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Communication Studies
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Kindergartners understandings of television: A cross cultural comparison

Dafna Lemish
a a

Senior Lecturer, Department of Communication, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel, 69978 Available online: 22 May 2009

To cite this article: Dafna Lemish (1997): Kindergartners understandings of television: A cross cultural comparison, Communication Studies, 48:2, 109-126 To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10510979709368495

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KINDERGARTNERS' UNDERSTANDINGS OF TELEVISION: A CROSS CULTURAL COMPARISON

DAFNA LEMISH

This study compared American and Israeli kindergartners' understandings of television. Macrosystem cultural differences are applied to explain the differences in these children's viewing preferences, ability to distinguish between fantasy and reality characteristics of television, perceptions of news' functions, and the purpose of commercials. Overall, the Israeli children in this study lag behind their American counterparts in the development of television literacy. However, they had much more knowledge about the news and its role in society. The argument advanced is that "television" as a medium may mean different things to different children growing up in different cultures.

A central focus of media studies has been on articulating how children comprehend x \ . a n d understand television. Several studies have focused on the role of informal mediation by families in enhancing young children's comprehension and learning from television as well as its role as a socializing agent (Corder-Bolz, 1980; Desmond et al., 1985; Lemish, 1987; Lemish & Rice, 1986; Messaris, 1987; Messaris & Sarett, 1981). Such mediation studies typically concentrate on parents' restrictions on viewing times and contents, on content comprehension, and on the production of textual meanings. The general conclusion to be drawn from these studies is that children differ, among other things, in their attitudes toward television, their viewing habits, and their communication patterns as a result of family influences. More recently, Hodge and Tripp (1986) contend children need to be seen as active viewers situated in much broader social relationships and contexts than the family alone. As a result, the television-related meanings attained by children are understood to result not only from individual cognitive processes, but also from their learning orientations and expectations about texts which are socially shared (Buckingham, 1993). This suggests that social class, race, and gender play significant roles in these processes of meaning production-though few empirical studies have been conducted to confirm these views. Following this line of reasoning, Atkin, Greenberg, and Baldwin (1991) studied the home ecology of children's television viewing. Based on Bronfenbrenner's (cited in Atkin et al., 1991) ecological typology, they suggested three levels of relationships between television viewing and mediation: "(a) microsystem, or pattern of activities that influence the child in a given setting (e.g., interaction with parents at home); (b) a macrosystem, involving relations at the level of subculture or culture (e.g., socioeconomic status) along with any belief systems or ideology underlying such consistencies, and (c) an exosystem, which includes one or more settings that do not involve children as active participants but nevertheless influence them (e.g., a family media room)" (p. 41). Their study limits its definition of macrosystem to occupation, income, education, and ethnicity. As a result, it overlooks the more general concerns that differ across cultures-national identity, deep social or political conflicts, national goals, and media systems. Korzenny and Ting-Toomey (1992) suggest a list of variable clusters that should be considered in cross-cultural research. The first cluster, which they label antecedent variables, includes: social, political, historical, cultural, and media contexts. Similarly,
Dafna Lemish (Ph.D., Ohio State University) is Senior Lecturer, Department of Communication, Tel Aviv University, Tel Aviv, Israel 69978. The Americanpart of this project was supported by a grantfrom the Scholars Program of The Annenberg School for Communication, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, U.S.A. COMMUNICATION STUDIES, Volume 48, Summer 1997

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Berger (1992) stated the goal of cross-national studies is to gain insights into issues such as national character and related social, political, and belief systems and values. While Berger suggested comparative analysis of cross-national television texts according to questions regarding ideology, values, social class characteristics, language, and dialogue among others, he seems less concerned with other general issues relating to a cultural understanding of television as a medium, such as the nature of media systems in particular countries, as well as the public's perceptions of their role in identity formation. When it comes to television, societies differ in the historical development of the medium, its institutional characteristics, the ideology attached to it, the mechanisms of control, as well as in preferred genres and contents, tension between global and local forms of entertainment, unique functions and uses and the like. It follows that children's understanding of television should be analyzed as an interaction not only of individual, contextual, and social characteristics as has been suggested before, but also of a more general understanding of television as a culturally situated medium. The purpose of the investigation reported in the current study is to contribute to the understanding of such social influences through a comparison between children growing up in different cultural settings. More specifically, the primary purpose of this study was to compare and contrast the early development of television literarcy with a view to analyzing children's understandings of television. Such a study is important because cross-cultural studies that compare and contrast the development of television literacy in two very different television environments may further highlight those aspects shared by all children of a certain developmental stage, in contrast, to those aspects unique to particular cultures. In doing so, we might be able to ask: Are children's age-related genre preferences universal? Does a televisionsaturated environment such as the United States accelerate children's television-related development, enabling them to make a distinction between fantasy and reality on television or to develop an understanding of the function of news? Does accumulated experience with television commercials result in earlier and/or better understanding of advertising? Does children's talk reflect differing cultural attitudes toward television? The two cultures chosen for this initial cross-cultural study were the United States and Israel. Though each society is composed of heterogeneous cultural groups, both are democratic Western societies with relatively similar television fare, yet they differ greatly on other television-related variables. For example, Israel was just introducing a cable system as well as a second channel to the existing public channel when this study was conducted. This new channel began experimenting with the use of private commercials for the first time in Israel's 25 years of television history. Within one year, the Israeli viewing audience was offered a multichannel partially commercial television system. In comparison with their American counterparts, Israeli children have just discovered the remote control and channel-zapping behavior associated with such a varied system (Tidhar & Nossek, 1994; Weimann, 1995, 1996). KINDERGARTNERS AND TELEVISION LITERACY The growing body of research on young children's understanding of television has found that by six years of age children spend an average of two hours a day viewing a variety of television programs, including prime-time content (Comstock, 1991). They have favorite programs and tend to know when they are broadcast. They have a fairly good grasp of some audio-visual conventions (such as montage). They discriminate between children's programs and other television genres as well as between programs

