Background Television Research Makes Headlines

Jessica Piotrowski is a co-author of the manuscript “Background Television in Homes with Young Children”, a top paper to be presented in May 2012 at the International Communication Association (with M. Lapierre, Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania and D.L. Linebarger, University of Iowa). Using a representative sample of American families with young children aged 8 months to 8 years, they found that the average American child is exposed to nearly 4 hours of background television per day with younger children and African American children exposed to the greatest amounts of background television.  The International Communication Association recently released a press release associated with this manuscript.   More than forty media outlets have covered this piece, including the French Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, Time, MSN, and Education Week.