Always Connected: The new digital media habits of young children

by Aviva Lucas Gutnick et al. | March 2011 | View Bio |  (3)

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Today’s parents, academics, policymakers and practitioners are scrambling to keep up with the rapid expansion of media use by children and youth for ever-larger portions of their waking hours. This report by Sesame Workshop and the Joan Ganz Cooney Center takes a fresh look at data emerging from studies undertaken by Sesame Workshop, independent scholars, foundations, and market researchers on the media habits of young children, who are often overlooked in the public discourse that focuses on tweens and teens. The report reviews seven recent studies about young children and their ownership and use of media. By focusing on very young children and analyzing multiple studies over time, the report arrives at a new, balanced portrait of children’s media habits.

Always Connected was written by Aviva Lucas Gutnick, Michael Robb, Lori Takeuchi and Jennifer Kotler.

 

Related blog post:

Technology, Activity, Content & Context: Reflections on “Always Connected” by Jennifer Kotler

 

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3 comment(s)

Many thanks Catherine, for your reply to my comment and for fixing the chart in the report.

by Joel Hooper | Posted Mar 17, 2011 at 9:45 am

Hi Joel: You are absolutely correct - there was a design error and the x-axis of the chart was incorrectly labeled. We've uploaded the report with the corrected chart here. Thanks so much for your close attention - and we apologize for the confusion that this has created!

by Catherine Jhee | Posted Mar 17, 2011 at 9:44 am

There seems to be a problem with the report – specifically with Chart 3. In the text it is stated that: "More children use the Internet regularly and for longer periods of time than ever before. Most children who go online do so a few times a week, and unsurprisingly, usage increases with age. Among very young children (0 to 5) who use the Internet, about 80% do so at least once a week." Yet Chart 3 is titled, "Percent of children who participate in activity in typical day", and for 0-5's in the internet category a figure of approx 70% is shown. I think the title of the chart is either mistaken or misleading. Because unless I'm reading this chart totally incorrectly, this means that of all US children under 5, approx 70% of 0-5's use the internet daily. This is absurd AND it is totally inconsistent with the data in the text. It is absurd because if we assume equal distribution of children under 5 across the 5 year groups then 1/5 (20%) of children under 5 are under 1. Assuming under 1's don't use the internet, close to 100% of 1-5's must use the internet daily in order to get to your figure of approx 70%. It is inconsistent with the text which says (paraphrasing), 'of those children

by Joel Hooper | Posted Mar 15, 2011 at 11:41 am

3 comment(s)