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and commercials (Bryant & Anderson, 1983; Liebert & Sprafkin, 1988). Yet, the research literature suggests that these children have an incomplete understanding of television content and television as a medium. For example, one particular area of interest in the developmental psychology literature is in the changes that develop in younger children's ability to distinguish between real and fantasy dimensions of television (Dorr, 1983; Hawkins, 1977). These studies found that most preschoolers are able to distinguish between real objects and televised images as well as between "real" human actors and "unreal" cartoon characters. By kindergarten age, children begin to identify the grouping of television programs that are distinguished by the co-occurring features of form and content. They recognize the factuality of news but only gradually make correct judgments about fictional dimensions of television entertainment as they mature through elementary school grades (Fitch, Huston, & Wright, 1993). Yet, they still lack the understanding that television programs are staged and that television characters are portrayed by actors (Dorr, 1983). These same developmental theories claim that the 7-8-year-old period is one of significant change in children's cognitive development. Obviously, 7-8-year-old children comprehend television content differently from adults for a variety of psychological reasons (Collins, 1983). For example, while ability to identify television genres increases with age, the understanding of the persuasive intent of television commercials was found to be vague before the age of 7-8 (Blosser & Roberts, 1985). More specifically, between 10-50% of kindergartners studied (depending on the interviewing technique) were able to articulate some understanding of such intentions (Wartella, 1980). In summary, an integrative review of the literature suggests that before the average age of 7, children differ from older ones in their cognitive abilities to understand television in the following areas:
1. Difficulty in understanding storylines and narratives: Children gradually acquire the ability to reconstruct events, understand sequence, distinguish between central and incidental information, connect causes to consequences, and the like. 2. Difficulty in understanding characters: Children gradually acquire the ability to understand and describe characters not only by exterior appearance but also personality traits, motivations, feelings, personal history, and social orientation, as well as the contexts in which they act and their interrelationships with others. 3. Difficulty in understanding the audio-visual language: Children gradually acquire the ability to identify and understand the codes and conventions of audio-visual expressions such as special effects, shooting angles, slow and fast motions, and the like. 4. Difficulty in understanding the production world of television: Children gradually acquire the understanding that all television, including realistic genres, are products of human action and that behind each television text exists a cooperation between many professions and roles. 5. Difficulty in understanding television as an industry: Generally, young children are unaware of the complicated system of economic, social, political, legal, and human constraints that influence television content in various ways. 6. Difficulty in understanding the interrelationships between television and reality: Generally, young children are unaware of television's selective nature, of its role in creating as well as representing certain parts of reality, and of television's contribution to the construction of our world view.

Despite a growing interest regarding kindergartners' television literacy, direct studies of kindergartners are infrequent (see Krendl et al., 1993, as an exception). Much of what we seem to assume about this age group has been inferred from older, lower-grade school children. Moreover, rarely in these studies is the child's voice heard directly: How does she talk about television? What does he know about his medium? How do

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they choose to articulate their understanding of television? To gain a richer understanding of kindergartners' television literacy, it is necessary to meet kindergartners and listen to their voices directly. As a result, the primary resources for this study were kindergartners' own talk-their descriptions, in their own words and their own frames of reference, of the medium of television, and their explanations of how it works and what it is about. METHODOLOGICAL CONSIDERATIONS DataBase
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The study, conducted in 1993-1994, was comprised of two samples: kindergartners from the United States of America and from Israel. The American sample consisted of 48 children from four classes in a public school in one higher-middle class neighborhood in a very large city on the East coast. A letter requesting permission was sent out to parents of 87 children. All children whose parents agreed were included in the study. Of the interviewees, 21 were boys and 27 were girls. The children's ages ranged from 5.67 years of age to 6.83 years. The mean age was 6.16 years. All but two children were Caucasian with Christian orJewish religious affiliations. The Israeli sample consisted of 25 kindergartners from two classes in a public school in one higher-middle class neighborhood in a very large city in Israel. Since parents' permission was not required, all children of the appropriate age were interviewed. Of the interviewees, 13 were girls and 12 were boys. The children's ages ranged from 5.58 to 6.16 years of age. The mean age was 5.75. All the children were Israeli Jews. Clearly, the children interviewed were not representative of American and Israeli societies. However, an attempt was made to match the American and Israeli children on a group level as closely as possible. Most were children of middle- to upper-class families, with well-educated parents who own expensive homes (U.S.A) or apartments (Israel). Most families owned more than one television set and a video recorder. In addition many subscribed to cable and several had a video-camera at home. The children attended kindergartens in public schools located in safe neighborhoods. All but three children in each sample lived with both their biological parents and siblings.
Interviewing Children

