Adolescent Television Consumers: Self-perceptions about their Rights

Abstract

The paper analyses the perceptions of a representative sample of the Spanish population aged between 12 and 18 with respect to the protection of their rights by television channels. To this end, a survey was distributed with 59 questions designed specifically for much wider research to analyse the opinion of minors on the protection of their rights on television and the Internet. No question in the survey referred to specific channels or programmes identified by the researchers and the information on these arose from the adolescents’ own opinions. The results presented refer to data on television and, more specifically, the respect of the fundamental rights of television viewers in general and those of minors in particular. From these results, we can conclude that adolescents clearly perceive the infringement of the following rights: equality, dignity and privacy; objective, accurate and pluralistic information; free expression and opinion – particularly when this refers to children. Likewise, they demonstrate a critical position which rejects types of programmes that do not respect their rights. Researchers propose that this critical ability of younger viewers be utilised from a dual perspective: on the one hand to create a school of citizenship and, secondly, to encourage social change to bring about a more just and equitable society..