2009 - Neilsen - TV Viewing Among Kids at an Eight-Year High
"American children aged 2-11 are watching more and more television than they have in years. New findings from The Nielsen Company show kids aged 2-5 now spend more than 32 hours a week on average in front of a TV screen. The older segment of that group (ages 6-11) spend a little less time, about 28 hours per week watching TV, due in part that they are more likely to be attending school for longer hours." - Neilsen Wire (Oct 2009) via Unplug Your Kids
2010 - Kaiser Study (Released Jan 2010)
According to the study, kids 8-18 are spending, on average:
4:29 hours per day watching TV
4:54 hours per day watching TV/movies
7:38 hours per day plugged into media (TV, movies, music, computer, video games, print)
From page 4 "Children who live in homes that limit media opportunities spend less time with media. For example, kids whose parents don’t put a TV in their bedroom, don’t leave the TV on during meals or in the background when no one is watching, or do impose some type of media-related rules spend substantially less time with media than do children with more media-lenient parents.
From page 4 "Nearly half (47%) of all heavy media users say they usually get fair or poor grades (mostly C’s or lower), compared to 23% of light media users. Heavy media users are also more likely to say they get into trouble a lot, are often sad or unhappy, and are often bored. Moreover, the relationships between media exposure and grades, and between media exposure and personal contentment, withstood controls for other possibly relevant factors such as age, gender, race, parent education, and single vs. two-parent households."
2005 - Kaiser Study
According to this Kaiser Family Foundation Study
2005 Study based on "a nationally representative survey of 2,032 3rd-to 12th-grade students age 8–18..." (page 40)
"Young people spend an average of three hours a day watching TV, and close to four hours a day (3:51) when videos and prerecorded shows are included. TV-watching time is highest among younger kids: 8-to 10-year-olds spend more than four hours a day (4:10), including videos and recorded shows. " (page 26)
"Children whose parents have kept media out of their kids’ bedrooms, who turn the TV off during dinner, who don’t leave the TV on in the home unattended, and who set media rules and then enforce them, spend substantially less time using electronic media and more time reading than children whose parents don’t take these steps." (page 39)
"Television watching as traditionally measured has declined in recent years, especially among younger students. The percentage of eighth-, tenth-, and twelfth-graders who reported watching four or more hours of television on an average weekday decreased between 1991 and 2008, with the largest drops occurring in the younger age groups. (See Figure 1)"
Students whose parents have a high level of education are less likely to be heavy weekday television watchers than students whose parents have low levels of education. For example, among tenth-graders in 2008, 34 percent of students whose parents did not complete high school watched four or more hours of television on weekdays, compared with 14 percent whose parents completed graduate school. (See Figure 3)
2004 - Percentage of children watch 4 or more hrs per day by Parents Educational Attainment
The percentage of students at each grade level who watched one hour of television or less per day increased between 1991 and 2008, from 20 to 32 percent among eighth-graders, from 29 to 37 percent among tenth-graders, and from 38 to 43 percent among twelfth-graders. (See Table 1, Table 2, and Table 3)
However, as noted earlier, television content is now available on a variety of devices. Using this more inclusive definition of TV watching, use among 8-18-year-olds increased between 2004 and 2009. Children ages 11-14 watched the most TV content in 2009 (five hours and three minutes daily).20"
According to this 2003 Kaiser Family Foundation Study
"This report is based on the results of a nationally representative, random-digit dial telephone survey of 1,065 parents of children ages six months to six years old..." (page 35)
Percentage of 4th-graders, by time spent on television viewing each day, year 2000 and year 1992:
2000
1992
None
2
2
One Hour or Less
23
17
2 Hours
23
21
3 Hours
17
19
4 Hours
11
13
5 Hours
6
9
6 or more Hours
18
20
Same table simplyfied:
2000
1992
None
2
2
One Hour or Less
23
17
1 to 2 Hours
23
21
Over 2 Hours
52
61
So, in the year 2000, 52% of 4th graders were watching TV for more than 2 hours per day.
And, in the year 2000, 35% of 4th graders were watching TV for more than 3 hours per day.