All the interviews of the children were conducted in their classes, during regular school hours, by one female interviewer (the author of this article). Each interview lasted between 20-45 minutes in the American sample and 15-30 minutes in the Israeli one. All but three interviews were tape-recorded and transcribed. In addition, the four teachers of both groups were interviewed. Since inferences made in this study were based almost exclusively on verbal output it becomes extremely important to consider several methodological issues relevant to interviewing children. First, each interview with the child began with a "warm-up" chat and an explanation about the tape-recorder. The interviewer explained to the American children that because she came from a different country she was not familiar with American television and asked for the children's assistance in explaining certain things. This strategy seemed to legitimate asking questions about the obvious and to solicit an attempt from the child to explain what otherwise is taken-for-granted knowledge. The Israeli children were told that television people would like to understand more about what children think and know about television and they were asked to assist in

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explaining certain things. Since many of the issues discussed were relatively novel for the children, a discussion of them did not seem trivial. Second, since most children in both groups were quite eager to try to explain things, some in more detail than the others, a special effort was made to mirror the child's responses for further prompting and to avoid evaluative comments. By adopting the child's language and avoiding evaluation, a supportive climate between the interviewer and the children was established which encouraged the children to explain their perceptions in more depth. Third, interviews were unstructured and followed a loose outline, which included discussion of the child's viewing preferences, television genres, television technologies, the making of television, and the reality of television. The length of the interview was almost always a function of the child's cooperation. Children varied in their attention span, openness, willingness to cooperate, and interest in the interview. Overall, the Israeli children were less talkative than their American counterparts. This difference may be explained by the fact that the American sample was familiar with the interviewer, who happened to be also the mother of a class member. Furthermore, the American children were accustomed to having mothers in the class who volunteer to work with them on a variety of subjects. For the Israeli sample, the interviewer was unfamiliar and visitors in the class are, in general, a unique occurrence.
Analyzing Children's Talk

Analyzing children's talk requires confronting the issue of production versus comprehension. In particular, we must not assume that language is a clear indicator of the child's actual inner world (Buckingham, 1991; Hodge & Tripp, 1986). Children's production of linguistic utterances often fail to represent, to over-represent, or to under-represent their understandings and feelings. For example, many children produced strings of "I don't know" in response to various questions. A less persistent or inexperienced interviewer might have concluded that the child "really doesn't know." However later in the interview, when the child was involved in a different chain of thought, different stimuli prompted the same child to suddenly produce complicated and sophisticated responses referring or relating directly to the question which had earlier elicited an "I don't know" response. In other cases, children produced more complicated talk than they were actually able to understand. Such was the case of a child who suggested that the audience decides what's on television (clearly, a very advanced understanding!). When asked to explain the meaning of "audience," the child stated that the audience is the man who tells the actors what to do (probably referring to the director). Furthermore, children's use of language should be understood and analyzed in a particular social context (Buckingham, 1993). In these particular cases, the settings were clearly school-based and the interviewer was a mother "helping out with school assignments" in the American case and a "stranger from television" in the Israeli case. The interview demanded that the child concentrate on direct thinking processes, as exhibited by interviewer's requests for "think," "explain," "tell about," etc. It is possible that alternative methods using drawings or audio-visual materials would have produced different insights into children's understanding. Yet, the goal in this study was to actually hear what each child had to say, within the limits-or uniqueness-of his or her individual expressions. For this reason, as well as their young age, a decision was made to interview each child individually rather than in a focus group.

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Analysis of Transcripts

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It is the nature of studies such as the one before us that they produce vast amounts of verbal output that is sometimes exciting, sometimes repetitious, and all too often overwhelming in its complexity. Transcripts were read several times and their content coded according to themes that were emphasized in children's talk; key expressions, programs or concepts which reoccurred; and interpretations regarding the general concern of this study, namely, the children's understanding of the medium of television. While an attempt was made to let the data generate issues for analysis, certain predetermined theoretical concerns were built in throughout the interviews and analysis. This was particularly true for the Israeli part of the study, which was conducted after the American part was already concluded. Emerging schemes of interpretations were already available and were used to conceptually reduce the data to particular issues. As a result, differences between the Israeli and American kindergartners were made salient in the following topics: viewing preferences, understanding the reality and the making of television, and in the discussion of two specific genres: news and commercials. What follows then is a description and discussion of the comparative aspects of the study (for a detailed account on the early development of television literacy based on the American part of the study, see Lemish, forthcoming). Selecting specific parts of an ongoing conversation to illustrate the arguments is bound to cut off various strings of contextual meanings. In addition, it involves choice and interpretations that already reflect broader theoretical assumptions and expectations. Hence, concluding that discourse with one child is representative of others is always problematic. While acknowledging the complexity of each individual interpretation, an attempt has been made to explain it in terms of a broader understanding in order to gain insights into the world of these kindergartners' understanding of television. ISRAELI AND AMERICAN KINDERGARTNERS' UNDERSTANDINGS OF TELEVISION: A COMPARISON
Viewing Preferences

