AZMedia is a subject impossible to ignore, especially when discussing children and adolescents. Youth spend more time with media than they do on any other activity except for sleeping—an average of 7+ hours/dayAlso, The vastmajority of youth has access to a bedroom television, computer, theInternet, a video-game console, and a cell phone.Other important statistics reveal that old 75% of students ages 11-16 years old played games at home, 24% playedgames every day, and over 60% spent time in anticipation of playing. 97% of adolescents play video games. 93% are online and 71% have a cell phone.
AZThis graph shows media use among 8-18 years olds.As we can see, television remainsthe dominant medium, withtelevision watching at an all-time high inthe United States. However, these patterns will probably change within next few years as technology tools advance and evolve.
AZThis next graph illustrates the average amount of time youth spends with each medium, stratified by age group/11-14 year olds for the most part seem to be the heaviest users of media. This is an important pattern, since at this age youth can be especially malleable cognitively. It is also interesting to see that print is the only medium where younger people display a heavier use.
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AZObservational Learning Theory is often mentioned in the context of media. Children and adolescents mimic what they see and acquire complicated scripts for behaviors, beliefs about the world, and moral precepts about how to behave from what they observe. Such learning is especially likely to happen when observed behaviors seem realistic or rewarded.Superpeer theory has been also used in the discussion about media. It states that media serves as powerful best friends which make risky behaviors seem more normative to the youth.Violence – is an important aspect of this discourse since By the age of 18, the average adolescent will have seen an estimated 200 000 acts of violence on television alone. When we add video games and internet, these numbers are hard to imagine.adolescents in many studies displayed preference for violent video games. One study reported that violence occupied 50% of video game playing time. Some researchers suggested that playing violent video games can decrease empathy for victims of violence and increase in violent behaviors through normalization of violence. New and not well research media, such as internet with its social networks creates potential for other forms of violence such as cyber bullying. Overall it is not to say that violent video games determine violent behavior, but there is strong evidence to support the claim that they do increase the risk for violence. This does not diminish the concern we should have about violent video games as a public health threat. Some researchers compare this exposure to cigarette smoke or lead-paint: not everybody exposed will develop adverse outcomes, but the risk is substantially increased.When it comes to sexual messages, It has been proven that teenager shows have more of sexual content than the adult-oriented shows. Modest but significant association has been found between exposure to sexual content in media and early sexual initiation, which brings us back to the superpeer theory. Finally, studies had shown that high alcohol and drug content of various media has significant effects on young people. Substance abuse can become normative, for instance, Recent studies of social networking sites have found that substance abuse is referenced in 40% of the profiles.
2. The role of media is also substantial in the development of eating disorders. Media popularize unrealistic body images. There has been an interesting natural field experiment in Fiji revealed that the prevalence of eating disorders increased dramatically after the introduction of American television programs which show excessively thin female characters. On the other hand, the internet contains numerous pro-anorexia sites which disseminate advice on purging methods, and so on.3. Viewing television and playing video games are both associated with increased subsequent attention problems in childhood.It seems that a similar association among television, video games, and attention problems exists in late adolescence and earlyadulthood. Some studies showed link between video game use and ADHD diagnoses. Although effect size is not very large, it is still of a public health concern, considering the ubiquity of television, video games and other media. 4.finally, School performance can be affected by heavy use of media. For instance video games addiction was strongly correlated with lower academic achievement. School performance can be affected in both ways – by taking away time that could have been spent on homework and by affecting a young person cognitively.
Aside from affecting behaviors and beliefs, media can also influence person’s physical health in a negative way.For example, One found that thegames did impact sight.Heavy TV viewing has been associated with multiple physical health problems, such as the ones listed on the slide. Obesity is an important negative health effect resulting from frequent media use. Children and adolescents see 4400 –7600 of food ads of junk food per year. It has been proven that such advertisement has an effect on eating habits and food preferences. It is suspected that with increasing access to internet, youth will be exposed to even a larger number of food advertisements. Finally, Eating while viewing is also a problem, since people consume more food while watching TV. Another issue is decreased physical activity due to more time spent on media use.
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