sesame street

PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE

This article was downloaded by: [TÜBİTAK EKUAL]On: 19 October 2010Access details: Access Details: [subscription number 772815468]Publisher RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954 Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK

Media PsychologyPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t775653678

The Impact of Sesame Street on Preschool Children: A Review andSynthesis of 30 Years' ResearchShalom M. Fisch; Rosemarie T. Truglio; Charlotte F. Cole

Online publication date: 17 November 2009

To cite this Article Fisch, Shalom M. , Truglio, Rosemarie T. and Cole, Charlotte F.(1999) 'The Impact of Sesame Street onPreschool Children: A Review and Synthesis of 30 Years' Research', Media Psychology, 1: 2, 165 — 190To link to this Article: DOI: 10.1207/s1532785xmep0102_5URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s1532785xmep0102_5

Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf

This article may be used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial orsystematic reproduction, re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply ordistribution in any form to anyone is expressly forbidden.

The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contentswill be complete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug dosesshould be independently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss,actions, claims, proceedings, demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directlyor indirectly in connection with or arising out of the use of this material.

http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t775653678

http://dx.doi.org/10.1207/s1532785xmep0102_5

http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf

MEDIA PSYCHOLOGY, I, 165-190. Copyright O 1999, Lawrence Erlbaum Associates, Inc.

The Impact of Sesame Street on Preschool Children:

A Review and Synthesis of 30 Years' Research

Shalom M. Fisch Rosemarie T. Truglio

Charlotte F. Cole Children's Television Workshop

Thirty years after its broadcast premiere, Sesame Street continues to pursue its mission of entertaining and educating children around the world. This article assesses the impact of the U.S. Sesame Street and several international Sesame Street coproductions, through a review of research on the series' effects on children's academic skills and social behavior: Consistent patterns of data collected over 30 years indicate that Sesame Street holds significant positive effects for its viewers across a broad range of subject areas. Measurable effects can endure for as long as 10 to 12 years, and many have been found to be consistent across countries and cultures as well.

November 1999 marks the 30th anniversary of the premiere of Sesame Street on American television. For 30 years, Sesame Street has entertained and enlightened children across the United States and around the world.

It is difficult today to realize what a revolutionary departure Sesame Street

was from the existing state of children's television in the late 1960s. Although television series for children had been produced and broadcast since television was developed, no series prior to Sesame Street had attempted to address a set of specified educational goals: to teach a curriculum. Moreover, at the time, virtually nothing was known about the potential of television to serve as an

Requests for reprints should be sent to Shalom M. Fisch, Children's Television Workshop, One Lincoln Plaza, New York, NY 10023. E-mail: sholly. [email protected]

Downloaded By: [TÜBTAK EKUAL] At: 21:35 19 October 2010

166 FISCH, TRUGLIO, & COLE

educational tool. Few systematic studies on the impact of educational television existed; few empirical data were available. Thanks to Sesame Street, that would soon change.

Early on, the Sesame Street team realized that it would need substantial and ongoing involvement by experts in education and early child development. This realization led to the creation of what would eventually come to be called the CTW (Children's Television Workshop) Model (e.g., Mielke, 1990), an interdisciplinary approach to television production that brought together content experts, television producers, and educational researchers to collaborate throughout the life of the project (Fig. 1). This collaboration would not be pro forma, nor would it be limited to the occasional involvement of educational consultants. Rather, producers and researchers would work hand-in-hand at every stage of production. Sesame Street's first Executive Producer, David Connell, and Research Director, Edward Palmer, observed that "if Sesame Street was an experiment-and it very definitely continues to be one-this notion of broadcasterlresearcher cooperation was the most bold experiment within it" (Connell & Palmer, 1971, p. 67).

Figure I . The CTW Model.

Research studies conducted in support of Sesame Street and all CTW projects fall into two broad categories. Formative research is conducted before and during production to provide information that can guide the production of new material. Summative research is conducted after production to assess whether the material has met its goals and to examine its impact on the series's audience.

By 1999 Sesame Street had certainly become the most heavily researched series in the history of television. More than 1,000 studies have examined


SESAME STREET 167

Sesame Street and its impact in areas such as literacy, number skills, and promoting prosocial messages, as well as its formal features as they pertain to such issues as children's attention (see CTW Research Division, 1989, for a comprehensive bibliography of studies through 1989). As a growing number of international coproductions of Sesame Street have appeared (such as the Mexican Plaza Stsamo or the Turkish Susam Sokagi), this research has also assumed an international scope, with studies conducted by local researchers to assess the impact of these series in their native countries and languages.

This article reviews research that spans the past 30 years to examine the impact of Sesame Street on children. The first portion reviews several key studies on the impact of the U.S. version of Sesame Street on school readiness. Next, the review examines research on the series' impact on children's social development. Finally, the focus expands beyond the domestic Sesame Street series to discuss the process by which Sesame Street coproductions are created in countries other than the United States, along with evidence on the impact of some of those coproductions.

SESAME STREETAND SCHOOL READINESS

From the very beginning, one of the chief motivations behind the creation of Sesame Street was "to foster intellectual and cultural development in preschoolers" (Cooney, 1966), that is, to help preschool children-particularly those from minority and low-income families-become ready for school. Of course, "ready for school" is a very broad phrase that encompasses not only skills that are traditionally considered academic, such as number skills and learning to read, but also personal attributes, such as self-confidence, and interpersonal skills, such as cooperation with peers (Zero to Threemational Center for Clinical Infant Programs, 1992). This section reviews selected landmark studies on the impact of Sesame Street on children's performance in literacy, mathematics, and other "academic" subjects, with a particular emphasis on longitudinal studies that have assessed the impact of preschool children's viewing of Sesame Street on their later school performance and academic skills. Impact on interpersonal skills is addressed in the next section, Sesame Street and Social Behavior.

Early Research on Impact

The educational impact of Sesame Street was first documented in a pair of studies conducted by the Educational Testing Service (ETS; Ball & Bogatz, 1970; Bogatz & Ball, 1971). The first of these studies, conducted after the first



season of production was completed, assessed Sesame Street's impact on a variety of cognitive skills. A geographically and ethnically diverse sample of nearly 1,000 children aged 3 to 5 (most of whom were considered to be from disadvantaged backgrounds) were either encouraged or not encouraged to watch Sesame Street (at home or at school) during a 26-week period; across the sample, exposure ranged from zero times per week to more than five. Before and after this 26-week exposure, the children were tested via an extensive battery of measures that covered several dimensions: knowledge of the alphabet and numbers, names of body parts, recognition of forms, knowledge of relational terms, and sorting and classification skills.

