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Content Analysis of Children's Television Programming and Commercials

By Tierra Nichols

Abstract

The average child watches 3 hours of television this study involves research in race of children's television programs and commercials, how is race present in today's children's television shows?
Introduction
Television is one of the most powerful and influential socializing agents of Children. On an average children's weekly television viewing is 3 hours a day, receiving messages about the world and about their identities. Attitudes, ideas, beliefs, about the world as well as social skills are developed in the age range of 2-18. (Kaiser Family foundation 1999). In the case of race, children use television for information about other races and may form their bias based on how other races are portrayed on television (Larson 2002).
There is an ample amount of evidence that media plays a significant role in the process of identity and can affect children's cultural attitudes. One theory known as social learning theory states that children learn about themselves and the world around them from observation (Orbe 2001). Therefore viewing televised material can influence attitudes. The purpose of this study is to analyze the portyals of people of color in children's programming. Diversity is very favorable among stations such as Nickelodeon, Disney, and ABC on Saturday mornings. These cable companies have created programs that feature a variety of diverse characters, in the advertisements between these programs most commercials feature a mixture of ethnic groups. This is why it is necessary to understand to see in what ways has television influence both minority group and majority groups of children's attitudes toward other racial groups and their own racial group and their identities.

Literature Review
Studies have shown that mass-mediated communication affects interracial communication in a variety of contexts (Orbe 2001). The numerical representation...