Media researcher Dale Kunkel said Wednesday he expects to see NIH conduct new research on the effects of violence in media on kids.
"Not everyone may be aware, but one of the implications of the stimulus package is that there is as windfall of money going to [National Institutes of Health] for research. I would be very surprised if we don't see some additional children and media research coming to NIH," he told an audience at a Kaiser Family Foundation seminar on the effect of a new Democratic-controlled Washington on media policy issues.
Kunkel said he expected there to be money for violence research, as well as kids advertising.
Senate Commerce chairman Jay Rockefeller (D-W. VA.) in the past has proposed giving the FCC the ability to regulate violent content, and extending it to cable and satellite. At least one of the seminar panelists suggested the media violence issue could resurface at any moment.
"We're only one school shooting away from concerns about the role of violence in our kids lives," said Jeff McIntyre, national policy director for Children Now. "I don't know that we will necessarily see this sort of panacea approach to it that Senator Rockefeller is proposing," he added, "but I think it is very likely that we start rising the tide on this that there may be some approaches. Senator Rockefeller has offered in the past some variations on...the safe harbor. There are a lot of different options beyond expanding FCC authority in a more blanket approach."