American as well as Israeli kindergartners love to watch television. Furthermore, they speak about the medium and its contents enthusiastically. Most of the Americans were in the processes of "outgrowing" cartoons and educational preschool programs (such as Sesame Street), while developing a strong preference for situation comedies. In contrast, the Israeli viewers were still loyal viewers of the educational programs and cartoons. Dramatic programming-including situation comedies-were rarely mentioned in the Israeli interviews. At least two possible contextual explanations can account for this difference in viewing preferences. First, Israeli television at the time of the study consisted of two general broadcast channels, each of which devoted only a few hours a day specifically to children's programs. Of the time devoted to children's programming, typical American cartoons were but a small portion of a variety of programs imported from other parts of the world or produced locally. The Israeli Educational Television shares broadcast time with the two general broadcast channels. In addition, as mentioned above, cable television, which offers a variety of channels and programming schedules, was a relatively new phenomenon in Israel. Even though its penetration in urban areas

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in Israel was very high, only about half of the children in the Israeli sample study had access to it. Generally speaking, then, Israeli children had much less exposure to cartoons and much more exposure to educational programming on their two broadcast channels than their American counterparts. Second, almost all situation comedies broadcast on Israeli television, including the cable channels, were at the time imported from the United States and England. While cartoons aimed at the young audience are dubbed into Hebrew, all dramatic programming is in its original languages but includes Hebrew subtitles. The language barrier presents a serious comprehension challenge, since most Israeli kindergartners do not understand English nor are they capable of reading such texts in Hebrew. This was clearly expressed by the children themselves. Many used "English" as an additional criteria for sorting different television genres. A common comment by Israeli children was: "I watch cartoons. My (older) sister watches English programs." This is a similar distinction to "children's programs" versus "adults' programs" used by the American children. Their comments were often: "I watch kids' shows; my parents like to watch grownups' shows." "English" could also mean much more than a non-comprehensible language. It could possibly refer to what is perceived as less-familiar, maybe even irrelevant content (therefore grouping it together with adult programming). The following quotations illustrate this point. An Israeli boy (IB) describes his older siblings' preference for Channel 4 (a cable movie channel) in response to a question by the interviewer (Int).
Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Do you watch it with them? No. Why? Because it's boring. It just has movies. What do you mean, just movies? It is not cartoons. It is movies in English.

An exception to this was the animated situation comedy The Simpsons. A boy asked to tell about The Simpsons after mentioning it as a favorite program answered:
IB: I don't understand a thing. It's in English. Int: So why do you like it if you don't understand a thing? IB: I see the pictures.

This suggests that when the visual attributes of the program are attractive and familiar enough (as in this case of animation dealing with a family), a special effort is made by the child to overcome the linguistic obstacles so as to find pleasure and meaning through the visual content. "What's Real"? American as well as Israeli children were spontaneously struggling to understand the issue of television reality. This comes as no surprise given what we know of young children's difficulties in distinguishing between the fantasy and reality dimensions of television discussed earlier. I did not have to ask directly about "what's real"; they freely used "real" as a categorizing device to distinguish generally between television and everyday life, as well as between types of programs. All children in this study argued that the news is real and cartoons are not. However, a significant difference between the groups emerged in relation to the realistic genres of dramatic fare. Most American children expressed that television is composed of people acting a role. Israeli children, on the other hand, were very confused in their discussion of realistic genres of

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television. One example came from a discussion of the action adventure program Maguiver, mentioned by an Israeli boy (IB) as a favorite:
IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: Ifheflieswithouta parachute he can jump. How can he do that? Is it a cartoon? No. So how does he do it? Maybe he jumps to the ocean. And nothing happens to him? No. Who is Maguiver? Is he a man? Yes. Can we meet him? No. Why not? Because it speaks English and it's in a different country. And if I travel to that different country, can I meet him? No, because maybe you don't know where he lives.

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This boy, it seemed, was unaware of the fictional elements of television drama and attributed unusual qualities to his favorite character. As the conversation unfolded, the boy kept offering rational explanations for the existence of this person. At no time did he provide a hint of an understanding that this person was an actor playing a role. A budding understanding of the fantasy dimensions of television came from an Israeli girl (IG) who described a program about a boy who can fly.
Int: IG: Int: IG: How come the boy can fly? There is a picture on top of a picture. What do you mean? It means it is a real picture and a drawing, and it looks like it is real. And someone holds the boy outside and then he flies.

