Parents’ attitudes towards children’s TV consumption: Mediation styles

The most recent studies on child audiences highlight the paramount importance of parents in determining the impact television content may have on children’s development. This article presents the results of a research study focused on describing and classifying the different styles of parental mediation in children’s television consumption. This study is based on 48 in-depth interviews applied to parents from the Community of Madrid who have children aged 4 to 12 years. The detailed study of the indicators derived from the literature review (such as TV viewing control measures, co-viewing and perceptions about television) has allowed us to identify four parental mediation styles and to conclude that parental mediation is very simplified and reduced to its normative dimension.