TV Watch: Parents Want the Remote Control

By Joel Meyer -- Broadcasting & Cable, 11/28/2005 10:38:00 AM

Parents favor personal interaction over content-blocking technology to monitor their children’s television use, according to TV Watch online poll released Monday.

The poll asked 513 parents with children between the ages of 2-17 to quantify how they manage what their kids watch. Russell Research conducted the poll for the network-backed lobby TV Watch, a group that pushes for parental responsibility (blocking technology, TV ratings and the V-chip, for example) over content regulation.

Of those polled, 91% say they take steps to monitor what their kids see on TV.

Among the tools used: watching TV with children (63%); limiting viewing to certain shows (61%) or certain time periods (55%); using TV ratings (52%), using cable controls (17%), satellite controls (12%) or the v-chip (5%) built into TV sets. 

Most parents in the poll (91%) favored parental involvement as the best way to keep kids from “seeing what they shouldn’t see,” according to a TV Watch release. On the other hand, 9% said government should increase control and enforcement of network television programming.

The study was released on the eve of Tuesday’s day-long Senate Commerce Committee “Open Forum on Decency.” (C-SPAN will air the forum live from 9:30 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. ET on Tuesday.) The committee is working on a bill to boost indecency fines and the FCC's enforcement powers, as did a House indecency bill that has already been passed.

The Senate Commerce Committee also plans to hold hearings on decency and Internet porn Jan. 19.

The margin of error for the study is +/- 4.3 percent.—John Eggerton contributed to this story

Talkback

We would love your feedback!

Post a comment

» View All Talkback Threads

Related Content

• Topics
• Author
• Most Popular Pages

No related content found.

Also by this author

• Flash!

• Martin Taps FCC Wireless Advisor

• Pope Show Ratings Unholy for ABC

• Rudolph Pulls CBS Sleigh Even With ABC

• Nielsen: Ad Spending Up 4.5% Through 3Q

Also by Joel Meyer

Most Popular Pages

No Top Articles

Product Wire

• Resource Center
• Browse Categories
• Browse Companies

Featured Company

• Rivo

  Rovi Corporation is focused on revolutionizing the digital entertainment landscape by delivering solutions that enable consumers to intuitively connect to new entertainment from many sources and locations. The company also provides extensive entertainment discovery solutions for ..more

---

Most Recent Resources

• Multi Format Encoding for Efficient Content Repurposing
• The CIOs Guide to Videoconferencing Security Keeping Pace with th..
• Extracting and Preparing Metadata to Make Video Files Searchable
• Robust Encoding, Transcoding and Streaming Systems – Critical B..
• Simultaneous Multi-Format Encoding for Efficient Content Repurpos..