An overwhelming majority of the public wants more educational programs for children on commercial television. More than three-quarters of Americans believe there are good reasons to regulate children's TV more strictly than programming intended for general or adult audiences. Eighty percent of respondents in the survey believe there are good reasons to regulate children's television. One of the reasons that people support regulation of children's programming is that they believe it has a negative impact. In addition, very few respondents who ranked the current quality of programming as fair or worse expect improvement.
Most people blame the networks and advertisers for the lack of quality in children's television.
Respondents were far more likely to assign responsibility to the television networks and advertisers than to the viewing public. The survey was designed and analyzed by Mark Cooper , Ph.D., of Citizens Research. The questions were part of a national random digit dial computer assisted survey conducted August 24-27, 1995. The questions were developed by relying on questions which had been asked by major survey organizations in previous national opinion surveys. Along with standard demographic questions such as income and education level, respondents were asked if they have at least one child under the age of 18.