The results of the study indicated that exposure to Sesame Street had the desired educational effects across these dimensions. Those children who watched the most showed the greatest gains between pretest and posttest, and the areas that showed the greatest effects were those that had been emphasized the most in Sesame Street (e.g., letters). These effects held across age (although 3-year-olds showed the greatest gains, presumably because they knew the least when they came to the series), sex, geographic location, socioeconomic status (SES; with low-SES children showing greater gains than middle-SES children), native language (English or Spanish), and whether the children watched at home or in school.

The second ETS study (Bogatz & Ball, 1971) consisted of two components. One was a replication of the earlier study, using Season I1 shows that had been produced under a revised and expanded educational curriculum. This study confirmed the earlier results, finding significant gains in many of the same subject areas and in new areas that had been added in the second season (e.g., roles of community members, counting to 20 rather than 10).

The second component was a follow-up study that examined 283 of the children from the Season I study (Ball & Bogatz, 1970), about one-half of whom had begun school in the interim. Teachers were asked to rate all of the children in their classes on several dimensions (e.g., verbal readiness, quantitative readiness, attitude toward school, relationship with peers), without knowing which ones had been Sesame Street viewers or were participating in the study. Results showed that, contrary to the claims of critics of Sesame Street, viewers were not bored, restless, or passive when they entered a formal classroom experience. Rather, frequent Sesame Street viewers were rated as better prepared for school than their non- or low-viewing classmates.

These findings were challenged by critics of Sesame Street, most notably by Cook and his colleagues (Cook et al., 1975). They argued that the effects observed in the ETS studies did not reflect merely the effect of watching Sesame


SESAME STREET 169

Street; rather, these researchers felt that the effects reflected a combination of viewing and adult involvement in the viewing experience. In fact, Cook et al.'s point was not without merit, as subsequent research has shown that young children's learning from television can be affected by parental coviewing and commentary (e.g., Reiser, Tessmer, & Phelps, 1984; Reiser, Williamson, & Suzuki, 1988). Yet, parental involvement was not solely responsible for the ETS findings. Even when Cook et al. conducted a re-analysis of the ETS data, controlling for other potentially contributing factors such as mothers' discussing Sesame Street with their child, the ETS effects were reduced, but many remained statistically significant. Such effects could not simply be explained through parental involvement; Sesame Street itself had made a significant contribution.

Recent Research on Impact

The above results are echoed and extended by several recent studies of the effects of viewing Sesame Street. A 3-year longitudinal study, conducted at the University of Kansas, examined the impact of Sesame Street on school readiness by tracking approximately 250 low-SES children from either age 2 to age 5 or from age 4 to age 7 (Wright & Huston, 1995). The study took into account not only viewing of Sesame Street but viewing of all television, as well as non- television activities (e.g., reading, music, video games) and numerous contextual variables that have been found to affect academic achievement (e.g., parents' own level of education, native language, preschool attendance). At regular intervals over the 3 years, children were tested with a broad range of measures, including standard tests, such as the Peabody Picture Vocabulary Test and Woodcock-Johnson Letter-Word Recognition Test.

The results of the study indicated that preschool children who watched educational programs-and Sesame Street in particular-spent more time reading and engaged in educational activities. In addition, these children performed significantly better than their peers on age-appropriate standardized achievement tests of letter-word knowledge, mathematics skills, vocabulary size, and school readiness. These differences were consistent with earlier findings on the long-term impact of Sesame Street on children's learning of vocabulary (Rice, Huston, Truglio, & Wright, 1990) and remained significant even after the effects of various moderator variables (e.g., parents' educational level, primary language spoken at home) were removed statistically. In addition, long-term effects were found when children subsequently entered school; for example, consistent with the earlier Bogatz and Ball (1971) data, teachers more often rated Sesame Street viewers as well adjusted to school.



A second study (Zill, Davies, & Daly, 1994) was a correlational analysis of data from a national survey of the parents of approximately 10,000 children, originally collected for the U.S. Department of Education's National Household Education Survey in 1993. This analysis found that preschoolers who viewed Sesame Street were more likely to be able to recognize letters of the alphabet and tell connected stories when pretending to read. These effects were strongest among children from low-income families and held true even after the effects of other contributing factors (e.g., parental reading, preschool attendance, parental education) were removed statistically. In addition, when they subsequently entered first and second grade, children who had viewed Sesame Street as preschoolers were also more likely to be reading storybooks on their own and less likely to require remedial reading instruction.

It is important to note that, because the Zill et al. (1994) data are correlational, they do not conclusively indicate a causal relationship between Sesame Street viewing and these various educational outcomes. Nevertheless, they are highly suggestive and consistent with data from the University of Kansas study.

Finally, the longest ranging evidence for the impact of Sesame Street is a "recontact" study conducted at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst and the University of Kansas (Anderson, Huston, Wright, & Collins, 1998). This study examined 570 high school students who either had or had not watched Sesame Street as preschoolers. Results indicate that viewing Sesame Street as a preschooler was significantly related to performance in high school; high school students who had watched Sesame Street as preschoolers had higher grades in English, Mathematics, and Science. For boys, the effect of watching Sesame Street 5 days per week translated into a grade point average difference of .35 (the difference, for example, between a B+ and an A-); for girls, it translated into a difference of . lo.

In addition, those teenagers who had viewed Sesame Street as preschoolers also used books more often, showed higher academic self-esteem, and placed a higher value on academic performance. These differences held true even after the students' early language skills as preschoolers and family background variables were factored out.

Conclusion

Together, these studies stand as powerful evidence of Sesame Street's potential for helping to prepare children for school. This is not to say, of course, that Sesame Street is the only tool that should be used; certainly, hands-on experiences provided by parents and caregivers are vitally important and cannot


SESAME STREET 17 1

be replaced. Nevertheless, preschool viewing of Sesame Street has been shown repeatedly to exert an impact on children, both immediately and once they enter school. Indeed, it appears that viewing Sesame Street can even contribute toward children's developing an ongoing love of learning that can stretch as far as high school, if not beyond.

SESAME STREETAND SOCIAL BEHAVIOR

Simultaneous with its emphasis on academic skills, Sesame Street has, since its inception, maintained a parallel emphasis on fostering social skills. The original, 1969 curriculum for Sesame Street incorporated several broad goals related to social interactions and social units (Lesser, 1974). These goals included topics such as:

Differences in perspective: Recognizing that an event may be seen and interpreted differently by different individuals.

