The Pervasiveness of Media

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IN-FLIGHT BOREDOM is a thing of the past, as increasingly more airlines equip each individual seat with a TV screen and headset jack, along with basic channels, film rental options, and satellite radio. © Charles Polidano/Touch The Skies/Alamy

With broadband Internet access, global satellite technology, and 24/7 news and entertainment content, many of us have mass media content available to us at all times. The average adult spends about 5 hours per day watching TV (Nielsen, 2013) as well as over 5 hours per day on online digital media via computers, smartphones, and tablets (eMarketer, 2013). Children and teens spend about 7.5 hours on a typical day devoted to entertainment media, including TV, movies, computers, cell phone entertainment, video games, music/audio, and print (Kaiser Family Foundation, 2010). Of course, much of this time is spent media multitasking—using more than one media type at the same time—and that overlapping usage allows kids and adults to pack nearly 11 hours of content into their daily lives. In fact, in today’s digital media environment, it is almost impossible to escape media (Pavlik & McIntosh, 2013).