Mediating Flemish Children's Reactions of Fear and Sadness to Television News and its Limitations

Abstract

We questioned a representative sample (N = 1047) of Flemish children ages 11 and 12 about their news consumption during an “average newscast” period without extraordinary situations such as child abduction, terrorist attacks, or severe murder cases, as is predominantly the case in previous studies. We measured news exposure, fear and sadness scores, total amount of television viewing, gender, age, and asked children about parental guidance. Our data indicate that the frequently recommended active parental mediation style does not result in more successful mitigating effects on fear or sadness. Hierarchical multiple regression models show that mere news exposure adds to explanation but in a limited way when compared with partial restrictive parental guidance—the largest predictor (additional 15 per cent) in fear. Active parental mediation is a significant predictor (additional 5 per cent) in sadness scores. In-depth interviews suggest that the precise content of parental intervention is crucial.

Keywords:

• children
• in-depth interviews
• news
• parental guidance
• survey

Acknowledgements

We want to thank Marjolein Put, master in communication studies, for her help with the in-depth-interviews.

Notes

^1. Although we questioned our informants about other emotions that can be evoked by watching the television news such as being happy because of a news topic and they gave information on when this happened, we chose to limit the focus of this specific article to feelings of sadness and fear on which we had quantitative and qualitative data. In relation to the parental guidance concept, we regarded these two emotions as those that parents would most likely consider the most important.

^2. We are very grateful to Moniek Buijzen who provided us with results expressed in percentages on the fear and sadness items in the research she and her colleagues conducted on children's reactions to the exposure to intense news coverage of a murder case in the Netherlands.