Cooperation: Recognizing that in certain situations it is beneficial for two or more individuals to work together toward a common goal.

Behaving by rules and recognizing fairness and unfairness.

Identifying the role of family and individuals from one's neighborhood, city, or town, and knowing what their responsibilities are.

Recognizing the form and function of institutions that children may encounter (schools, airport, post office).

Social development became even more central to Sesame Street in its third season, when the in-house production and research teams undertook a major effort to redefine the series' definition of social behavior and place a stronger emphasis on this curriculum area, particularly in the area of cooperation. These goals have continued to evolve over subsequent years. Most recently, several leading experts were consulted to inform a revision of Sesame Street's social development goals for Season 30. Figure 2 lists these goals.



Current Sesame Street Goals

Affective I . Emotions:

2. Pride and Self Esteem:

Social Interactions I . Friendship:

2. Conflict Resolution:

3. Cooperation:

4. Sharing:

5. Turn Taking.

6. Entering Social Groups:

The child can recognize, identify, and label the following emotions: love, anger, fear, surprise, happiness, sadness.

The child can express how shelhe felt when experiencing one of these emotions.

The child can recognize one of the above emotions in others and express some understanding of how they feel.

The child expresses feelings of pride, self-worth, and esteem for hisher own abilities and efforts.

The child can express that anyone can be a friend, and a friend is someone for whom you care.

The child can express that friends don't always have to agree in order to remain friends.

When presented with a simple conflict situation, the child can recognize, identify, andlor propose a nonviolent resolution to the conflict.

The child can recognize that in certain situations it is beneficial, and sometimes fun, for two or more individuals to work together to accomplish a common goal.

The child can recognize that in certain situations it is beneficial, and sometimes fun. for two or more individuals to share.

The child will recognize that taking turns promotes fairness.

The child can carry out instructions that emphasize turn taking

The child recognizes and demonstrates various strategies for initiating interaction with other children and groups of children such as making friends with a member of a group, asking other children to let him or her play, and sharing a toy with a group member.

The child who is already a member of a group can recognize that a new child would like to join his or her group and displays tolerance toward that child's attempts to enter the group (i.e., acts friendly toward the new child; invites the new child to join the group).


Human Relations 1. Diversity: The child will know that people have many skin colors, hair textures, eye

shapes, statures, dress, names, accents, and languages.

The child will know that people who have different skin colors, hair textures, eye shapes, statures, dress, names, accents or languages can be good friends, can work and live together, and should be respected.

2. Dlflering Perspectives: The child recognizes that individuals or groups may have different

reactions to or perceptions about a particular situation.

3. African American Culture: The child will be able to give positive descriptions of African American

culture and people.

4. Anlerican Indian Culture: The child will be able to give positive descriptions of American Indian

culture and people.

5. Asian American Culture: The child will be able to give positive descriptions of Asian American

culture and people.

6. Latino Culture: The child will be able to give positive descriptions of Latino cultures and people.

7. Spanish Language: Functional phrases such as:

Hola (Hi) Como estB(s)? (How are you?) Bien, gracias (Fine, thank you) Quieres jugar? (Do you want to play?) Bienvenidos (Welcome) Adi6s (Goodbye) Si (yes), no (no)

Spanish numbers from one to ten: Uno (one), dos (two), tres (three), cuatro (four), cinco (five), seis (six), siete (seven), ocho (eight), nueve (nine), diez (ten).

8. Children wit11 disabilities: The disabled child will demonstrate feelings of pride, self-worth, and

esteem for hislher own abilities.

The nondisabled child recognizes that there are numerous similarities between himself/herself and children with disabilities (e.g., interests, feelings, personalities, daily activities, needs, values, abilities, desires, and ways of communicating.)

Figure. 2. Social goals for Sesame Street in Season 30



In addition to these broadly defined goals, Sesame Street has also addressed a variety of sensitive subjects, such as race relations and even death, for a preschool audience. The treatment of such material is discussed later in the Specific Social Issues section, along with some of the research that informed its development and assessed children's comprehension of the segments that were produced.

Broad Impact on Social Behavior

One of the earliest studies to examine the impact of Sesame Street on social behavior was a study of children's modeling of cooperative behavior presented in the series (Paulson, 1974). In this pretest-posttest study, seventy-eight 3- and 4-year-old children from disadvantaged, inner-city backgrounds viewed the third season of Sesame Street, and cooperation was tested before and after the viewing period through several measures: (a) Children were shown sets of pictures and asked to choose the one that showed characters cooperating, the one that depicted the best solution, and the best way to have fun; (b) pairs of children were given tasks to perform in controlled situations (e.g., building a tall stack of blocks, finding a way to hang up two coats when only one hanger was available) while researchers scored their interaction for cooperative and uncooperative behavior; and (c) researchers observed the children's naturalistic behavior during free play. Results indicate that after the treatment period, Sesame Street viewers displayed significantly more cooperative responses than nonviewers. However, this effect stemmed primarily from test situations that were similar to those presented in the Sesame Street programs that the viewers had watched (i.e., the picture selection test and several of the controlled situations); the differences between viewers and nonviewers did not generalize to prosocial behavior in free play.

This finding is consistent with other studies conducted in the 1970s that found exposure to prosocial segments on Sesame Street to be associated with program- specific prosocial learning effects but not with transference to increased prosocial behavior in free play (Bankart & Anderson, 1979; Leifer, 1975). However, Bankart and Anderson found that viewing did lead to generalization of a slightly different kind: Viewers who watched 30-minute videotapes of prosocial segments on Sesame Street showed reductions of aggressive behavior (including both physical and verbal aggression) in free-play sessions conducted later on the same day.

Stronger effects of viewing prosocial Sesame Street episodes were found in a recent quasi-experimental study conducted by Zielinska and Chambers (1995) in eight day care centers. These researchers were interested in the impact of both


SESAME STREET 175

Sesame Street itself and related hands-on follow-up activities and discussion. Thus, a sample of 150 children watched either prosocial or "neutral" (i.e., cognitive) segments from Sesame Street, followed by participation in either cooperative or neutral cognitive activities. To assess the effectiveness of this intervention, pre-and posttest observations of social behavior during free play were conducted, with an eye toward several classes of prosocial behaviors: positive interaction, cooperation, helping, giving, sharing, turn-taking, comforting, and affection.

