It's Hard Out There for a Parent: Negotiating the Child's Media Landscape

Session Submission Type: Panel

Abstract

From the moment of their child's birth, parents are faced with a dizzying array of choices regarding the best ways to nurture and support this young life. Parents of young children are tasked with making decisions that run the gamut from relatively minor issues (e.g., what clothes the child should wear) to more serious issues such as children's medical, psychological, and social well-being. Moreover, child-rearing information is often directed to parents from a multitude of sources and that information can vary wildly in quality (e.g., nutrition- Harris, Thompson, Schwartz & Brownell, 2011; vaccinations- Poland & Spier, 2010).


One particular concern is how parents make decisions regarding their child's media use. As numerous studies have shown, a child's media diet can have both beneficial (e.g., Anderson, Huston, Schmitt, Linebarger, & Wright, 2001) and deleterious (e.g., Bushman & Huesmann, 2006) effects on the child's health and well-being. Understandably, parents have expressed significant concerns about their child's media exposure (Bleakley, Vaala, Jordan, & Romer, 2014) with research also showing that such concerns predict media use with children (Cingel & Krcmar, 2013; Vaala, 2014).

With these issues in mind, this panel will examine how parents negotiate their children's media use and exposure, particularly in ways that have not previously garnered significant research attention. Utilizing diverse populations, methodologies, and perspectives, this panel presents findings related to (1) parents' decision-making processes related to media choices, (2) the ways parents directly engage with their children about media, and (3) differences in media attitudes/practices among both lay and expert populations.

To address panel goals, four presentations are proposed. Two presentations investigate how parents in the United States and the Netherlands select educational apps for their children. In the

American study, researchers used a survey experiment with parents to understand how they select apps for their children and the information they rely upon to inform these decisions. In the Dutch study, researchers employ a Uses and Gratifications approach in a survey investigating why parents select the apps they do for their children.

The third presentation uses an experimental approach to test how parents engage with children while viewing prosocial programming to see how parents can help children form moral judgements.

Finally, the fourth presentation examines how parents with academic training in the field of children and media (e.g., CAM members) differ from lay parents regarding their concerns about media, media practices, and their children's media exposure.

Sub Unit

• Children Adolescents and the Media

Chair

• Matthew A. Lapierre, University of Arizona

Individual Presentations

• Contextualizing Parental Needs for Children’s Apps - Jessica Taylor Piotrowski, U of Amsterdam/ASCoR; Francette Leonie Broekman, U of Amsterdam

• Parents’ Reactions to Descriptions of Children’s Apps: Results From a Parent Survey Experiment - Sarah Vaala, Joan Ganz Cooney Center; Tamara Spiewak Toub, Joan Ganz Cooney Center; Elisabeth McClure, Joan Ganz Cooney Center

• Communicating Verbally and Nonverbally About Moral Lessons: The Influence of Parent-Child Interactions During Television Viewing on Children’s Moral Judgments and Reasoning - Drew Cingel, U of California -- Davis; Malika Gehant, Northwestern U; Megan K. Olsen, Northwestern U; Marina Krcmar, Wake Forest U

• Trust Us, We’re Experts: How Children and Media Researchers Use Media With Their Own Children - Matthew A. Lapierre, University of Arizona; David Bickham, Harvard U

Respondent

• Erica L. Scharrer, U of Massachusetts, Amherst