Music Listening vs. Television Viewing among Older Adolescents / Donald F. Roberts and Lisa Henriksen.

A study questions recent findings that adolescents spend more time viewing television than listening to music. It is argued that questions about what constitutes music listening and music media, about adequate scales to measure time spent with television and music media, and the age range from which recent samples have been drawn, have led researchers to overestimate adolescent television viewing and underestimate music listening. Data were drawn from a pilot study conducted with 314 ninth and 351 eleventh graders from three high schools. The survey differed from previous assessments of music by (1) measuring amounts of listening in smaller increments; (2) differentiating between music listening via radio and other media; and (3) sensitizing respondents to music listening as a background activity. Results indicated that adolescents were found to spend significantly more time listening to music than viewing television. Results concerned with: (1) the relationship between adolescent sociability and time spent with television and music media; and (2) gender, age or racial/ethnic differences in amount of, and reasons for using, television and music media are also presented. Taken together, these results point to the centrality of music media in adolescence. Future research needs to consider differences within audio media as well as between audio media and audio-only media. (Eight tables of data are included and 28 references are attached.) (Author/MG)

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