Clearly this girl had a notion that someone is creating a flying scene through the use of a background drawing, but she was very confused about how this was accomplished. Actors and actresses in dramatic family programs were perceived by Israeli children as actually being related and living together in real life as a family while their American counterparts had already realized that they are just actors and actresses playing roles. Rarely did the Israeli children use an equivalent vocabulary of words such as "acting," "rehearsal," "reading lines," etc., which were often mentioned by the American children and followed by a demonstration of some understanding of the creative process of making television programs. Such was the example provided by the following American boy (AB):
Int: How do they know what to do in the program? AB: They have script and they rehearse it and they know what to do. Int: What is a script? AB: It tells them what to do. Int: How do you know that? Did anybody explain this to you? AB: I can tell by the way people sometimes forget the words.

Many American children were able also to articulate some understanding of the making of cartoons. For example, an American girl said: "It's like a coloring book and people color in and people make them talk with their voices." An American boy explained: "Something they can draw a lot on a lot of pages like about 2,000 pages and

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keep them flipping and keep them moving." An American boy discussing a popular cartoon said:
AB: It's just a cartoon. Int: What is a cartoon? AB: It's something that they draw on paper and they shoot it and it looks like it's real. Int: So it's not Teal? They just draw it and they take pictures of it. And how about Saved by the Bell (situation comedy mentioned earlier)? Is that a cartoon? AB:No. Int: What is that? AB: Just real people.

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Israeli children, on the other hand, were very unclear about the making of cartoons. In a discussion of a cartoon, an Israeli girl (IG) suggested that they are drawn:
Int: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: If they are drawnhow come they can move? Can pictures move? Maybe they are dolls that they draw and cut out and put diem on a stick. And how do they move? They move it. Who are they? The people that move it.

An Israeli boy suggested that the cartoon Ninja Turtles can talk because "they have a voice . . . they have a mouth of turtles but not of people; they have a different voice." When asked how come turtles can talk and how diese turtles are different, the boy answered:
IB: Because they have a voice. Int: What do you mean they have a voice? IB: Their back. Their back makes the voice.

Later in the interview when discussing broadcasts of soccer games, the boy argued that it is similar to the Ninja Turtles, except that in soccer they use balls and in the Ninja Turtles they use bombs. While clearly distinguishing between things that are possible and feasible in their own lives and on television, many of the Israeli children still attributed fantastic qualities to people and animals on television. Some interviewees went so far as to argue that, if they themselves were on television, they could do certain things as well (e.g., fly). For example, many of the other children's explanations of cartoons suggested that they are people in drawn costumes or that they are pictures that the "television" moves. Similarly, "machines," "electricity," and other vague concepts were used as possible explanations for the creation of the fantasy world of television. Such was the explanation given by an Israeli girl to the operation of the puppets in her favorite educational program: She explained that the puppet has a special machine that can make her talk and move when you press the buttons. What's News? Both American and Israeli children described news as "real," "grown-up," and "important." An American boy explained: "They tell people and they show things that are really going on around the world . . . it is real things that really happen on the news." Similarly, an Israeli girl said: "That's the idea of the news, that it is not imaginary. It has to happen so they can really tell about it. It's not just nonsense." The reality of die news was often contrasted with cartoons and drama in both groups.

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For example: consider the following segment from an interview with an Israeli boy (IB):
IB: Int: IB: Int: IB: I don't like to watch (the news). But sometimes it happens that I peek. And when you peek, what do you see? Things that are not cartoons. Not cartoons? That's why it doesn't interest me.

Similarly, Int: In the news, is it also cartoons? IB: No, it's like MichaelJackson, real people. Downloaded by [Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen] at 01:54 21 September 2011 In a discussion of his favorite situation comedy, an American boy said: "No, they don't

do it like Saved by the Bell. They tell people and they show things that really happen on the news." For both groups, news is about "what's really happening." While American and Israeli kindergartners agreed on their perception of news, some of the Israelis added that the news was about "what's happening in die country." The discussion of the content and purpose of news by the two groups is especially revealing. For the American children, "news as weather" was quite a common understanding: Int: Do you know what the news is?
AG: It tells you if it is going to rain or if it is going to be sunny.

In contrast, only three Israeli interviewees mentioned the weather as an important part of the news. The rest were mainly concerned with national security and politics: IG: They talk about all the lawyers and the Prime Ministers. Or,
IB: It's all about Prime Minister Rabin . . . Things that happen in the world. Int: What things are happening in the world? IB: People die. Maybe wars.

Or,
IB: I don't understand the news at all. Int: What do they talk about in the news? IB: They talk about the Arabs that want to kill the people.

And,
IB: They (parents) watch Arabs throwing stones.

Or,
IB: .. .you need to listen to the news to know what's happening. If we are in good relationships with the Palestinians, if today it is going good with them or not.