Results of the study showed a main effect of viewing prosocial Sesame Street material: Prosocial behavior during free play increased after viewing the prosocial segments, regardless of whether viewing was followed by related activities and discussion. Moreover, consistent with earlier data from Bankart and Anderson (1979), those viewers of the prosocial segments who then participated in cooperative follow-up activities also showed the lowest rates of antisocial behavior during free play.

Specific Social Issues

Over the years, Sesame Street has dealt with many social issues relevant to preschoolers, some more difficult than others. Typically, Sesame Street material dealing with these more narrowly defined issues (which may, in some cases, be addressed in only a single episode of the series) is not subjected to the same sort of large-scale summative research described previously. However, each effort is approached with consultation from experts in the relevant area, and small-scale formative research investigations can provide some indication of preschool children's comprehension of the material as well as the segments' impact. For the sake of illustration, we consider here several social topics that have been addressed by Sesame Street: death; love, marriage, and pregnancy; race relations; and divorce.

Dealing with Death. In 1983, Sesame Street dealt with the death of its longtime storekeeper, Mr. Hooper. The actor who played this character died, and the producers decided to deal with his death on the show rather than replace him with another actor. The episode was kept simple, conveying three key messages (Mr. Hooper is dead; Mr. Hooper will not be coming back; and Mr. Hooper will be missed) and leaving plenty of opportunity for families to explain death to their children according to their own cultural and religious beliefs.

Prior to broadcast, this show was tested with a sample of thirty-one 3-, 4-, and 5-year-old children at three day care centers, and a companion set of focus



groups was held with parents. The research found that most children (more than three fourths of the 4- and 5-year-olds) understood the key messages embedded in the show: Mr. Hooper was not there because he had died; he would not be coming back; and Big Bird and the adult characters felt sad. The reception among parents was very strong, and approximately one half of the parents said that they discussed death with their children after viewing the show (Sesame Street Research, 1983).

Love, Marriage, and Pregnancy. In 1988, the production team decided to have Maria and Luis (two of the existing human characters) fall in love, get married, and have a baby over the course of the 19th and 20th seasons of Sesame Street. To inform the production of segments on these topics, formative research was incorporated early in the process-before any material had been produced- to assess preschool children's existing knowledge and misconceptions about these topics (Sesame Street Research, 1988a, 1988b). This research helped target scripts directly to children's prior knowledge and allowed the writers to focus their attention on areas in which children's knowledge was weakest. At the same time, it provided baseline data that could be used later, once segments were produced and tested for comprehension.

In fact, the subsequent data on children's comprehension of these segments was very positive, further attesting to the potential impact of individual segments within the show. Research on the love and marriage segments showed that, compared to the baseline data collected with children of similar ages before production, viewers of these segments were better able to define love and marriage (with kissing emerging as the most salient indicator of love). In addition, whereas almost all of the children in an earlier study had believed that people who were angry with each other did not still love each other, 67% of the children who viewed a segment in which Maria and Luis argued and made up understood that they still loved each other even when they were angry (Sesame Street Research, 1988~) .

Segments on Maria's pregnancy had an even more dramatic impact on preschoolers' understanding of pregnancy. Compared to the baseline data collected prior to production, preschool children who viewed the segments on pregnancy demonstrated a greater knowledge of the subject; for example, they more often defined the term pregnant in terms of having a baby (63%, vs. 43% in the baseline data), could explain where the baby was growing (83%, vs. 57% baseline), and understood that the baby could move inside its mother (90% vs. 60% baseline), among other effects (Sesame Street Research, 1989).


SESAME S'I'REET 177

Race-Relations. In 1989, another challenging curriculum was launched. A 4-year race-relations initiative was designed to be more explicit about physical and cultural differences and to encourage friendship between people of different races and cultures. The impetus behind developing this curriculum was the increasing problem with race relations throughout the United States, but in particular in New York City.

The goals developed addressed ways to promote positive interaction between five groups (African Americans, American Indians, Latinos, Asian Americans, and White Americans) by emphasizing the similarities that make us all human, and by fostering an appreciation of racial and cultural differences. Through these curriculum goals, children were encouraged to view people who look different from themselves as possible friends, and to bring a child who has been rejected because of physical and/or cultural differences into the group.

The creation of such material for preschool children required a great deal of thought, planning, and research prior to production. Experts were consulted, and because the prior literature contained little research on many of the issues underlying these topics, an extensive program of formative research was conducted with literally hundreds of children (for detailed reviews of portions of this literature, see Fisch et al., 1994; Lovelace, Scheiner, Dollberg, Segui, & Black, 1994).

This initial research produced numerous striking results that fed into the creation of Sesame Street episodes. For example, although the majority of African American, Chinese American, Puerto Rican, Crow Indian, and White children tested said that they would want to be friends with children from other groups, far fewer thought that their mothers would be happy about their being friends with children from most other groups. Perhaps as a result, when building toy neighborhoods with paper dolls, White preschoolers were significantly more likely than African American children to segregate cut-out dolls of African American and White children in homes, schools, playgrounds, churches, and stores.

These findings (and others) revealed several implications for the production of segments pertaining to race relations. Assuming the validity of social-learning theory, they demonstrated the importance of exposing viewers to other cultures, of showing children from different ethnic groups as friends, and of showing their parents as happy about their friendship.

Many of the key elements that underlay the approach taken in the race- relations curriculum were exemplified by a segment called "Visiting Iesha," a live-action film in which a White girl, Olivia, sleeps over at her friend Iesha's home. Because Iesha's family and neighborhood are African American, the



sleepover allows Olivia the opportunity to experience and enjoy new foods (e.g., grits) and activities (e.g., performing cheers with a group of African American girls); she is also made to feel at home by Iesha, her family, and other African American children in the neighborhood. Formative research revealed that, of the 60 African American and White children with whom the segment was tested, nearly all were able to recall activities that the two girls had done together, and 70% recognized that Olivia was happy about being at Iesha's home. On a more concrete, behavioral level, 70% of the children said that they would want to play with a Black Barbie doll after viewing the segment, in which the characters were shown playing with both Black and White dolls (Sesame Street Research, 1991).

Divorce. At times, research has also been instrumental in making the decision not to air Sesame Street segments on particular topics. In 1992, for example, producers attempted to deal with the issue of divorce via a show in which the parents of Snuffy and Alice (a pair of Muppet Snuffleupagusses) get a divorce. The show was written and fully produced, and subsequently tested for comprehension and appeal with a sample of 60 preschool children (Sesame Street Research, 1992).

