Teen Media Consumption Soars To Almost 8 Hours/Day

This latest study cited over at PC World has our teenagers spending about half their waking hours consuming media of some type. Which may be an underestimate, due to multitasking.

An updated study released Wednesday by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation found that children average 7.5 hours of media consumption per day, an a increase of almost two hours and fifteen minutes in five years. When multitasking – consuming more than one form of media at the same time – is taken into effect, the total jumped to 10 hours and 45 minutes, the Foundation found.

The study has implications for several aspects of popular culture, she said, including whether or not kids' aptitude for multitasking was actually beneficial in a work world, and whether or not advertising guidelines for targeting children and teenagers needed to be adjusted.

In total, media consumption peaked at ages 11 to 14. Black and Hispanic students, however, reported that they spent far more time consuming media – an additional three and a half hours per day – then white students, for a total of about 13 hours per day.