10 Reasons Why Media Education Matters

This is courtesy of Media Education Foundation.

» The average American watches over 4 hours of television per day.

» 56% of children ages 8-16 have a TV in their bedroom.

» The average American child sees 200,000 violent acts on TV by age 18.

» The average American youth spends 900 hours in school & 1,023 hours watching TV each year.

» The average American sees 2 million TV commercials by age 65.

» 45% of parents say that if they have something important to do, they are likely to use the TV to occupy their child.

» Children spend a daily average of 4 hours and 40 minutes in front of a screen – 2 1/2 hours of which are spent watching television.

» 97% of American children ages 6 & under own products based on characters from TV shows or movies.

» Children ages 2-7 watch television alone and unsupervised 81% of the time.

» Nearly 3 out of 4 teens say that the portrayal of sex on TV influences the sexual behavior of kids their age. 1 in 4 admits it influences their own behavior.