Although the subject of divorce had been approached with great sensitivity in the show, the results of the study pointed to several unintended negative effects. Many of the children did not understand that Snuffy and Alice's parents still loved them despite the divorce or that they would still see their father even after he moved away. Based on these data, the production team decided that they did not want to risk the possibility of negative effects among the viewing audience. Despite the cost of having produced the show, it was decided that this show would not be aired (and, indeed, it never was).

Conclusion

Taken together, research on the broader impact of Sesame Street on social behavior, coupled with data on children's understanding of specific social issues covered in the series, suggests that Sesame Street can exert a significant impact on children's social behavior. However, effects in this area have been found less consistently than in areas such as literacy or school readiness. Research has shown consistently that children understand social material and messages presented on the series and that it affects their behavior in situations comparable to those shown on the series. Some studies have also found effects on children's social behavior in other situations (e.g., Zielinska & Chambers, 1995), whereas others have not (e.g., Paulson, 1974). Naturally, it is difficult to determine the degree to which the differences among the findings from these studies are due to


SESAME STREET 179

the use of different Sesame Street segments, the difficulty of influencing social behavior, or simply the difficulty of measuring social behavior accurately enough to gauge effects. We speculate that, in fact, all of these factors play a role in producing less than uniform findings.

SESAME STREET AROUND THE WORLD

The globalization of Sesame Street began nearly 30 years ago, shortly after Sesame Street's initial broadcast in the United States. Producers from Mexico, Canada, Brazil, and Germany independently approached CTW, because they saw the value of Sesame Street but wanted programs that would specifically address the educational needs of children in their own countries. To create the desired series in partnership with CTW, the producers devised a flexible production plan that is now used to create all international productions of Sesame Street. As in the United States, the model evolved to include a triune of individuals: producers, who are responsible for the creative elements of the production; educational content specialists, who set the curricular priorities; and researchers, who provide information about the program's effectiveness.

To date, 19 different adaptations of the series have been created in countries such as Brazil, China, Germany, Norway, Mexico, Poland, Russia, and Spain (FIG. 3). These adaptations feature unique characters and sets and have at their foundations curricula that have been designed by local educators (Gettas, 1990). The result is that when children view Sesame Street, they view a program that has the same essence as our domestic program, in a context that reflects local values and educational priorities of a specific country.

In Production andlor Broadcast No Longer in Production Canada (Sesame Park) Brazil (Wla Stsamo) China (Zhima Jie) France (1, rue Sesame) Egypt (to be named) Kuwait (Ifiah Ya Simsim) Germany (Sesamstrasse) Philippines (Sesame!) Israel/Palestinian Territories (Rechov Portugal (Rua Stsamo)

Sumsum/Shara'a Simsim) Sweden (Svenska Sesam) Mexico (Plaza Stsamo) Netherlands (Sesamstraat) Norway (Sesam Stasjon) Poland (Ulica Sesamkowa) Russia (Ulitsa Sezam) South Africa (to be named) Spain (Barrio Stsamo/ Barri SPsam) Turkey (Susam Sokagi)

- - - -- - -- -

Figure 3. Past and current Sesame Street international coproductions.



The CTW Coproduction Model

In order to better understand the diverse impact of Sesame Street worldwide, some understanding of the CTW coproduction philosophy is necessary. In working outside the United States, CTW's design is not to impose American sensibilities but, instead, to provide a framework for a series that will be created in-country by a local production team. Sets reflective of a given culture are created and inhabited by characters developed specifically for each adaptation, giving the local viewers a cast that participates in activities and situations that meaningfully reflect the lives of the programs' viewers. The production in Germany, for example, features a German bear who wears sneakers; in Mexico, the studio segments take place in a colorful plaza populated by Abelardo, a bright green parrot, a grouch character called Poncho, and others. Fifty percent or less of the program content is material dubbed from CTW's international library of segments. These segments are selected by the local production team for their pertinence to a given program's educational goals.

The coproduction process begins with a determination of the feasibility of and need for the production, something that is pursued through formal and informal research. Early efforts gauge the potential for support of the project among the education community, government entities, and the broadcast and production realms. Once these concerns have been addressed satisfactorily, the process of developing an educational plan begins. The production team convenes a group of local educational specialists representing a range of fields such as child development, child language, cultural studies, sociology, gender studies, art, music, cognitive environmental studies, mathematics, literacy, and other fields relevant to children's lives. The experts meet with the production team for several days in a "curriculum seminar" to discuss the educational priorities for the children of their countries.

Throughout the world, these discussions have resulted in determining a range of educational priorities. Although the curricula contain elements in common (e.g., numeracy, literacy, perceptual skills), each has unique aspects that educators have identified as having critical importance to children in their countries. For example, the Chinese curriculum contains a section devoted to aesthetics, because specialists determined this to be an area that has sometimes been de-emphasized in school curricula but is important to children living in their culture. In Israel and the Palestinian territories, teaching children in the region mutual respect and understanding is a primary focus, whereas preparing children for life in their new open society is a critical element of the production in Russia. In this way, the series can provide educational messages on some of


SESAME STREET 18 1

the broad curricular areas that are common to preschoolers around the globe, as well as educational content that more specifically addresses local children's needs.

Research on the Impact of Sesame Street Coproductions

Thanks to this broad range of subject matter, research on the various Sesame Street coproductions provides opportunities both to assess the impact of Sesame Street across cultures and to gauge the potential of television to convey educational content not addressed in the curriculum of the domestic Sesame Street. As in the research conducted in support of the U.S. version of Sesame Street, research on the coproductions includes both formative and summative work.

Formative research has examined a wide range of topics. Researchers have, for example, contributed to the development of studio sets (Gemark, 1993; Kirwil, 1996a; Plaza Sisamo IV Department of Research & Content, 1993) and characters (Kirwil, 199617; Ulitsa Sezam Department of Research & Content, 1996) by testing prototype samples with children in the target audience and using children's reactions to refine features of a given set or character. The appeal and comprehension of specific segments and entire episodes is a primary focus of much of the formative work accomplished by the international research teams. Typically, researchers set up test situations in which small groups of children co- view test segments or episodes in day care or school settings. Researchers observe and record children's viewing behavior and attention. Comprehension is usually evaluated by individually interviewing children after they view. Production teams use the results of such testing to refine individual segments and to gain information of more general value to the production of future segments. The scope of each formative study is too small to provide conclusive evidence of any specific effects. Yet, the information gained collectively from studies throughout the world contributes to a larger body of research on Sesame Street that has served to catalog elements that attract and engage young viewers and offer insight into the effective presentation of educational content.

