Visual Complexity and Young Children's Learning from Television.

The impact of both the static and dynamic visual complexity of a half-hour sequence of “Sesame Street” segments upon viewers' visual attention, recall, and recognition are assessed in this study of 48 four and five year olds. Previous research has produced inconsistent results with respect to the links among the three sets of variables in this observational learning process. Results of a path analysis indicated strong negative relationships between static complexity and all three viewer variables, positive relationships between dynamic complexity and both attention and recognition, and between attention and both types of learning. No significant relationship emerged between dynamic complexity and recall. Implications for television production aimed at young children are discussed.

[1]  Daniel R. Anderson,et al.  Young children's attention to "Sesame Street." , 1976 .

[2]  G. S. Lesser.  Learning, Teaching, and Television Production for Children: The Experience of Sesame Street , 1972 .

[3]  Thomas D. Cook,et al.  Sesame Street Revisited , 1975 .

[4]  Elizabeth Pugzles Lorch,et al.  The Effects of TV Program Comprehensibility on Preschool Children's Visual Attention to Television. , 1981 .

[5]  J. Flavell.  The Developmental psychology of Jean Piaget , 1963 .

[6]  James H. Watt,et al.  An Information Theory Measure for Television Programming , 1974 .

[7]  J. Duffy,et al.  Path analysis: a strategy for investigating multivariate causal relationships in communication disorders. , 1981, Journal of speech and hearing research.

[8]  J. Minton.  The Impact of Sesame Street on Readiness. , 1975 .

[9]  Gerald S. Lesser,et al.  Children and Television: Lessons from Sesame Street , 1974 .

[10]  E. Wartella,et al.  A Review of Cognitive Development Theory and Research and the Implication for Research On Children's Responses To Television , 1977 .

[11]  C. Atkin,et al.  The surgeon general's research program on television and social behavior: A review of empirical findings , 1971 .

[12]  A. Bandura.  Social learning theory , 1977 .

[13]  H. Sprigle.  Who Wants to Live on Sesame Street , 1972 .

[14]  M. Sanders.  Handbook of Sensory Physiology , 1975 .

[15]  B. Friedlander,et al.  Suburban Preschool Children's Comprehension of an Age-appropriate Informational Television Program. , 1974 .

[16]  A M Liberman,et al.  Perception of the speech code. , 1967, Psychological review.

[17]  Jacob Cohen,et al.  Applied multiple regression/correlation analysis for the behavioral sciences , 1979 .

[18]  L J Busby,et al.  Sex-role research on the mass media. , 1975, The Journal of communication.

[19]  E. Lorch,et al.  The relationship of visual attention to children's comprehension of television. , 1979, Child development.

[20]  Claude E. Shannon,et al.  The mathematical theory of communication , 1950 .

[21]  Joseph T. Klapper,et al.  The effects of mass communication , 1960 .