Patricia M. Greenfield was one of the first psychologists to present new research on how various media can be used to promote social growth and thinking skills. In this now classic, she argues that each medium can make a contribution to development, that each has strengths and weaknesses, and that the ideal childhood environment includes a multimedia approach to learning. In the Introduction to the Classic Edition, Greenfield shows how the original edition set themes that have extended into contemporary research on media and child development, and includes an explanation of how the new media landscape has changed her own research and thinking.
Background and overview; Television and reading skills; Television and cognivite development; Television and other leisure activities; Television-viewing patterns and use of other media; Television and sex-role attitudes; Television and children's aggressive behavior; Television and adults: thinking, personality, and attitudes; Summary. conclusions, and implications.
In this provocative book, economist Jonathan Rothwell draws on the latest empirical evidence from across the social sciences to demonstrate how rich democracies have allowed racial politics and the interests of those at the top to subordinate justice. He looks at the rise of nationalism in Europe and the United States, revealing how this trend overlaps with racial prejudice and is related to mounting frustration with a political status quo that thrives on income inequality and inefficient markets. But economic differences are by no means inevitable. Differences in group status by race and ethnicity are dynamic and have reversed themselves across continents and within countries. Inequalities persist between races in the United States because Black Americans are denied equal access to markets and public services. Meanwhile, elite professional associations carve out privileged market status for their members, leading to compensation in excess of their skills.
Abstract: A comprehensive report summarizes the past 10 years of research activities and findings concerning the effects of television viewing on child behavior and development. Approximately 90% of all research publications on this topic appeared during this period, representing over 2500 titles. The report is presented in 2 volumes, a summary report and technical reviews. The technical reviews comprise overall, comprehensive, and critical syntheses of the scientific literature on specific topic areas, developed by 24 researchers in this area. The topic areas address such issues as cognitive and emotional aspects of television viewing; television's influences on physical and mental health; television as it relates to socialization and viewer's conceptions of social reality; and television as an American institution. The overall orientation of the report is toward research and public health issues.
Between 1948 and 1955, nearly two-thirds of all American families bought a television set—and a revolution in social life and popular culture was launched. In this fascinating book, Lynn Spigel chronicles the enormous impact of television in the formative years of the new medium: how, over the course of a single decade, television became an intimate part of everyday life. What did Americans expect from it? What effects did the new daily ritual of watching television have on children? Was television welcomed as an unprecedented "window on the world," or as a "one-eyed monster" that would disrupt households and corrupt children? Drawing on an ambitious array of unconventional sources, from sitcom scripts to articles and advertisements in women's magazines, Spigel offers the fullest available account of the popular response to television in the postwar years. She chronicles the role of television as a focus for evolving debates on issues ranging from the ideal of the perfect family and changes in women's role within the household to new uses of domestic space. The arrival of television did more than turn the living room into a private theater: it offered a national stage on which to play out and resolve conflicts about the way Americans should live. Spigel chronicles this lively and contentious debate as it took place in the popular media. Of particular interest is her treatment of the way in which the phenomenon of television itself was constantly deliberated—from how programs should be watched to where the set was placed to whether Mom, Dad, or kids should control the dial. Make Room for TV combines a powerful analysis of the growth of electronic culture with a nuanced social history of family life in postwar America, offering a provocative glimpse of the way television became the mirror of so many of America's hopes and fears and dreams.