For example, a study in Mexico examined the use of a song to model an environmental message about cleaning up trash (Gemark, 1994). Results illustrated that the song did a good job of attracting children's attention and reinforcing educational points that had been presented verbally prior to the song, but it was less successful at conveying content that had been presented only in the song. Researchers recommended that songs be used to engage children and emphasize educational content but should not be depended upon as lone carriers of curricular messages. Such findings parallel those of a study conducted in the United States (Lorch &Anderson, 1979) that led to similar conclusions about the



benefits of music to engage children rather than communicate educational content.

In addition to formative work, a number of summative evaluations have broadened our understanding of the value of Sesatne Street across cultures. Some studies have focused on the reach of the broadcast and/or have examined the general appeal of the program. A detailed presentation of these types of market surveys is beyond the scope of the current report, but they are worthy of some mention because they provide information that historically has been used by broadcasters, funders, and others to make decisions about the sustainability of some coproduction projects.

A study conducted in the Netherlands (Kohnstam & Cammaer, 1976) provides a useful example. Using audience ratings, parent and teacher interviews, and observations of children's attention, researchers sought to determine the degree to which the first season of Sesamstraat successfully reached its Dutch and Belgian audiences. Researchers found that over 50% of all children between the ages of 3 to 6 in both countries had some access to the program. Additionally, the program was one of the most frequently mentioned when parents were asked to name their 3- to 6-year-olds' three favorite programs. The study also found that kindergarten teachers were aware of the series and regarded it as useful, although some of the Dutch teachers surveyed suggested that the pace of the program was too fast. As others have noted (Palmer, Lesser, & Theroux, 1978), one important element of the Sesamstraat study is that it highlighted both the strengths and weaknesses of the program and, in so doing, provided information that assisted the production team in improving future seasons of the series. Some of the recommendations that resulted from the report focused on the pace of the program, the quality of some of the characters' voices, the relationship between the stated objectives and the educational goals presented on the series, the appropriateness of the series for its target audience, and the broadcast schedule.

Other summative evaluations have maintained a more specific focus on impact issues, such as children's learning from the series. One of the earliest studies that examined educational impact was also one of the most comprehensive. Researchers in Mexico conducted a controlled experimental study of children's learning from Plaza S&samo (Diaz-Guemero & Holtzman, 1974). A sample of two-hundred-twenty-one 3-, 4-, and 5-year-olds were randomly assigned to either an experimental group that regularly viewed the program for 6 months or a control group that viewed alternative children's programming. Researchers evaluated children's pre- and postviewing performance on a battery of tests representing various skills in the Plaza Sksamo


SESAME SlXEET 183

curriculum. Children who had regularly viewed the program performed better than did their nonviewing peers on tests of general knowledge, numbers, letters, and word skills. The researchers also noted positive differences in the performance of Sesame Street viewers on cognitive tests (e.g., relational skills, sorting, and classification) and oral comprehension. Gains differed across age, with 4-year-olds benefiting most from watching and 3-year-olds, the least.

Years later, a study in Turkey (Sahin, 1992) noted similar effects of Susam Sokagi, the Turkish adaptation of Sesame Street. The study evaluated the pre- and postbroadcast performance on a range of curricular skills of 1,166 children between the ages of 3 and 6. Comparing same-age peers before and after exposure to the broadcast, children who watched the program performed better on a range of curricular skills (e.g., number concepts, language), even when factors such as maturation and mother's education were taken into consideration.

A smaller scale study was used to evaluate Rua Sksamo, the Portuguese adaptation of Sesame Street. The researcher (Brederode-Santos, 1993) devised a multicomponent study that brought together a compendium of information including ratings data, surveys of parents and teachers, and pre-post viewing data from a small quasi-experimental study of 36 children from a Lisbon kindergarten.

The study indicated that the reach of the program was extensive, with as much as 95% of a sample of the target population (3- to 7-year-olds) having some exposure to the program. Regarding parents' perspectives, the researcher noted that a majority of the parents in the study considered the program educational and thought that the children were learning from it. An analysis of children's learning revealed trends similar to those noted in other summative evaluations, with greatest gains in language and numeracy skills.

Findings in the numeracy and literacy areas have surfaced on many of the studies. A fairly recent analysis in Mexico (UNICEF, 1996) found similar gains. The researchers studied 3- to 6-year-olds from low-income families in Mexico City (382 children) and Oaxaca (396 children). In both cities, participants were randomly assigned to a high-exposure group, who regularly viewed Plaza Se'samo in their school classrooms for a 3-month period, or a low-exposure group, who watched cartoons. Comparisons of performance on a battery of curriculum-based tests indicated findings in the area of symbolic representation (letter recognition, numeric skills) and geometric shapes. Some evidence of gains was found in the areas of ecology, nutrition, and hygiene in the Mexico City group.

The study also serves as a reminder of an aspect of general summative research design that must be accommodated by researchers. Although an attempt



was made to create "experimental" and "control" groups, at the time of the study, the reach of Plaza S&samo was so great that it was not possible to know the degree of incidental exposure children had to the program. In the case of the study in Mexico, it was believed, for example, that it was likely that children in the control group had at least minimal exposure to the program outside of the school setting. To control for this difficulty, researchers used an admittedly imperfect, substitute measure of exposure: They included in their analysis a variable that looked at children's familiarity with the Plaza Se'samo characters, reasoning that children who demonstrated familiarity with the characters were likely to have had exposure to the program.

In contrast, a study in Russia provided a unique opportunity to address this issue of exposure systematically. The program in Russia was initially broadcast in only some regions of the country. Researchers elected to evaluate the impact of the program in a geographical area beyond the broadcast reach, something that enabled the researchers to compare the performance of children who had viewed videotaped versions of each of the 65 episodes to the performance of children who had watched animated Russian fairy tales. Although a final report has yet to be completed, preliminary analysis of an experimental study of preschool children conducted in Irkutsk, Siberia, indicates that after 6 months of viewing Ulitsa Sezatn, viewers developed basic numeracy and literacy skills at a faster rate than their nonviewing peers. They also made gains in some of the social domains tested, including awareness of children with disabilities (Ulitsa Sezam Department of Research and Content, 1998).

