Kids Prefer to Tune In PBS Shows, Study Shows

Young children left to themselves watch more educational television than when their parents watch with them, says a new study that looked at scores of working-class households in California.

“These findings suggest that children prefer PBS (Public Broadcasting Service) over commercial networks, but when children and parents view TV together, they watch the commercial channels that the parents prefer,” the study said.

It supported previous findings that preschool children watch about 25 hours of television a week, watch fewer hours after they start school and are usually unsupervised by parents in their programming choices, the authors said.

“The important thing to me is that the attitude that parents set up in relation to television in the home seems to have an impact on what children will watch and how much they watch,” said Dr. Howard L. Taras, lead author and assistant pediatrics professor at UC San Diego.

“Children of parents who regard television more as a baby-sitter or distraction will watch more TV,” he said in a telephone interview.

Also, children of parents who regard television more as an educational tool will watch more PBS, he said.

The study found children viewed more PBS programming in households where television was not routinely being used as entertainment, where parents were not viewing TV with the youngsters more than 50% of the time and where children had a strong influence on program selection.

The study was based on interviews with working-class English- and Spanish-speaking parents from households that totaled 66 children ages 3 to 8 in a suburban San Diego community. Findings were published in the March issue of the American Medical Assn.’s American Journal of Diseases of Children.