There are several possible explanations for the prevalence of "news as weather" descriptions by the American kindergartners. First, the local television news programs on the East coast of the United States indeed emphasizes the weather reports; they are placed within the hard news framework and use "hyping techniques" intended to highlight their importance and to generate interest and excitement. Second, during the winter months that directly preceded the research, the area where the study was conducted underwent a severe blizzard. Schools were closed for a few days and the

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weather reports had an immediate relevance to each child. Therefore, for this particular age group of children, the weather was related to such questions as: What will I wear? Will the trip be canceled? Will we have a day off from school? It was suggested that the perception of "relevance" of the news was the major interest, with weather being an immediate manifestation of the phenomenon. Third, informal home interviews with mothers of a quarter of the American sample provided additional insight: all of them expressed concern over their children's exposure to disturbing violent news and claimed that they make a point of turning the news on to catch a glimpse of the weather forecast and then switching to another channel. Israeli children's responses suggest that for them news deals with the "bad" and the "sad": death, war, injuries, earthquake, and so on. The news is also concerned with authorities: the government, military, police. While several of the American children mentioned these negative aspects of the news, all were concerned with personal safety (robbery, fire, murder). In contrast, most of the Israeli children were almost entirely concerned with security on the national level (which certainly bears significance on the personal level as well). Regardless of these differences, the "surveillance" function of the news (to use Wright's terminology, 1960) seemed to underlie both groups' discussions. Such was the example presented by an American girl: "It's a good thing to have cable so you know what's on the news and the weather that's on so you'll know if there's a storm or anything, and if you do that then you'll know if there's a storm coming and you can get all the stuff to be protected. Like if there was a tornado or hurricane or something or like a big storm or thunderstorm, you would know what to do." Similarly, referring to a different content area, but attributing the same function to the news an Israeli girl (IG), answered a question about what is in the news:
IG: An earthquake in America and all kinds of things. Soldiers got wounded. Int: Why do they show us an earthquake in America and soldiers get wounded? IG: Because it is important to know. If for example someone sees the news and he goes to America, and he goes on vacation and afterwards there is an earthquake, so he needs to watch television.

Here too, this Israeli girl is suggesting that the news' role is to warn us against dangers in our physical and social environment. Another Israeli boy (IB) expresses his discomfort with watching fighting in the news:
Int: So why do they show people shooting in the news if it is unpleasant? IB: So the grownups, the adults will know what happened and they will tell the others so there will be peace and if there will be peace they will not attack.

Children in both groups, so it seems, perceived the "surveillance" function of the news as it was relevant to their own personal reality. For American children, the weather was perceived as the major interest. For Israeli children, the Arab-Israeli conflict was perceived as the most threatening to their well-being. Israeli children however, were generally more preoccupied with and informed about the news than their American counterparts. A few of them were even concerned with the pragmatic implications of the news. For example, in an attempt to compare news to cartoons, an Israeli girl (IG) argues:
I" : . It is much more important. Int: Why is it more important then cartoons? IG: Because you can't help in them (=cartoons).

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The implied purpose of the news, according to this girl, is to help. When earlier asked to describe what's in the news, she said:
IG: All kinds of things. That soldiers got killed or wounded or that a terrorist came. Int: Why do your Mom and Dad want to watch this? IG: Because they are for peace and want to help.

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The overall impression was that Israeli children perceived the news as relevant to social action (e.g., helping, telling others, warning against trouble), on top of its informative function. In summary then, kindergartners in both countries clearly distinguish news as adult programs that tell you what's happening "so you'd know" and occasionally, "so you'd do something about it." They understand that news deals with what is relevant in their lives-for American children, mostly the weather; for Israeli children, mostly issues of war and peace. From the children's point of view, news is instructional and serves a prosocial purpose. The news' reality is unchallenged and its role in the construction of reality is yet unperceived.
Commercials

Both groups had difficulty describing how commercials "look different" (in terms of formal features) from other programs. Both groups claimed that commercials were "short shows" and that "you could just tell it's a commercial." In contrast to the American children, most of whom understood that commercials present products that can be bought, the Israeli children accepted commercials more for their entertainment value. When asked about the purpose of commercials, Israeli children answered:
IG: IB: IB: IB: IB: Maybe to entertain us. To make the children laugh. Because we want to see them. Because it's pretty. So it will be interesting.

For most American children, however, commercials were prosocial: they are there to tell you about new products "so you'd know" and use them.
AB: (discussing a detergent commercial) So you know what it's for and know what it does. AG: Because you can find things out for your birthday. You can tell your aunt, uncle and grandma and grandpa what you want for your birthday. AB: . . . like it tells you like what other stuff there is to buy that's good to get so you can get them if you need to get them.

Very few of the Israeli interviewees used this line of argument. One example did come from a very talkative girl who mentioned a favorite Coke commercial.
Int: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: Why is there a Coke commercial on TV? So they'll buy it. Why should they buy it? If there were no commercials no one would have known about it and no one would have bought it So what if no one would have bought it? There is a supermarket. And if there was no commercial no one would have wanted to buy it. So let's say no one would have bought it in the supermarket. So what? It's bad, because they want us to buy. Why do they want us to buy? So we will have food.