Conclusion

The pattern of findings from the summative evaluations around the world indicates that children gain basic skills from watching Sesame Street coproductions. The strongest findings both historically and across cultures have been noted in the literacy and numeracy areas. Several explanations are possible. First, across a season of a given program, the areas in which maximal gains are found typically are the most frequently and specifically represented. As in the United States, most coproductions feature in each episode at least one literacy segment (often highlighting the same letter of the alphabet in multiple segments within a given episode) and one or more numeracy segments that, in parallel to the literacy segments, focus on a particular number presented multiple times throughout an episode. Such reinforcement of literacy and numeracy messages throughout a given episode is bound to maximize learning, as it did in Ball and Bogatz's (1970) early summative research on the U.S. Sesame Street. By


SESAME STREET 185

contrast, whereas social and other skills are also presented in each episode, the messages cover a broader range of skills within the social domain and are less likely to be reinforced multiple times within a given episode.

An additional explanation concerns the way skill level is evaluated in the summative research. Some of the studies (e.g., the Turkish study) focus primarily on academic, rather than social, skills. Obviously, if an area is not tested, there is no opportunity to note effects. Furthermore, testing an understanding of elements such as emotions and social relations poses great challenges to the researcher. It is far easier, for example, to quantify how high a child can count than to measure children's understanding of abstract concepts such as love and empathy. Although developmental psychology and related disciplines have made great strides in this area, it can be argued that research instruments assessing social variables are not as refined as those available in the literacy and numeracy domains.

It would be erroneous to conclude, therefore, that just because we have not always found strong effects in the social-affective domain that Sesame Street

coproductions are ineffective in teaching such skills. A more likely explanation is that our measures and research designs are not sensitive and reliable enough to detect the effects, and/or that we are not studying the effects for a long enough time to note them. Future evaluations of Sesame Street coproductions may wisely focus more directly on the social-affective domain. Such is the case, for example, of a study of Rechov Sumsurn/Shara'a Simsim, a coproduction seen in Israel and the Palestinian territories. The program is designed to teach mutual respect to children living in the region. An impact study has only just begun at the time of this writing, but its primary focus is on Israeli and Palestinian children's social reasoning and understanding and knowledge of the "other" group. It is our hope that the battery of tests developed for this study will be adapted for use by other researchers gauging the effectiveness of Sesame Street coproductions, thereby initiating a trend in our coproduction studies that will delve further into children's learning of our social messages.

CONCLUSION

The literature covered in this review stands as powerful testament to the potential for television-and Sesame Street in particular-to serve as an educational tool. As these studies demonstrate, Sesame Street has been found to exert a significant effect on children's academic skills and social behavior, both in the United States and abroad.

When the data from these studies are examined in combination, several broad and striking points emerge. The first is the wide range of areas in which Sesame



Street has been shown to have effects. The fact that television can be effective in encouraging (for example) literacy, prosocial behavior, mathematics skills, race relations, and preschoolers' understanding of death is impressive. The fact that all of these effects-and more-have been produced by the same television series is truly remarkable.

This review reveals a second trend: Where longitudinal data have been collected, the data are noteworthy for the duration of the effects produced by Sesame Street. Effects have been found to last for a period of 1, 3, or even 10 to 12 years, with measurable differences between viewers and nonviewers of Sesame Street appearing as late as high school.

Of course, we must note that longitudinal studies of Sesame Street typically have focused on academic skills, and even short-term effects in this area have been found more consistently than short-term effects on social behavior. However, the fact that some researchers have found Sesame Street's effects on social behavior to generalize to free-play situations suggests that potential for long-term effects on social behavior may exist as well. Indeed, if we believe that violent television can produce enduring negative effects on children's behavior (see, e.g., Wilson et al., 1997, for a review), then it seems reasonable to expect that positive television can produce enduring positive effects as well.

A third trend that emerges from this review is the consistency of effects from a cross-cultural perspective. Effects found in Mexico, Turkey, Portugal, and Russia have all been parallel to those found in the United States. Such consistency, in the face of the cultural differences that exist among these societies, speaks to the effectiveness of the coproduction model. It appears that the care taken to ensure the cultural relevance of each coproduction has been successful in helping the series reach and exert a positive impact on its particular target audience.

Finally, the retrospective view afforded by this historical approach also points to the consistency of effects that have been found over a period of decades; the same types of effects found among children in the early 1970s continue to be found among a new generation of children in the 1990s. The reason for this likely stems from the fact that Sesame Street has not remained static over the years. The first season of Sesame Street was referred to as the "first experimental season," and it is noteworthy that the current season is referred to as the "thirtieth experimental season." Production techniques and formats are constantly updated to reflect the current state of the art. Curriculum goals are continually revisited and revised to reflect current thinking on best practices in education. Formative research is used on an ongoing basis to help ensure that material is appealing and comprehensible to its target audience. All of these have contributed to an


SESAME STREET 187

underlying foundation that has allowed Sesame Street to remain timely and educate children for the past 30 years. It is these same methods that will help to carry the power of Sesame Street into the next millennium.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT

We gratefully acknowledge Maria Betances, Dena Guadalupe, Beth Richman, Susan Scheiner, Joel Schneider, Ivelisse Segui, and Fiona Yung for their helpful support preparing this paper; the many researchers whose work formed the basis for this review; and the talented creative teams responsible for the production of Sesame Street and its many coproductions over the past 30 years.

An earlier version of this paper formed the basis for a symposium at the 1998 meeting of the International Communication Association. Some information is also taken from a recent publication that reviews summative research on Sesarne Street and all of the other television series produced by CTW (Fisch, 1998). The publication also provides a brief summary of the history of CTW and compares its functioning in the 1960s with its functioning today.

REFERENCES

Anderson, D. N., Huston, A. C., Wright, J. C., & Collins, P. A. (1998). Sesame Street and educational television for children. In R. G. Noll & M. E. Price (Eds.), A communications cornucopia: Markle Foundation essays on information policy (pp. 279-296). Washington, DC: Brookings Institute.

Ball, S., & Bogatz, G. A. (1970). Thefirst year of Sesame Street: An evaluation. Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing Service.

Bankart, C. P., & Anderson, C. C. (1979). Short-term effects of prosocial television viewing on play of preschool boys and girls. Psychological Reports, 44, 935-94 1.

Bogatz, G. A., & Ball, S. (1971). The second year of Sesame Street: A continuing evaluation. Princeton, NJ: Educational Testing Service.

Brederode-Santos, M. E. (1993). Learning with television: The secret of Rua Sksamo (English translation of Portuguese, M. E. Brederode-Santos, trans., 1991, Corn a Televiso o Segredo da Rua Se'samo. Lisbon: TV Guia Editora). Unpublished research report.

Children's Television Workshop Research Division. (1989). Sesame Street research bibliography. New York: Author.



