Encyclopedia of Children, Adolescents, and the Media

*Starred Review* As media of all kinds become more pervasive, their effect on children and adolescents is much discussed and debated. This encyclopedia pulls together research on topics related to young people's daily media experience. Editor Arnett is a research professor at Clark University in Worchester, Massachusetts, and the author of Emerging Adulthood: The Winding Road from the Late Teens through the Twenties (2004). More than 400 contributors from universities and organizations, primarily from the U.S., supplied the 463 entries. Broad areas of coverage (as outlined in the Reader's Guide) include advertising; advocacy groups; computers and electronic media; gender and sexuality; movies, music, and television; public policy; and violence and aggression, among others. Although some entries discuss benefits, the weight of opinion in the entries in the encyclopedia is decidedly in the direction of the concerns and potential negative effects of media. Examples of entries include Cigarette use in television and movies; Gender roles in music; Internet use, psychological effects of; Manga (Japanese comic books); and Viral marketing. The relationship between food advertising and obesity; the portrayal of women in hip-hop; the cognitive effects of electronic games; the sexual information available in teen magazines; and media use in Asia, Europe, and Latin American are all the subjects of entries. A number of entries provide historical perspective, showing how comic strips or children's television programming, for example, have evolved over the years. Others discuss academic theories such as mean world syndrome and the super peer. Each signed entry is from one to several pages in length and offers a list of further readings and cross-references. The index, more than 70 pages long and repeated in each volume, is invaluable for locating information on Dawson's Creek, Grand Theft Auto, Madonna, and MySpace. A decision was made to exclude specific characters, performers, and media products as topics for entries in part because they come and go, and entries on them would already seem dated by the time the encyclopedia was published. Although the cost is substantial, this resource should be valuable at both academic institutions and large public libraries since there is no other like it. Libraries with online book collections should watch for it as part of the Gale Virtual Reference Library. Highly recommended. Shonrock, Diana