Media Advertising and Your Child: Information for Parents and Caregivers

Preschool children live in a world of electronic media, a world of vivid colors, sounds and images. Most youngsters watch television and Internet. They view DVDs and movies. Many of them play video games. Some of them even use cell phones with screens and keypads. They see information mixed with many forms of advertising. They also see advertising in printed form on signs and billboards. By the time children have reached the age of eight, most of them are watching media and exposed to advertising more than 7½ hours a day, seven days a week. Recent research tells us that children ages two to eleven years old see more than 25,000 advertisements a year on television alone