Elise Erin lee
UAL
Extended diploma
in Creative Media Production and technology.
Unit 12
Research
I have chosen to look into debates around tv such as:
Does television effect children
Does watching television effect child obesity
Does watching non age appropriate programmes such as Eastenders and Coronation street
https://www.raisesmartkid.com/all-ages/1-articles/13-the-good-and-bad-effects-of-tv-on-your-kid
I have chosen that for my final idea I want to look into what different programmes are age approiate for young children and how it may affect them later in life. I have chosen to look into this as I feel that it is a subject that is often over looked and while by some parents it is not done on purpose when a family all sits down to watch television together should a 5 year old really be watching programmes such as Eastenders and Coronation street and taking in adult themes at such a young age.
My final debate will be; What programmes are age approriate for young children and how does it affect them later in life.
I will be talking to different parents, teachers and teenagers about their experiences with either themselves or their own children watching programmes or films which are not targeted at them and how they feel it has effected themselves or others. I decided on this idea while looking into if watching too much television can affect children's development and social skills. I then started to read an article on how children can become violent from watching certain things. I do not know much about this topic however from research I hope to learn a lot more. I need to find out what the age rating different programmes are, I will need to speak to certain teenagers from different backgrounds to find out if they watched any of these programmes growing up and see how it affected them or did not affect them. I also want to try and speak with teachers of young children to understand how it may affect children's behaviours in classrooms or on the playground as many children change their behaviours when not around their parents. Even though this may change I am looking to either create a small documentary on the issue or a video essay using scenes from the programmes. I feel that this project will be a real eye opener for myself and others and I am excited to find out more about the issue. I also want to ask why it is acceptable for children to be able to view these programmes so easily and how we can build awareness to parents that it is not okay. I want to research relevant and up to date articles on the issue to find out what we can do to prevent this from becoming a bigger problem.
Coronation Street
Eastenders
The Jeremy Kyle show
diary entry 07/01/2019
Today I started researching into the exposition of children and tv, I looked into different tv shows that I feel is inappropriate for children to be watching at such a young age. I looked into different articles about at what age experts believe children should start watching tv. Tomorrow I am planning to start doing more research into these shows by watching short clips and episodes.
Interview questions for teacher
What kind of a school do you teach in?
What age group do you teach?
How would you say you have seen television effect children in different ways?
Do you think by watching programmes such as Eastenders or Coronation Street it can make a child more mature or it can effect their behaviour?
What do you feel should be done by parents?
Interview questions for Parent
How old is/are your child/children?
Do you watch tv with them?
Do you/would you let them watch soap operas?
How do you feel this would effect them in later life?
Do you feel that by letting children view such adult themed programmes it will make them more mature?
Interview questions for teenager
How old are you?
What kind of programmes did you watch as a family growing up?
Do you feel that these programmes have influenced you in anyway and if so how?
Do you think it is appropriate for young children to watch such programmes?
Diary entry 08/01/2019
In todays lesson I started researching the different programmes that I am interested in, I have also had an idea that I want to maybe interview a couple of people, to see what their thoughts are on this topic. Tomorrow I am going to carry on with my research.
For my final product I wan to be able to create a video essay in which I speak about the effect exposing children to these shows at such a young age can have on them. I want to interview three different people which as you can see above I have started to write out a small draft for their questions. I want to do this as I feel it would be interesting to not only have my opinion but to also involve these people as we would have a parent who would be the person letting them watch the programmes a teacher who may see the effect of a child watching these programmes and a teenager who may have witnessed first hand what it is like to watch such storylines and how it may have effected or shaped who they are today.
Eastenders
In this video, which is a scene from the highly viewed soap opera Eastenders we see two grown men fighting in the street, this was a scene which was included in a live episode of the programme in a special anniversary episode, it was viewed by millions all over the world and is a prime example of the type of violence showed by the show on a regular basis. The programme should be able to show whatever they like however I do believe that there should be some kind of an age rating available as this is clearly not suitable for children to watch as it is a grown up issue that children that at such a young age shouldn't have to deal with.
Coronation street
Coronation Street, or better known as "Corrie" is the longest running soap opera and just like Eastenders is shown all over the world, the soap is well known for being a lot less violent then what Eastenders is however they deal with more relevant issues which is always seen as a good thing and I do agree with as I do believe that in this day and age it is the best way to educate some people, in this clip we see "Bethany's story" the storyline was about a 16 year old girl that was being groomed by an older man, as a viewer there was some scenes that even as an 18 year old I still found it uncomfortable to watch, this programme usually airs at 7:30 most nights some children would be in bed by this time however, some may still be up and this is defiantly not an issue they should be exposed to.
The Jeremy Kyle Show
This programme is called, Jeremy Kyle the show airs every morning at around 9.25am and is an on screen counselling session for families, the show has been running for around 15 years and is very popular, the issues dealt with include drug addictions, affairs and DNA results, now it can be argued that this show airs when children are at school which is true it does. However when it is school holidays the show doesn't stop airing so when children are off from school the show is still airing, certain types of language are used and different topics are openly talked about. This is something that children should 100% not be exposed to at all. In this scene we see an elderly lady shouting about what she has come on the show to resolve this is not an example someone of such respect should be acting and it is defiantly not something children should be viewing.
Diary entry 10/01/2019
These are the three programmes that I wanted to speak about in my final product and from watching these short clips From watching the short clips I am sure you can see the point I am trying to make for my final product. I would say that the Coronation street clip is the most distressing as even though yes it is educational it should not be a topic a young girl or even boy should be exposed to at all and should not have to at a young age understand what it means and that it does go on. In my opinion if a child were to watch the clip from eastenders they might mirror the fighting at home with siblings or even at school with their friends which is why I want to be able to talk to a teacher to understand what they see everyday as a result of children watching the shows. the third clip which is of a talk show is something that in my opinion should not be on tv at all. Even though it does air in the morning when most children are at school and you could argue that they would not be watching it still airs during school holidays when children are off.
I have conducted this short survey, in order to find out what people think about this issue or to find out if it even is an issue, I felt that by asking this question first it would set the tone for the rest of the survey, I also wanted to find out if there was any programmes or films that would have been watched which would be considered very inapropriate for children, most people said mainly soap operas which helps me as I know that I am researching the right thing.
This was the question that I was most excited to receive answers from as I knew I was going to receive a variety of different answers from different people. The answer which I agree with the most is "There would be a moral argument as to if it is right or wrong, however you would only know how the child has been affected once they have grown up" this answer has helped me so much as it backs up the point of the answers from the teenager, I will defiantly be using this in my video essay.
This was one of the most important questions on the survey, I feel that by asking people to answer this question it will help them see it in a different light, I received some interesting answers from this question, everyone agreed that if their child were to start displaying the qualities they were witnessing they would not be allowed to watch these programmes again. This question has helped me as I understand now how this problem can be seen from a parents type of view.
Diary entry 14/01/2019
As part of my research I decided to conduct a survey I did not receive as many responses as I would have hoped to however I still thought it was interesting to look at and read through. As you can clearly see I have good some very mixed responses. I did decide to post this survey on mums net as I thought it would be amazing to see what my target audience actually thinks. One of the most interesting comments to me was "i'd remind my child that this is a television programme which is broadcast, not real life" and even though this might work in my own opinion telling a child that it is not real life is not going to stop them from watching something bad happen and it all turn out good in the end as they might think that is what happens to everyone.
Biblography
15/01/2019
Today I finished all my research which I am very happy with, I have really enjoyed this research as it is something that I have always been very intrested in and I feel that I have learnt a lot from it. I am very excited to start my pre production work.