Kids Watching TV - American Statistics
"The new school year has started and the school routine is back. A European study led by Spanish researchers has shown how the proportion of young people who watch television and play on the computer for more than two hours per day doubles at the weekend. And while boys opt for video games, teenage girls prefer to surf the net." - Science Daily (Sept 2010)
"The amount of television usage by children reached an eight-year high, with kids ages 2 to 5 watching the screen for more than 32 hours a week on average and those ages 6 to 11 watching more than 28 hours. The analysis, based on the fourth quarter of 2008, measured children's consumption of live and recorded TV, as well as VCR and game console usage." - Los Angeles Times (Oct 2009)
"While most teenagers (60 percent) spend on average 20 hours per week in front of television and computer screens, a third spend closer to 40 hours per week, and about 7 percent are exposed to more than 50 hours of 'screen-time' per week, according to a study presented at the American Heart Association's 48th Annual Conference on Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology and Prevention." - Science Daily (March 2008)
"Recent data suggest, however, that U.S. youngsters from infancy to age 6 watch an average of one hour of TV daily, and that 8-to-18-year-olds watch an average of three hours daily." - MSNBC (July 2005)
"New research out of the University of Cincinnati finds that young children are watching TV, videos and other screen media while parents are trying to take care of other tasks in the home." - Science Daily (June 2012)
"As family income and education levels increase, time spent consuming media decreases, with the bulk of that decrease coming from less time spent watching TV, which wasn't the case in the 2005 study." - Ars Technica (Dec 2011)
"In a typical day, 47% of babies and toddlers ages 0 through 1 watch TV or DVDs, and those who do watch spend an average of nearly two hours (1:54) doing so." - Common Sense Media (Oct 2011)
"On average, children were exposed to 4 hours of screen time each weekday, with 3.6 hours of exposure coming from home. Children in home-based child care spent a combined average of 5.6 hours watching television or videos at home and while at child care, with 87% exceeding the 2 hour recommendation. Center-based child care scored slightly better, with children watching an approximate total of 3.2 hours each weekday at home and while at child care. Children who did not go to child care also tended to exceed the recommendations, however, with the average child watching 4.4 hours a day." - Science Daily (Oct 2010) and CNet News (Nov 2010)
"Approximately 40 percent of three-month old children and about 90 percent of children age 24 months and under regularly watch television, DVDs or videos, according to a report in the May issue of Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine." - Science Daily (May 2007)
"Although parents believe in the educational value of TV, DVDs and videos, just 32 percent of parents always watched with their children. Parents also had an inflated idea of how much of these media other children were watching and believed that their children viewed less than the average amount. The study indicated that the perceived average viewing for other families is 73 percent higher than the actual average. "At the end of the day the amount of TV viewing is based on what parents think is normal," said Zimmerman. "Perceptions of norms tend to shape behavior even if those norms are inflated."" - The Medical News (May 2007)
Report finds pre-schoolers use media as much as play outside - CNN (Nov 2003)
"The study also found that single mothers and mothers with less education are more likely to have children whose TV viewing exceeds AAP guidelines. And, children who watch at least three hours of TV a day at age 2 are more than twice as likely as other children to watch at least three hours a day at age 6." - About.com
Kids Watching TV - British Statistics
"In Britain, more than a fifth are overweight or obese by the time they start school, according to official figures." - Mail Online (April 2012)
"They found that almost three-quarters of British kids spend more time watching TV in a week than they do playing outside.
Around 36% of kids say they only play outside once a week or less." - First News (Aug 2010)
"British children spend an average of five hours and 20 minutes in front of screens a day, a shock report has revealed. The startling figures show youngsters are wasting more time watching TV than they were five years ago, when they were spending four hours and 40 minutes staring at screens. " - Mail Online (Jan 2008)
"But smart kids with educated parents watch less TV and spend more time reading books, the national study of more than 3000 four and five-year-olds shows." - Herald Sun (July 2007)
"A poll of 2,100 children conducted by the Telegraph has found that half of eight to 14-year-olds watch a minimum of four hours of television a day during term time. Even more time is spent in front of the television at weekends and holidays, with some children more than doubling their daily viewing." - The Telegraph (July 2004)
Kids Watching TV - Australia Statistics
"A study of more than 4500 Australian pre-schoolers found kids of part-time mums eat less junk food, watch less television and are less likely to be overweight or obese." - Courier-Mail. (Feb 2010)
"Research by the hospital indicates that very young children in Australia spend more time watching television than in any other activity. Four-month-old children watch an average of 44 minutes of television daily, while children under 4 years with pay TV at home spend at least three hours a day in front of the screen. " - Times Online U.K. (Oct 2009)
"Kids as young as three are so addicted to technology that they themselves turn on the TV and watch it for over nine hours a week, a study has found." - Medindia (Dec 2008)
Kids Watching TV - Canadian Statistics
"As Canadian children and youth grow older, time spent playing outdoors diminishes almost by half. The result is that they become glued to the screen – dramatically exceeding the guideline of two hours per day – and consequently receiving an “F” grade for Screen Time in this year’s Report Card." - YMCA of Nigara News (April 2011)
"Nearly 40 per cent of pre-school girls in Spain are now classified as overweight or obese, academics discovered. The four-year study also found that more than one in eight children overweight in northern Europe - rising to more than 25 per cent in parts of southern Europe." - Mail Online (April 2012)
"The study, carried out in five Spanish cities (Granada, Madrid, Santander, Murcia and Zaragoza), analyses the link between a family's socioeconomic level and the time that teenagers devote to three sedentary activities -- watching television, playing videogames and studying, all outside school hours. The conclusions of this study, published in the European Journal of Public Health, confirm that young people exhibit different sedentary behaviours depending on the socioeconomic situation of their family. In addition, the kind of work that their parents do has more impact on the amount of time they spend on these sedentary activities than their education does. The pattern of these findings, which confirm the trends seen in other European countries, is that teenagers are significantly more sedentary in families where mothers do not work outside the home." - Science Daily (June 2011)
Reading Statistics
"Children as young as seven are more likely to own a mobile phone than a book, figures show, fuelling fears over a decline in reading." Telegraph (May 2010)
"This chartbook provides both national and state by state information about whether parents are meeting the recommendation of daily reading aloud to their children ages 0-5 years. Reading Across the Nation is designed as a resource for policymakers and professionals who are working to optimize the early language and literacy experiences of young children. Drawing on data from the National Survey of Children's Health (2003), National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) (2005), and Reach Out and Read (ROR) National Center this chartbook presents "reading snapshots" for each state, with comparative rankings on key literacy indicators." (pdf) - Reachoutandread.org
"New research out of the University of Cincinnati finds that young children are watching TV, videos and other screen media while parents are trying to take care of other tasks in the home.
