Media and Your Kids

The media: It's been around for ages, but now, it is here more than ever. What you experienced growing up is worlds away from what your children are growing up with today. Some kids' lives are consumed by the media, and there can be very negative effects. Read on to find out how the media can affect your child and what you can do to make sure that you set healthy media guidelines for your children and your household.

Media Influence

Most people know that obesity is an increasing problem in America. There are many different factors that are increasing this statistic, and one of them is the media. If your children are watching TV, reading a magazine, listening to their MP3 players, or on the computer, they are probably not doing anything physically active. It is important that kids get enough physical activity everyday, so help your child think of physical alternatives to sitting in front of the TV all day. If your children watch more than two hours of TV every day, they have a higher chance of becoming obese than children who watch less TV.

A study that took 40 hours of popular shows for kids ages 6 to 11 found that almost 30 percent of the commercials shown were for food. Most of these ads are for fast food, sugar cereals, candy, sodas and other foods that kids love but parents don't want their kids to have. But kids cannot directly see an alluring advertisement for the newest toy that comes with a children's fast food meal and go out and buy it by themselves. They have to go through their parents, and they have to be convincing. If parents say no, then marketers are not successful. Marketers have to appeal to both kids and their parents, and parents are the ones that spend the money on junk food. Therefore, parents need to be the ones who say no and tell their kids why the answer is no.

Kids influence the spending of over $500 billion a year. When your kids ask for the new "coolest" thing, ask if they saw it in an advertisement, such as a commercial on TV, or in a magazine, newspaper or on the computer. Then ask if it is something they want or if it is something they need. Accentuate the difference. The media had the effect of taking away your children's ability to control their impulses. Just like the magazines and cool gadgets at the checkout line at the store, the media makes everything seem so enticing.

Links:

• Children's TV habits linked to adult obesity, Common Sense Media, Accessed July 2007.
• TV ads market junk food to kids, Common Sense Media, Accessed July 2007.
• Commercialism, Common Sense Media, Accessed July 2007.

School Performance

Overexposure to the media is also linked to poorer academic skills. It is not uncommon for kids to go on the computer or watch the TV before doing their homework, or even while doing their homework. A study reported on by Common Sense Media shows that the more media kids are exposed to above a healthy limit, the worse they perform in school. They have smaller vocabularies, lack skills in reading and score worse on tests. Another study shows that kids who have TVs in their bedrooms score worse on tests than their peers who do not have TVs in their bedrooms, while kids who have computers in their bedrooms score higher on tests than their peers who do not.

An interesting statistic from Common Sense Media shows that the less TV people watch as kids, the more likely they are to be successful in school. So if kids are taught when they are young that homework and academics need to be separate from the media and do not watch much TV, they will be able to continue this work ethic into adulthood.

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