with some findings. The number of children
in the U.S. who have a VCR or DVD player in their room in 1999 was only thirty-six
percent, in 2004, fifty-four percent. OK? Now, that was a dramatic increase. And as
you can imagine, children who have TVs in their bedrooms spend more time
watching TV. They watch about three and a half hours a day. But children who don’t
have TVs in their bedrooms watch about 2 hours a day. That’s a big difference. OK?
That’s 1.5 hours more in a typical day, 10.5 hours more per week. Now, that’s
significant. And TVs are not alone. Other media is also used more when it is located
in the child’s bedroom.
So what can we conclude about the increased intensity of media use by children?
Well, not everyone agrees. Some research suggests lower test scores and shorter
attention spans, which make some people think that increased media use only has a
harmful effect on kids. And some people worry that today’s kids are too dependent on
visual media, that they don’t have the patience to read long texts, which could hurt
them in school and colleges.
But other people don’t have such negative opinions. They believe that so much
exposure to all kinds of media is just preparing them for real life. Now, life today is
filled with media and images. They’ll eventually have to live and work in that world,
so their media use is just preparing them for that. These children are really good at
shifting their attention from one thing to another, at focusing their attention on what
interests them. Some experts say this skill of monitoring and coordinating more than
one task at a time, but ignoring what isn’t important, may actually be useful, a benefit.
After all, managers and CEOs often supervise many people, many different projects at
a time. So this could be a useful ability. Combine their multitasking skills with
confidence with different media tools, and these kids may actually have essential
skills for the workplace of tomorrow.
So, let’s wrap up now. And I want to leave you with a thought. We need to continue
to study the changes in children’s media use, but we shouldn’t immediately infer that
the changes are negative, that they’re bad for kids. We have to consider how new
technology, and exposure to it, and different ways of using media may actually help
our kids in the long run.
OK. That’s it for today. Bye.