In 1966, Joan Ganz Cooney was a documentary producer at Channel 13 when Lloyd Morrisett, then Vice President at the Carnegie Corporation of New York, offered her an opportunity that would change the landscape of children's media forever. The Carnegie Corporation provided funding for a three-month study during which Joan traveled the country to…

The purpose of this study was to investigate various textual characteristics of popular children television shows. More specifically, researchers examined both the quantity and quality of question asked (i.e., question training). Furthermore, several readability components among the different shows (e.g., narrativity, syntactic simplicity,…

Research on intercultural couplehood often relies on cultures and "solid identities" to explain the couples' experiences. By looking at the media construction of an intercultural couple on Chinese television, we are interested in how they are presented and co-constructed through different perspectives, especially if and how (cultural)…

Empowering children for a critical and judicious use and consumption of media is a main objective of media literacy. This paper aims to examine the range of television programs available for children in Portugal through a comparative analysis of the programming for children broadcast by the four Portuguese terrestrial channels (RTP1, RTP2, SIC and…

For nearly four decades, Sesame Workshop has brought the joy of learning to the world's youngest citizens through the introduction of locally-produced coproductions of the preschool television series, "Sesame Street". Many of these television shows have been specifically designed to forward important prosocial messages directly linked to…

Finds that nature as a theme is completely absent in 80% and the outstanding theme in only 1.7% of television programming; not only less frequent, but separate from the dominant themes in prime-time; and treated as a sociopolitical "issue" (like "politics,""science,""religion," and "education").…

This paper is an initial examination of prime time television's response to the events of September 11, 2001. Based on a review of the 2001-2002 television season's prime time programs, the study identifies 15 programs (out of 65 that ran the entire season) that incorporated September 11th elements. Themes of these programs are discussed as are…

States that contrary to previous reports of "grazing," most viewers only used their remote control devices (RCDs) once or twice every half hour. Claims that the dominant RCD operation was direct channel punching, as opposed to dial turning. Concludes that most RCD activity did not take place during a program, thus voiding industry…

The Federal Communications Commission is currently considering modifying or eliminating existing media ownership rules. Children's advocates are concerned that any changes to these rules could negatively affect the already limited amount and types of programming available for children. Children Now conducted the first study to examine the…

Following a content analysis, 85 children's programs were assigned a pacing index derived from the following criteria: (1) frequency of camera cuts; (2) frequency of related scene changes; (3) frequency of unrelated scene changes; (4) frequency of auditory changes; (5) percentage of active motion; (6) percentage of active talking; and (7)…

Finds that stations in smaller television markets devoted less time to news than those in larger markets, and imported a greater proportion of their news content; imported news supplants strictly local news in these markets; and smaller-market stations imported a greater proportion of sensational/human interest news than they originated locally.…

Reviews the involvement of various television networks in distance learning, including public broadcasting stations, Cable in the Classroom, Arts and Entertainment Network, Black Entertainment Television, C-SPAN, CNN (Cable News Network), The Discovery Channel, The Learning Channel, Mind Extension University, The Weather Channel, National Teacher…

Concludes that where there are sweeps periods, there may or may not be more sex, depending on which network is analyzed. Notes that ABC cut its number of sexual behaviors per hour by almost half, while Fox more than doubled its rate per hour. (SR)

The mass media contribution to education politics is explored through the application of a pluralistic theoretical framework to evidence connected with the making of an episode of a U.K. current affairs television program. The episode addressed a politically contentious educational issue but proved controversial in itself. Several sources…

In 1994 the Kaiser Family Foundation commissioned a monitoring project which assessed the frequency and representation of sexual behaviors in five daytime television soap operas. A new study sought to provide up-to-date quantitative information and to extend the previous project by examining more specifically the representation of planning for and…