This study theorizes and tests moderators (perceived availability of marijuana and age-group) of the association between adolescents' frequency of marijuana ad exposure and past-year marijuana use. To test this model, I analyzed national survey data from 9,024 American adolescents with hierarchical regression techniques. Results showed that being…

To be literate in a society where the information shared online is often exploited, learners should be exposed to multiple aspects of contemporary predictive modeling. This article explores an activity in which grade 10 students learned how a famous AI algorithm (the Apriori algorithm) uses conditional probability to automate the process of…

The United States is currently experiencing its most severe measles outbreak in decades, driven in part by parents' belief that vaccines cause autism. That harmful misinformation is contrary to scientific evidence (DeStefano et al. 2013). The CEO of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, the world's largest multidisciplinary…

High school students have been through profound changes and challenges in the last three years. The experiences of the pandemic, lockdowns, virtual classes, and economic and social disruptions have had tremendous--and possibly lasting--impacts on them. As they prepare to enroll in college, have those experiences changed how they search for…

Introduction: This study assessed the influence of exposure to pro-tobacco advertisements on experimentation with emerging tobacco products among U.S. adolescents aged =9 years, in Grades 6 to 12. Method: Data were obtained from the 2011 National Youth Tobacco Survey. Multivariate logistic regression was used to measure the association between…

Media literacy interventions offer promising avenues for the prevention of risky health behaviors among children and adolescents, but current literature remains largely equivocal about their efficacy. The primary objective of this study was to develop and test theoretically-grounded measures of audiences' degree of engagement with the content of…

The influence of media on adolescents' health practices and behaviors, including personal values, beliefs, and perceived norms cannot be overstated. Youth media consumption continues to increase. Media messages are carefully designed to persuade the consumer to believe or do something. Some of the most persuasive media messages can be found in…

Conceptual Blending Theory (CBT) (Fauconnier & Turner, 2002), a cognitive theory of human processes of innovation, can be productively used alongside critical literacy approaches, for the analysis of how teachers and learners draw selectively, transformatively and purposively from aspects of the mass media. While numerous studies have pointed…

This study aimed at determining the interaction between parents and adolescents pertaining to television advertisements as a consumer socialization agent and the effects of advertisements on the purchasing decisions of adolescents. The effects of age and sex were also investigated. The sample included 240 high school students in grades 9, 10 and…