Three preschool children were observed intensively for three years to document children's early television viewing repertoires and programing preferences. Relevant information was obtained from children and parents during biweekly home television viewing sessions. In addition, parents reported in diaries and questionnaires all aspects of their…

The television industry is being dramatically transformed by new communications technology that in the coming decade will offer opportunities and dangers limited only by the imagination and wisdom of those producing television's artistic product and those regulating the proliferation of that product. The most dramatic and profoundly important…

This study investigated developmental changes in children's recall of televised central and incidental content. Central content was plot-relevant; incidental content was peripheral to the plot. Both content types were classified at two levels of production features, high salience and low salience. High salience features were high action, loud…

This paper discusses the utility of an ethnographic method that incorporates various participant observation techniques in providing information about family television viewing. It presents arguments for a naturalistic case study approach focusing on family-media interaction and suggests three methods of data collection: interviews and followups;…

In 1966 the University of California Medical Center at San Francisco (including Schools of Dentistry, Medicine, Nursing, and Pharmacy) established a broadly based communications media center designed to serve the variety of teaching, research, and continuing education requirements of the faculty. This article dwells on the variety of applications…

Opportunities for creative thinking or training in the utilization of mental processes other than assimilation, storage, and recall can be provided by television instruction when encouraged by teaching strategy. This syllabus presents a model for teaching productive-divergent thinking with 54 one-half hour telecasts on the theme of "You and…

In an effort to discover the effects of mass media on viewer perception of candidates' positions, tests were administered to 10 to 12 families at each of five locations across the country immediately following each of the 1976 Carter-Ford debates. Sixteen statements were drawn from the presidential platform of each party and each statement was…

Instructional Television of the Catholic Archdiocese of New York (ITV Center) is described as a fixed service broadcasting system which reaches 207 neighboring schools (188 elementary and 19 secondary), each of which is wired for closed circuit television. Production facilities, programing, and general administration of the ITV Center are…

Research was conducted to examine selected formal features of conversational segments enacted by family members in three modes of television programming: documentary, prime time, and soap opera. A sample of videotape recordings for each program format was content-analyzed for: (1) segment length, (2) length of conversational turn, and (3) duration…

This study examined factors that affect individual judgments of violent behavior portrayed on television. Study subjects included twenty "average" adolescents (control group) and twenty adolescents with a history of in-school social adjustment problems (experimental, or "adjustment," group). All the sujects were evaluated for self-esteem,…

If the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) is eventually to serve all citizens with public radio and television, technological and regulatory innovation will be required. Service to rural America and service to specific groups within urban areas cannot be accomplished within the limits of existing technology and existing spectrum allocation…

Focusing on introducing a participatory public television system which would actively serve the specific needs and interests of the community by directly involving the citizens in the station's decision-making process, the experiment examined the relationship of Cattaraugus County, a rural depressed county, to the new public television station…

A conference of public broadcasters sponsored by the Aspen Institute discussed the role of noncommercial television in informing the public on political issues and covering political campaigns. The topics of discussion included: (1) governmental restrictions of public broadcasting, (2) governmental subsidies of political candidates, (3)…

Using open-ended questions to elicit responses from 77 kindergarteners, 24 second graders, and 25 fifth graders in New York, an attempt was made to determine how children perceive the accuracy and the reality of television programs. The kindergarteners and second graders tended to restrict their observations to specific visual traits, while the…

This collection of essays by expert thinkers in the field of public broadcasting explores some of the many policy questions facing public broadcasting over the next decade. Among the topics dealt with in the 18 essays are: public radio, instructional television, public involvement, financing, research problems, production problems and the role of…