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Similarly, another Israeli girl (IG) was answering a question about a commercial for a dessert:
IG: So they'll eat because it is healthy. Int: Why do they want the children to eat? IG: So they'll be strong. Explaining a commercial for a kitchen knife, an Israeli boy (IB) suggests: IB: Maybe people don't know about it and want to know. Int: Why would they want to know? IB: Maybe people don't have a cutting knife and they need a new knife. Downloaded by [Radboud Universiteit Nijmegen] at 01:54 21 September 2011 Commercials, so it seems, are there to help us find what we need. Regardless of the major difference in the perception of commercials as dealing with products, about a quarter of both groups demonstrated an understanding of the persuasive intent and the profit motive involved: AB: So like they're advertising stuff. They want you to buy i t . . . well, paper towels, cough drops. Int: Why would they want you to buy them? AB: So they can get money. Or, AB: like if they didn't tell you where they were selling no one would never know it, the company would go out of business, no one would be coming. They wouldn't know what they have. And, AB: When they tell you this stuff they want you to really buy it and make enough money. Int: They want to make money? AB: Yeah. So they make these great commercials because they need more money. Similarly, the Israeli children explained: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: They show things that it's worthwhile to buy. Why do they show things that it's worthwhile to buy? Because the stores want to buy money. Why? Because they don't have money and they want money. But they want them to buy fast. (Later in the interview she suggested that "they" were poor and therefore needed the money, even though it was not clear who "they" were).

Another Israeli girl was explaining her love for candy commercials that excite her and make her want to buy it. Int: IG: Int: IG: Why do you think they've got these commercials? To convince people to buy it. Why do they want to convince people to buy it? Because they want money. If you see that no one is buying your products, it is a bad situation and you need to make commercials.

An Israeli girl was describing a new Barbie doll commercial when asked its purpose: IG: Int: IG: Int: IG: Because it is a new Barbie so they show her so people can buy her. Why do they want us to buy her? Because that's why they did it, to get money. How do they get money from advertising it? They advertise and then they'll buy and then they'll get money.

All of these children assumed that the only person profiting from advertising is the one

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selling the product. Television's role in this transaction seemed completely transparent to them. While the American children offered rival explanations for the purpose of commercials (such as providing a break for the people on the program to rest, change clothes, and the like)Israeli interviewees did not. In addition, while some seeds of cynicism or criticism were already noticeable in the American group, no cynicism or criticism of commercials was detected in the Israeli interviews: AG: They show you stuff that you buy... then it's not as good as it looks on TV. Apparently the development of this cynicism is encouraged by parents. An American girl related vividly her attempts to persuade her mother to buy her things advertised on television and her mother's refusal. She added: "She explained to me that they just want to make it really look cool so they can fool you like it's not really good." DISCUSSION This comparison between American and Israeli kindergartners' understandings of some aspects of television reconfirms the proposition that by six years of age there is a wide diversity among children's understanding of television. While some children were confused, others had some clear and accurate notions of television genres and reality-fantasy dimensions. However, beyond expected individual differences, a few more general themes emerged. First, the Israeli children as a whole, in this study lag behind their American counterparts in the development of television literacy. Their viewing preferences were similar to American pre-schoolers (rather than kindergartners), they were quite confused in regards to realistic genres, and they perceived commercials as mainly entertaining short programs. An argument can be made that the relatively limited experience of Israeli children with commercial television and its children's popular genres (such as commercials, situation comedies, and cartoons) can account for these differences. One might hypothesize that Israeli children are exposed to less discussion about television at home, have fewer opportunities to visit studios, watch "how it was done" programs, or encounter first-hand production experience with the medium. Israeli children's limited experience with television commercials is a case in point. As mentioned above, advertising on Israeli television was introduced gradually in the year preceding the study on one of the two main channels. Children- and family-oriented cable channels are still prohibited by legislation from broadcasting commercials. As a result, these children's acquaintance with television commercials was limited. This may explain their interest and lack of familiarity with this attractive genre and their limited experience with actually purchasing advertised products. Similar to other developmental issues, it can be argued that earlier exposure and accumulated experience in a particular area can accelerate learning and comprehension. Given that the Israeli television scenario is starting to resemble the American one more closely (Tidhar & Nossek, 1994; Weimann, 1995, 1996), this study provides a historical, comparative baseline for future study to verify this proposition (i.e., demonstrate a narrower gap between Israeli and American children in their comprehension of commercials). Recent screening on Israeli television of locally produced Hebrewspeaking situation comedies and dramatic series should provide us with a new basis for analyzing Israeli children's understanding of realistic drama. It will be of great interest to follow kindergartners' interest in such programming in order to determine whether

