media studies

[Alex Linder]

Generation M: Media in the Lives of 8-18 year-olds

http://www.chicagotribune.com/techno...l=chi-news-hed

American kids gorging on a diet of media, report finds

By Bonnie Miller Rubin
Tribune staff reporter
Published March 10, 2005

With a TV, a computer, a CD player, a Sony PlayStation 2 and a portable DVD player, Chris Herring's bedroom is more like a multimedia arcade than a place to sleep. "I just use them all," said the Homewood-Flossmoor High School senior. "Sometimes I am doing more than one at a time--I'm not even aware of it. It's so subconscious."

That multimedia juggling act has been mastered by many American children and teenagers, according to a study released Wednesday by the Kaiser Family Foundation, an independent health-care philanthropy.

The report shows that youths are increasing the time they spend with "new media" (computers, Internet and video games) without shedding the old (TV, print and music). Consequently, students are stuffing an increasing amount of media content into their lives, using more than one medium at a time and packing 8 1/2 hours of media content into just under 6 1/2 hours each day.

Those 8 1/2 total hours--which do not include exposure at school or as part of schoolwork--are up an hour from five years ago, with the biggest increase coming from video games (now at 49 minutes a day) and computer use (slightly more than an hour).

The study also found that children's bedrooms are plugged-in places, with two-thirds having a TV in their bedroom. The percent of kids with VCR or DVD players in their rooms rose to 54 percent from 36 percent over the last five years, and 37 percent have cable or satellite television.

Outside the bedroom, nearly two-thirds said the television is usually on during meals.

Though parents do a fair amount of hand-wringing over media saturation, about half of the kids said their families have no rules restricting TV watching--and children in families that do have rules say they are enforced only 20 percent of the time.

"There is a definite disconnect between the concerns expressed by parents and the actions that this study says they are taking," said Vicky Rideout, a Kaiser Family Foundation vice president who directed the report.

Titled "Generation M: Media in the Lives of 8-18 year-olds," the study involved more than 2,000 participants who completed questionnaires and kept media diaries.

The objectives of the study--conducted every five years and considered to be a "census" regarding youths and media--is to measure use, not to make judgments. "But anything that kids spend this much of their lives with is significant ... and something we need to look at very closely," Rideout said.

`Responsible choices'

Marsha Herring doesn't need to peek at a media diary to know her oldest child is a master of multitasking. It's not unusual for him to be online while also watching TV or listening to music.

Herring said that although Chris spends long hours sequestered with the Internet, he's more likely to be doing homework or researching assignments for the school paper and radio station than to be chatting up friends.

"It might be a problem if there was a huge drop in my grades ... but otherwise, my parents really don't question it," said the teen, who is headed to the University of Michigan in the fall.

"You have to know your kid ...," his mom said, "and I know that he makes responsible choices." As for her 12-year-old daughter, "the only electronic things in her bedroom are light bulbs." Herring feels she's not quite ready for the responsibility.

With the world moving faster and faster, "you have to work harder to enforce the rules," she said, which in her house include no TV until homework is completed, no loud music at home and regular scrutiny of her children's instant-messaging "buddy" lists.

After the report's findings were announced, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) delivered a keynote address as part of a panel discussion in Washington. Clinton called children's heavy media diet "as important a public health issue as any we can address," one that touches on everything from childhood behavior to obesity.

The saturation presents a dual challenge, she said: Parents face new obstacles when it comes to monitoring their children's viewing habits, and the impact of such non-stop exposure is unknown.

"How does a parent today who wants to protect their child from violent or explicit content have a chance?" asked Clinton, who said Wednesday that she and other senators will reintroduce legislation that would create funding to study the effects of electronic media on children's development.

Dr. Miriam Bar-on, a pediatrician at Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, said in an interview that the sheer amount of time spent tethered to TV and videos (nearly 4 hours a day), music (1 hour, 44 minutes), computers (1 hour, 2 minutes) and video games (49 minutes) is cause for concern.

Kids spent an average of 43 minutes reading.

The Kaiser report's findings show that youngsters are far exceeding the American Academy of Pediatrics' recommendations of no more than two hours of quality TV and videos a day for older children, she said.

"Anytime you spend this much time immersed in an activity--unless it's sleeping--it is not a good thing," Bar-on said.

Lack of supervision

Perhaps most distressing is the number of kids who have unfettered access to media without adult supervision. "You can't have control in the bedroom," she said.

Though conceding that today's parents spend long hours at work and commuting, Bar-on said the task is too important to let slide. "We're just asking parents to raise the bar on their parenting--not to make life-altering decisions."

Being media-savvy isn't all bad. Jerry Newman, a Crystal Lake father of two teenage boys, is impressed with their computer skills, which he feels will help them in the job market. And Newman positively marvels at his older son's ability to deftly handle "six or seven different media at one time," he said.

"It doesn't matter how late he gets home ... he'll still be up playing video games until 2 a.m.," he said. He's a good kid ... so it doesn't bother me, but it does bother me that he's a mole."

All JoAnn Rockman of Flossmoor knows is that there's no way she could manage a computer conversation with four or five people while simultaneously listening to music and watching TV--an everyday occurrence for her 18-year-old son, Max.

"If it were me," she said dryly, "I'd be sending something about my boss to my boss."

No wonder they're all nigger-worshippers with "ADD."