MUMBAI: The latest New Generations 2004 Cartoon Network kid's lifestyle survey suggests that achieving good grades in school and staying healthy are the two most important things for Indian children.
The survey indicated that Cartoon Network continued to be the leading channel, followed by Star Plus as the top favourite TV channel amongst kids and their mothers. The research also claimed that Pogo, launched early this year, also figured amongst the top three favourite channels.
The survey was conducted during May-June 2004 covering 14 centers and 6,412 respondents, comprising 3,206 children between seven to 14 years old, along with their respective mothers.
Sun TV with five per cent, Ten Sports four per cent, Discovery two per cent and Star Sports, Sony National Geographic ESPN Animal Planet all with a share of one per cent each, find their place amongst the favourite channels.
When queried by indiantelevision.com whether TV is used as a baby sitting tool; Turner International Asia Pacific vice president of research Duncan Morris said that having parents beside them while watching programmes just reinforced the learning and monitor television viewing habits of kids in a safe environment.
Adding further, Morris said that he hated the word edutainment. "The programme does boil down to entertainment and if learning is pushed down the throat, they reject it," he said.
The New Generation findings are as follows: kids' influence affects their parent's decision especially while purchasing durables such as computers (44 per cent) television (42 per cent) music systems (43 per cent) cars (33 per cent) and mobile phones (34 per cent).
Cartoon Network tops the mother's choice as the favourite channel, followed by Discovery, Star Plus, National Geographic, Pogo, Sony, Animal Planet, Zee TV, Ten Sports and Sun TV.
Another segment of the research, called 'Slice of life', claimed that 92 per cent of mothers interviewed in Ahmedabad said their families were vegetarians as against three per cent in Kolkata. Mumbai grabbed the fourth position with 64 per cent being vegetarians.
Highlighting the personal space for kids, the research said on an average every fifth kid among the sample size had a room for himself/herself. In Mumbai, however, only one out of every 30 kids has a separate bedroom. Jaipur, Ludhiana and Bangalore lead with one in three kids having their own bedroom.
The study also claims that cartoons figure amongst the top three favourite TV genres, whereas mythological programmes registers last in the list. The last years' findings indicated similar results.
The New Generations 2004 study reflects what kids like most about TV commercials. Forty two per cent said they liked commercials that made them laugh while 22 per cent preferred nice music. Another 15 per cent said they liked one which had their favourite film star while nine per cent said they liked commercials that showed kids of their age and three per cent said they like commercials that showed babies.
Kids may have a way with computers but this does not reflect Internet usage.The study says eight out of 10 kids in Mumbai and two out of of every five kids in Delhi use computers. But they are not necessarily savvy with the Internet. Fifty nine per cent kids in the survey use computers (including the kids who used a computer in the past three months). And only 19 per cent of computer users are also Internet users, the study said.
Cricket dominated the list of favourite sports among kids. Only 56 per cent of the Indian kids like to play compared to 69 per cent who prefer to watch.
There is, however, no major difference between last and this year's findings, said Morris.
Interestingly, Nickelodeon does not figure anywhere among the favourite channels. The study revealed that television or no television; most kids still enjoy playing regularly at home and outdoors.