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the genre-preference difference between the Israeli and American children reflects difference in taste or language and cultural barriers. A second conclusion of this study is that when compared with their American counterparts, Israeli children had much more knowledge about the news and its role in society and an awareness of television as connecting them with the world outside of their immediate space and time. This difference clearly reflects the uniqueness of the Israeli's cultural environment. Israeli news is indeed saturated with issues of national security, which are perceived on a personal-threat level. Israelis are, in general, heavy consumers of news from all media, and everyday small talk is constantly infiltrated with references to news sources. Obviously, a child raised in this society cannot escape the prevalence of this level of news dependency and is apparently aware from a young age of the "surveillance" function of the news. It is also worth mentioning that the kindergartners of this particular cohort were toddlers during the Gulf War when the entire State of Israel was attuned to the news 24 hours a day in traumatic circumstances for several weeks (see for example Tidhar & Lemish, 1994). It could be suggested then, that from an early age, these children have experienced a strong dependency on the news media. This is completely different from American children, who have no immediate need to be concerned about national security issues. Furthermore, their families watch and discuss the news less, and they are sheltered from bad news by their parents (Lemish, forthcoming). Third, the two groups differed in expressing a role of prior direct or indirect instruction from others. American children had internalized in their discourse parents' judgments about cartoons being "nasty" or "bad for your brain"; that news is "important," that violence should be avoided. They were aware of some of their parents' social uses of television ("so kids can watch while their Mom is fixing dinner"); that there are certain rules about the amount of television to be watched, regarding the hours they are allowed to watch, and the content suitable for them. This finding supports Krendl et al.'s (1993) report that the majority of the 50 preschoolers interviewed indicated that their parents had rules about television viewing (although they had some difficulty articulating what they were). I found very limited evidence of such learning in the Israeli children's discourse. One possible interpretation of this difference relates to Israeli society's general evaluation of television. For example, in a survey of parents of 2-11-year-old children, Levinson and Tidhar (1993) found that 77% of parents evaluated educational television's impact on their children as positive, and only 3% as negative. This compared to 46% positive and 16% negative with regards to cable television's impact. Given that at the time this study was conducted educational television was still the dominant television fare offered to young children, it follows that these children were raised in an atmosphere that had a relatively favorable and non-critical attitude to television. Abelman (1990) argued that parents' perceptions of television's impact on their children is among the most important factors in determining the amount of parental television mediation. In addition, he suggested that external social interventions, such as public pressure groups or televised public interest warnings, affect parents' willingness to intervene in their children's viewing habits. The general lack of debate over television's influence in Israel at the time of the study (which coincided with the transition to a multi-channel society) in comparison to a 20-year tradition of American public debate over this topic initiated by the Surgeon General's report on the influences of television (1972), can explain some of the differences in the talk of these Israeli and American children.

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This difference, like the others discussed above, may be disappearing as Israeli culture moves away from collectivism towards individualism as manifested by consumerism, a decrease of consumption of high culture, and an increase of popular media and the like (Katz, Haas, & Gurevitch, 1997). Television's role in Israel as an agent for the integrating of national identity may be giving way to global trends of entertainment. If this is the case, we should expect young Israeli children's understandings of television and its role in their lives to become similar to those of their American counterparts in the years to come. Possible support for such a thesis comes from Weimann's (1995, 1996) study of the introduction of cable to Israeli society. In his sample of 180 households, Weimann found significant change in consumption of television, in the social context of viewing television, and in feelings and attitudes towards the medium. For example, increased viewing time was accompanied by uneasiness and even guilt feelings (as expressed by agreement with statements such as: "Watching TV is often a waste of time"; "I often watch TV more than I intend to"). In addition, there was an increase in expressed worries about children's viewing and in attempts to control viewing, which often resulted in conflicts. A theme worth pursuing in the future is the gender differences which seem to be emerging in the Israeli group even at this young age in regards to both the news and commercials. Israeli boys seemed to know and/or be able/willing to articulate knowledge about the news more often than the girls. On the other hand, the girls seemed to understand commercials better than the boys. Surveys in Israel have suggested a higher male viewership of the news and news-related specials. In addition, most commercials that the children remembered (those broadcast during children's programs) consisted of food products, traditionally associated with women's role. The possibility of early socialization of children to expected gender roles in regards to television is a phenomenon worthy of further study. Recent discussions of television literacy development have positioned children in the center of the meaning-creating process: the needs, interpretations, pleasures, and social contexts surrounding their television world. At the same time, they acknowledge the ideological meanings integrated within the child's general social relations and particular viewing contexts (Buckingham, 1993; Hodge & Tripp, 1986). It is here that the role of culture as a whole has proven to be a primary factor, in this study, explaining differences in kindergartners' understanding of television. The context of viewing is situated in particular families which are not only part of particular sub-cultures, but are also an integral part of and influenced by society as a whole. Children growing up within these families accept television as any other integral aspect of their complex lives, a medium which defines them at the same time that it defines the world to them. The early development of television literacy, therefore, cannot be explained merely by cognitive development; neither can it be completely understood by accounting for the family context or social relations. A developmental model needs to include the differing roles macro-cultural processes play in socializing their children to the medium of television, its role in their lives, and the ideology ascribed to it. This may be particularly relevant as the trend for incorporating formal media literacy curricula in the school systems in the world grows. Lemish and Lemish (1997) have noted, that while there is broad agreement on basic principles of media education, the different social, cultural, and political agendas of countries lead to development of their own variations of media-education programs. For example, the Moral Majority in the United States of America and England use media education as a means to legitimate existing power structures. In contrast, media literacy in Israel and South Africa is used

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to achieve broader social and educational goals. In Israel, critical orientation is intended to advance citizen empowerment and progressive forms of social change, while in South Africa it is considered to be an important part of the anti-apartheid movement. Television in these and other countries is bound to be perceived differently by young children, since what they will bring with them to their early encounters with the medium will determine, at least to an important degree, what they will take out of them. Television as a concept, will therefore mean different things to different children growing up in different cultures. Any attempt to develop a universally applicable model of children's early development of television literacy will have to take this into consideration.
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