Analyst Speak: Their knowledge might be lacking but the influence of children is not

8 July 2010

We recently carried out research into what media devices children aged 6-11 have access to and how long they spend using them. We also investigated the brand recognition of some of the leading names in the sector.

According to the research, most children watch one to four hours of TV a day and spend up to two hours on games consoles and/or PCs during the week. These times increase during the weekend, with 64% of children spending one to four hours on a PC and a quarter spending three to four hours on a console.

Almost all children surveyed have access to a TV, DVD player, games console and PC/laptop. The majority of this access is in a family room, although more than half have a games console, almost half have a TV and more than one in four have a DVD player in their bedroom.

Many parents say they try to restrict their children’s access to these devices. Only a fifth of parents interviewed said they don’t restrict the duration of their kids’ activity. Restricting access to PCs (69%), games consoles (50%) and TVs (47%) is most common. By comparison, very few parents seem to worry about time spent with MP3 players (10%) or radios (6%). In general, the younger the respondent, the more likely they are to have their media consumption impacted by parental control.

We gave children a list of well-known brands and asked them if they could match them with what they made, sold or did. At 59%, Nintendo’s Wii had the highest recognition. Next was Ebay at 47%, Amazon at 46%, Facebook and Google at 45%, Apple at 37% and Bebo at 35%. But there’s some confusion with what they do. While Apple is almost universally considered cool, 52% matched it with video games and just 22% with computers. Microsoft was matched with computers by nine out of ten children. Social networks Facebook and Bebo were matched as such by six out of ten children surveyed.

Having brand recognition with kids really does matter. According to our research, kids wield an enormous influence on purchasing and, in particular, which shops to buy from. Even the youngest kids included in our research, aged six, expressed opinions about music brands, online stores and games shops. In my experience, it starts even earlier.

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