Kid's Entertainment Survey

[Diceomancer]

Below is a survey for a project in a business course I am taking. If I could get some volunteers to take it, that would be a big help. Thanks in advance.

The survey is for parents of children 13 or younger (or if that was the case within the past few years, you can think back to that point).
Responses from older siblings, friends of the parents, other relatives, or anyone who might have some knowledge of what parents of kids that age are thinking are also welcome.

1. Do you have any concerns about the entertainment content your kids watch?
2. How many sources of TV/movie entertainment do your kids have access to (Netflix, Youtube, TV, other streaming services, etc.)?
3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?
4. Imagine there was a tablet type device that was designed only to stream/play children's shows/movies. Is that something you would hypothetically be interested in? If so at what price?

[Telonius]

Below is a survey for a project in a business course I am taking. If I could get some volunteers to take it, that would be a big help. Thanks in advance.

The survey is for parents of children 13 or younger (or if that was the case within the past few years, you can think back to that point).
Responses from older siblings, friends of the parents, other relatives, or anyone who might have some knowledge of what parents of kids that age are thinking are also welcome.

1. Do you have any concerns about the entertainment content your kids watch?
2. How many sources of TV/movie entertainment do your kids have access to (Netflix, Youtube, TV, other streaming services, etc.)?
3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?
4. Imagine there was a tablet type device that was designed only to stream/play children's shows/movies. Is that something you would hypothetically be interested in? If so at what price?

My daughter is 10.

1. For TV shows, not so much. She knows what's appropriate and what's not, and Netflix & company are pretty good about putting kids' shows in the kids' shows section. There are a few notable exceptions (Watership Down, I'm looking in your direction), but those are even an issue in libraries, so I'm not sure it's really their fault.

Much more of a concern for YouTube. There's loads of content out there, and it depends on algorithms and self-reporting rather than curated content rating. While the parental filter does exist, it's not foolproof, and the "you might enjoy..." stuff on the right can get really sketchy really quickly. A couple of weeks ago she was half-traumatized by a claymation thing of two hamsters fighting, and one ate the other; apparently pretty realistically. (She did use the "report this" feature, so we were really proud of her for that).

Otherwise, I'm more concerned about what she isn't watching. Took me the longest time to convince her to watch Labyrinth, and could never get her into Fraggle Rock when she was younger. Maybe she just didn't like that era of Muppets.

2. Netflix, Amazon Prime, TV, YouTube, begging mom and dad to take her to the movies. We will also have Disney+ as soon as it's available.

3. More of a "change in the times" thing, but going back and re-watching some of the old classic kids' shows is a totally different experience when you can binge-watch it on Netflix. I don't miss the commercials. But when the older shows' narratives were structured around commercial breaks, with a minor cliffhanger just before the break, it comes off as kind of strange when it cuts right to the show's return. So now when she's watching something like the new She-Ra or Voltron, and it just plays right through for the whole 20 minutes, it's a different kind of story. I'm not sure if it's something I wish I'd change specifically. More like, I wonder how that's going to change things in the audience.

One thing I would like to have - some kind of "binge limit." Like, no more than X number of shows in a row without a break. Because there aren't any commercials, it's harder to judge when I have to tell the kid, "Last episode before dinner." I can't just trust that it's going to end at 6:00 or 6:30, since they're all like 22 or 18 or 25 minutes (or whatever they turn out to be). Might be useful for storytelling, not so useful for parenting.

4. I don't think I'd really be interested in that. She's already got her (fairly small laptop) netbook for Youtube, and we have Roku for organizing all of our streaming services on the main TV. Seems like it would be duplicating access that we already get, and just adding an additional gizmo.

[JeenLeen]

1. Do you have any concerns about the entertainment content your kids watch?
2. How many sources of TV/movie entertainment do your kids have access to (Netflix, Youtube, TV, other streaming services, etc.)?
3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?
4. Imagine there was a tablet type device that was designed only to stream/play children's shows/movies. Is that something you would hypothetically be interested in? If so at what price?

1. Yes. Lesser concerns are attention-span or how much they want to watch TV, but I think that's just normal for kids their age. Another lesser concern is seeing stuff like bullying or minor bad language and imitating that. But my biggest concern is some shows normalize things I don't want normalized for my kids.

2. A Roku box with Netflix. Used to use PBS Kids as well, but most of what we want there is also on Netflix. Sometimes I watch things on Youtube with the kids, but they don't have access to it themselves.

