COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH/CRI: Children's Digital Media Centers

美国儿童每天花很多时间与媒体打交道。虽然大部分时间是看电视，但越来越多的人参与数字互动娱乐技术，包括互联网。即使是我们所知的电视，也将很快发生戏剧性的变化，数字电视增加了图像的清晰度和互动的机会。知道如何使用这些互动技术将是21世纪受过教育的劳动力的必备技能，也可能是学习科学和技术的门户。因此，了解儿童如何使用和学习这些数字技术是确保儿童发展这些基本技能的重要一步。尽管儿童在电子娱乐媒体上投入了大量的空闲时间，但人们对新的互动媒体如何影响儿童在非正式学习环境中的学习知之甚少。一个问题是，该领域是跨学科的。研究人员研究各种问题，而不是系统地研究交互式数字媒体的特定领域，然后将这些知识整合到一个中央信息库中。另一个问题是数字技术的快速变化，使研究人员落后于最新发展一步。这些问题的一个结果是，对于新的数字娱乐技术如何影响儿童的学习，缺乏了解的知识基础。在接下来的5年里，该中心将推进儿童如何通过数字互动娱乐媒体学习的理论和方法。利用心理学、人类发展、传播学、社会学、人类学和医学等领域的研究人员组成的跨学科团队，研究人员将探索多层次的分析，以阐明对话以互动和身份的形式在儿童从娱乐性互动数字技术中学习所起的作用。在宏观层面，将进行两种类型的调查，以记录儿童在获取和使用新的和新兴的数字平台方面随着时间的变化和相似的模式。这些宏观层面的研究将指导微观层面的实验、观察和人种学研究的方向，这些研究将检查什么是互动，以及儿童如何从在线数字体验中学习以及学习什么。平行研究活动将审查不同年龄段的儿童，提供关于儿童使用媒体和媒体对其发展的影响的横向和纵向调查结果。总体而言，这些研究活动将扩大以下方面的知识库：1)正在出现的数字媒体的种类；2)儿童选择的互动数字媒体体验的种类；3)这些互动体验对儿童长期社会适应和学习成绩的影响；4)与数字技术的特定类型的互动如何影响儿童的学习；5)在线互动如何影响儿童的学习和身份建构；以及6)观察和互动体验如何在发育中的大脑中呈现。这一知识库将以出版形式在专业期刊上传播，通过在国内和国际会议上的演讲，并通过相互连接的网站，在儿童和数字媒体领域的研究人员、政策制定者、儿童倡导团体和创造者之间创造协同活动。总部设在乔治敦大学的儿童数字媒体中心还将包括德克萨斯大学奥斯汀分校、西北大学和加州大学洛杉矶分校。中心将包括一个指导委员会和一个由杰出同事组成的咨询委员会。

American children spend many hours with media each day. Although much of this time involves television viewing, an increasing amount involves participation with digital interactive entertainment technologies, including the Internet. Even television as we know it will soon change dramatically, with digital television adding improved clarity of images and the opportunity for interactivity. Knowing how to use these interactive technologies will be a necessary skill for an educated workforce in the 21st century and may be a gateway to studying science and technology. Therefore, knowing how children use and learn from these digital technologies is an important step in ensuring that children will develop these basic skills. Although children invest their free time heavily in electronic entertainment media, relatively little is known about how new interactive media impact children's learning in informal learning contexts. One problem is that the field is interdisciplinary. Researchers examine diverse issues rather than examine specific areas of interactive digital media systematically and then consolidate that knowledge into a central information base. Another problem is the rapid change in digital technologies, making researchers one step behind the latest developments. One outcome of these problems is a poor knowledge base for understanding of how new digital entertainment technologies influence children's learning. Over the next 5 years, this Center will advance theory and method in how children learn through digital interactive entertainment media. Using an interdisciplinary team of researchers from the fields of psychology, human development, communications, sociology, anthropology, and medicine, researchers will explore multiple levels of analysis in order to explicate the role that dialogue, in the form of interactivity and identity, play in children's learning from entertaining interactive digital technologies. At a macro level, two types of survey will be conducted to document patterns of change and similarity over time in children's access to, and use of, new and emerging digital platforms. These macro level studies will guide the direction of micro level experimental, observational, and ethnographic studies that will examine what interactivity is and how and what children learn from online digital experiences. Parallel research activities will examine children at different age groups, providing both cross-sectional and longitudinal findings on children's uses of media and the impact of media on their development. Overall, these research activities will expand the knowledge base about: 1) the kinds of digital media that are emerging; 2) the kinds of interactive digital media experiences children choose to have; 3) the impact of these interactive experiences on children's long-term social adjustment and academic achievement; 4) how specific kinds of interactions with digital technologies impact children's learning; 5) how interacting with each other online influences children's learning and identity construction; and 6) how observational and interactive experiences are represented in the developing brain. This knowledge base will be disseminated in published form in professional journals, through presentations at national and international conferences, and via interconnected websites to create synergistic activities among the researchers, policy makers, child advocacy groups, and creators in the children and digital media field.The Children's Digital Media Centers, based at Georgetown University, will also include the University of Texas at Austin, Northwestern University, and the University of California Los Angeles. Centers will include a Steering Committee and an Advisory Board of distinguished colleagues.