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Analysis of Children's Television Characters and Media Policies

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Handbook of Child Well-Being

Abstract

In modern society, promoting children’s well-being is a major concern for policy makers, educators, and health professionals. Media scholars share this concern and have been examining the influence of media on young people for many decades. Even in today’s multimedia environment, television still plays a significant role in the lives of children and their well-being. Although prevalent factors like time spent watching television may influence children’s well-being, research on media influence also needs to look at the content that is specifically made for children and to which they are attracted. Obviously, children are exposed to a wide variety of television content that is not especially targeted at them. Yet, children’s programming continues to play a pivotal role in their daily lives. In this chapter, we address this issue by reporting the results of a nationwide study, which investigates the state of well-being of television characters by applying a standardized scale to analyze national and international children’s programs broadcast in Canada. Our findings indicate that main characters on children’s television in Canada are predominantly presented as being positive and pleasant. In addition, this study suggests that national media policies may play a significant role in the type of content to which children are exposed.

We would kindly like to thank the Youth Media Alliance (Canada) and Dr. Ferran Casas, University of Girona (Spain) for their assistance with the research for this chapter. This research was generously supported by Bell Media in Canada. Please send correspondence to: André H. Caron, Département de Communication, Université de Montréal, C.P. 6128 Succursale Centre-ville, Montréal QC, H3C 3 J7, Canada; e-mail: andre.caron@umontreal.ca.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Département de communication, Université de Montréal, C.P.6128 succ. “Centre-ville”, Montréal, Canada

    Prof. André H. Caron Ed.D & Dr. Jennie M. Hwang Ph.D

Authors
  1. Prof. André H. Caron Ed.D
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  2. Dr. Jennie M. Hwang Ph.D
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to André H. Caron Ed.D .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Paul Baerwald School of Social Work and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Israel

    Asher Ben-Arieh

  2. Research Institute of Quality of Life, University of Girona, Girona, Spain

    Ferran Casas

  3. Department of Sociology and Human Geography, University of Oslo, Oslo, Norway

    Ivar Frønes

  4. Department of Anthropology, Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio, USA

    Jill E. Korbin

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Caron, A.H., Hwang, J.M. (2014). Analysis of Children's Television Characters and Media Policies. In: Ben-Arieh, A., Casas, F., Frønes, I., Korbin, J. (eds) Handbook of Child Well-Being. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9063-8_71

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-90-481-9063-8_71

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

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