3. Nothing realistic, as in nothing really actionable or feasible.

4. No. I don't like tablet-like things or the idea of my kids having one. I'm sure they will someday for school, but we use the TV for TV (well, Roku) and I don't want it too easily available in their bedroom or elsewhere.


I trust my kids just to watch the shows we've told them it is okay to watch. So far they haven't violated that trust. If that weren't the case, my concerns would be a lot more as some shows can look like kids shows on Netflix (from the little screenshot) but be really inappropriate for kids.

[Manga Shoggoth]

Looking back some 7 years ago...

1. Do you have any concerns about the entertainment content your kids watch?

Not really - virtually all of the things my daughter watched was in front of one of us (TV in kitche, TV in front room), and she tended to watch a very limited range of things.

2. How many sources of TV/movie entertainment do your kids have access to (Netflix, Youtube, TV, other streaming services, etc.)?

TV and Video/DVD. We generally didn't use streaming services or Youtube (partly because I didn't move on to broadband until much later), partly because they weren't prevelent in the UK until later.

3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?

Very simply, I wish the companies concerned would put a little effort into it instead of just shifting large quantities of junk because "it's for kids so it doesn't matter". Quality shows like MLP, Steven Universe, Gravity Falls seem to be a rarity. Nostalgia aside, I remember a lot more thought-provoking shows from my youth (and a few stinkers as well..).

4. Imagine there was a tablet type device that was designed only to stream/play children's shows/movies. Is that something you would hypothetically be interested in? If so at what price?

Not really. It would only be useful for a very young child, and it smacks of being a nannying device. It's a little like the children's section in the library - it supposedly covered up to late teens, but I had out-grown most of the stories there by my mid teens.

[J-H]

1. Do you have any concerns about the entertainment content your kids watch?
No, because we limit it severely. We spend a lot of time reading to our children, at mealtimes, for fun, and as part of homeschooling.

2. How many sources of TV/movie entertainment do your kids have access to (Netflix, Youtube, TV, other streaming services, etc.)?
Youtube on mommy or daddy's phone, or on the laptop. Thomas the Tank Engine, Mr. Rogers, and the Berenstain Bears are the most common "for funs" along with videos like Emmy Eats or semi-random videos of people building stuff. There are a few channels of traditional or semi-primitive building using bamboo or traditional chinese methods. The Chinese one has no subtitles and I don't remember the name. It's done by some super-skilled 20-30 year old Chinese woman who has a really neat ranch/farm environment.

3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?
I am generally content with it. I'd like to find some good video adaptations of the Bible, but they are all aimed at older children. Ours are 3 and 5, and, for example, the David and Goliath that I watched as a kid was a bit too violent and dark for the 3 year old (it opens with the Philistines killing people in the background).

4. Imagine there was a tablet type device that was designed only to stream/play children's shows/movies. Is that something you would hypothetically be interested in? If so at what price?
You couldn't pay me to buy it. They don't need to be addicted to a screen early, and there are plenty of great books in the children's section at the local library as soon as they start reading proficiently.

[Erys]

3. What do you wish was different about your kid's entertainment or the way it is consumed (I know this might overlap with 1)?
I am generally content with it. I'd like to find some good video adaptations of the Bible, but they are all aimed at older children. Ours are 3 and 5, and, for example, the David and Goliath that I watched as a kid was a bit too violent and dark for the 3 year old (it opens with the Philistines killing people in the background).

If you haven't found them already, check out 3-2-1 Penguins.

Its awesome.

[dps]

Not a parent, but my sister-in-law and her little boy are living with us now, so here's my take:

1. Yeah, but that's mostly down to what his mother let's him watch. It's her kid, not mine, so it's her call, but she definitely lets him watch stuff that I think is totally inappropriate for his age. If and when my wife and I have children, this will be a point of contention, because I'm pretty sure my wife will be perfectly willing to let them watch stuff I wouldn't let them watch.

2. We have Dish Network, so basically anything available on Dish's America's Top 200 Tier.

3. I wish my sister-in-law would at least try to make sure my nephew is watching stuff that is age-appropriate, instead of just parking him in front of the TV to let it babysit him.

4. Probably not, unless it were really, really cheap. Like, unrealistically cheap--say $5.

[Diceomancer]

Thank you for all your responses! They were a big help for my project.