Connell, D. D., & Palmer, E. L. (1971). Sesame Street: A case study. In J. D. Halloran & M. Gurevitch (Eds.), Broadcaster/researcher cooperation in mass communication research (pp. 64-85). Leeds, England: Kavanagh & Sons.

Cook, T. D., Appleton, H., Conner, R. F., Shaffer, A., Tamkin, G., & Weber, S. (1975). Sesame Street revisited. New York: Russell Sage Foundation.

Cooney, J. G. (1966). The potential uses of television in preschool educatiot~: A report to the Carnegie Corporation of New York. New York: Carnegie Corporation.

Diaz-Guerrero, R., & Holtzman, W. H. (1974). Learning by televised Plaza Se'samo in Mexico. Journal of Educational Psychology, 66, 632-643.

Fisch, S. M. (1998). The Children's Television Workshop: The experiment continues. In R. G. No11 62 M. E. Price (Eds.), A communications cornucopia: Markle Foundation essays on information policy (pp. 297-336). Washington, DC: Brookings Institute.

Fisch, S. M., Mendelsohn, S., Wilder, G., Williams, M., Lovelace, V., & Hall, E. (1994, July). Reaching specific audiences through mass media: Diversity and the Children S Television Workshop. Symposium presented at the annual meeting of the International Communication Association, Sydney, Australia.

Gemark. (1993). Plaza Stsamo IV formative research: Set evaluation. Unpublished research report.

Gemark (1994). Plaza Stsamo 1V later formative research: Musical segments. Unpublished research report.

Gettas, G. J. (1990). The globalization of Sesame Street: A producer's perspective. Educational Technology Research and Development, 38(4), 55-63.

Kirwil, L. (1996a). Study on the reception of the set designed for the Polish version of Sesame Street (English trans, of Polish). Unpublished research report.

Kirwil , L. (1996b). Cilica Sezamkowa fortnative character study: Executive summary (English trans. of Polish). Unpublished research report.

Kohnstam, G. A., & Cammaer, H. (1976). Sesamstraat: Preliminary results of a variety of studies on the reception of a 20-part series. Hilversum: Netherlands Broadcasting Foundation.

Leifer, A. D. (1975, April). How to encourage socially-valued behavior. Paper presented at the biennial meeting of the Society for Research in Chiid Development, Denver, CO. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No. ED 114-175)

Lesser, G. S. (1974). Children and television: Lessons from Sesante Street. New York: VintagelRandom House.


SESAME STREET 189

Lorch, E., & Anderson, D. (1979). Highlights of paying attention to Sesame Street: CTW International Research Notes. New York: Children's Television Workshop.

Lovelace, V., Scheiner, S., Dollberg, S., Segui, I., & Black, T. (1994). Making a neighbourhood the Sesame Street way: Developing a methodology to evaluate children's understanding of race. Journal of Educational Television, 20(2), 69-78.

Mielke, K. W. (1990). Research and development at the Children's Television Workshop. Educational Technology Research and Development, 38, 7-16.

Palmer, E. L., Lesser, G. S., & Theroux, J. (1978). International adaptations of Sesame Street. InterMedia, 6(6) 19-23.

Paulson, F. L. (1974). Teaching cooperation on television: An evaluation of Sesame Street social goals programs. AV Comm~lnication Review, 22, 229-246.

Plaza SLsamo IVDepartrnent of Research and Content (1993). Summary of Plaza Sksamo IV formative research to develop health and safety messages characters (English trans. of Spanish). Unpublished research report.

Reiser, R. A., Tessmer, M. A., & Phelps, P. C. (1984). Adult-child interaction in children's learning from Sesame Street. Educational Communication and Technology Journal, 32, 217-223.

Reiser, R. A., Williamson, N., & Suzuki, K. (1988). Using Sesame Street to facilitate children's recognition of letters and numbers. Educational Communication and Technology Journal, 36, 15-21.

Rice, M. L., Huston, A. C., Truglio, R. T., & Wright, J. C. (1990). Words from Sesame Street: Learning vocabulary while viewing. Developmental Psychology, 26, 42 1-428.

Sahin, N. (1992, July). Preschoolers'learning from educational television. Paper presented at the 25th International Congress of Psychology, Brussels, Belgium.

Sesame Street Research. (1983). Study on show #1839. Unpublished research report.

Sesame Street Research. (1988a). First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes Maria and Luis with a baby carriage. Unpublished research report.

Sesame Street Research. (1988b). Love. . . the continuing saga. Unpublished research report.

Sesame Street Research. (1988~). Pregnancy. Unpublished research report. Sesame Street Research. (1989). Pregnancy (part 4): The bottom line.

Unpublished research report. Sesame Street Research. (1991). Visiting Iesha. Unpublished research report.



Sesanze Street Research. (1992). Findings of research on show #2895, divorce show. Unpublished research report.

Ulitsa Sezarn Department of Research and Content. (1996). Research on the studio characters and sets based on the segments "Zeliboba's big family," "Things can be reused," and "Sharing apples" (English trans. of Russian). Unpublished research report.

Ulitsa Sezam Department of Research and Content. (1998, November). Preliminary report of summative findings (Oral presentation to Children's Television Workshop). New York, NY: Author

UNICEF. (1996). Executive summary: Summary assessment of Plaza Se'samo IV-Mexico (English trans. of Spanish). Unpublished report. Mexico City, Mexico: Author.

Wilson, B. J., Kunkel, D., Linz, D., Potter, J., Donnerstein, E., Smith, S. L., Blumenthal, E., & Gray, T. (1997). Television violence and its context: University of California, Santa Barbara Study. In J. Federman (Ed.), National television violence study: Vol. I . Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage.

Wright, J. C., & Huston, A. C. (1995). Effects of educational TVviewing of lower income preschoolers on acadetnic skills, school readiness, and school adjustment one to three years later: A report to tlze Children? Television Workshop. Lawrence, KS: Center for Research on the Influences of Television on Children, The University of Kansas.

Zero to Threemational Center for Clinical Infant Programs. (1992). Heart start: The emotional foundations of school readiness. Arlington, VA: Author.

Zielinska, I. E., & Chambers, B. (1995). Using group viewing of television to teach preschool children social skills. Journal of Educational Television, 21, 85-99.

Zill, N., Davies, E., & Daly, M. (1994). Viewing of Sesame Street by preschool children and its relationship to school readiness: Report prepared for the Cl~ildren? Television Workshop. Rockville, MD: Westat. Inc.


sesame street

Documents