ADHD, the Media, and Growing Up

Researchers at the Kennedy Krieger Institute in Baltimore, MD recently found that boys diagnosed with ADHD scored lower on motor coordination tests than their female counter parts or control groups. The study, published in Neurology, tested skills like tapping feet to a rhythm and balancing in young people between 7 and 15 years old. The results now have researchers wondering why boys with ADHD seem so much more delayed.

Advertising and Today’s Child

69% of Parents feel that their children see too many ads on TV.

The average American child sees around 3,000 advertisements a day on TV, the Internet, billboards, in magazines and, increasingly, in schools.  Over the course of a year children view 40,000 commercials on television alone. Industry spends an estimated $12 billion on advertising to children each year to ensure that from the minute they wake up in the morning to eat their sugar coated cereal straight until they’re tucked into bed between sheets featuring the smiling face of their favorite cartoon hero they see as many ads as possible.  With estimates that children 12 and younger influence the spending of over $600 billion dollars a year it’s no wonder that the amount of advertising targeting children is growing.