Libraries adding video games. The American Library Association has announced a new project funded with a $1 million grant from the Verizon Foundation, the charitable branch of Verizon Communications. The project will place video gaming systems like XBOX 360’s and Wii’s in public libraries and will then will be studied to see how video gaming affects the literacy skills of young people. This is an interesting way for libraries to adapt to the changing interests of today’s youth in order to remain relevant. Read the full story here…

Summer camps place cell phones, electronics on hold. In our ultra-connected world, young campers are learning to be without their Ipod’s, cell phones, and video games. Read the full story…

Movie Studios Agree To Help Discourage Teen Smoking. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control says teenagers are twice as likely to pick up the habit if they see cigarette smoking in movies, on television, or in cigarette ads. Also, tobacco companies use menthol flavor to get young people to smoke, says a new study to be published in the American Journal of Public Health. To combat this glamorization of smoking motion picture studios will be placing commercials discouraging smoking on DVD copies of films that depict characters smoking. Read the full story…

Gossip girl goes too far again. As an inappropriate follow-up to April’s edgy marketing of WB’s Gossip GIrl series (picture at left), the network has once again pushed the envelope. The series seems to be capitalizing on the criticism it has received from parent groups that have taken issue with the series’ sex and drug riddled plots involving teens. Click here to see the current marketing images…

VA School may “Go Green” and implement a 4-day school week. Read the story here...

Teens listening to more FM Radio. After a 2007 study suggested that most teens are listneing to less radio than they had in the past, a new study has stated that teens report increasing radio listening this year. While the reason for this is unknown I would speculate that young people find it easier to flip on a radio rather than constantly be flipping through songs on an Ipod. Additionally, in our connected world, listening to the radio creates a greater feeling of being linked with the outside world than an MP3 player. Read the story here…

Textbooks going electronic. With McGraw-Hill reporting that they will be offering 95% of their textbooks in electronic versions, Amazon is looking to capitalize with their new e-reader Kindle. Imagine a world where a college student can have all of their textbooks easily accessible in a device the size of a notebook. No more lugging around heavy backpacks! It reminds me of the moment I bought my first Ipod and realized I could hold my entire music collection in the palm of my hand. The one drawback is that I guess it would be hard to sell your used textbooks. Read the full story…

“Playground for pedophiles”. A new teen dating site called MyLOL.net is receiving criticism that it will become a “playground for pedophiles”. With

19,000 worldwide members (150 of which are males over 40) the site has become the top teen dating site on the net. Read the full story here. / View video here.

In This User-Generated World, Teen Girls Prefer Expert Content. Even though this is a generation that loves to create content, teen girls seem to still prefer to receive information from experts found in magazines rather than from friends’ blogs. Read the full story…

I don’t know about you, but I am constantly looking for “The Next Big Thing.” Whether it’s the latest trend in fashion, in film, literature, television, or really anything pop culture oriented, I’m interested.  One of the most difficult areas of pop culture to predict the next big thing is music. With the prevalence of sites like Myspace.com and purevolume.com, up and coming bands can circumvent the usual process of non-stop touring and eventually getting signed to a major label before gaining wide exposure.  Now, a young artist can record a demo on his home computer, post it on Myspace and within weeks be exposed to millions of prospective fans.  For this reason, it can become very difficult for parents to keep up with the music their teens are listening to. To help you keep up on what news trends may be in popular music and who and what the next big artists could be I suggest you check out the list of “next little things” on idolator.com.

Each entry lists a few new bands from all genre’s and gives a brief review of the kind of music and what’s unique about them.  It may not be useful for all, but if you know teens who love music, this site may give you something to talk to them about.   

The Nokia Lolitas: A combustible mix of minors, sex and technology

It’s a sultry early Friday night in downtown Fairfield and a pod of teenagers has converged at the local 7-11 for the free Slurpees being given away in celebration of July 11, aka 7/11. The teens are armed with all the tech you’d expect from suburban kids of some means, raised in the age of cell phones and the Internet. Instead of riding Razor Scooters, they’re talking on Razr V3 fully-loaded phones and listening to tunes on their iPods. As the new tech has taken hold, it’s been accompanied by a spike in amateur, do-it-yourself exhibitionism. It’s a sexual revolution that’s trickling down to teens, who are experimenting with sexuality in a way that’s more public than ever before. Read the full story… 

Studies Suggest, But Don’t Confirm, Bullying-Suicide Connection 

Researchers have repeatedly found signs of an apparent connection between bullying and suicide in children, according to a new review of studies from 13 countries. Nevertheless, there is no definitive evidence that bullying makes kids more likely to kill themselves.  Still, “once we see that there’s an association, we can act on it and try to prevent it,” said review lead author Dr. Young-Shin Kim, an assistant professor at Yale University School of Medicine’s Child Study Center.  According to international studies, bullying is common and affects anywhere from 9 percent to 54 percent of children. In the United States, many have blamed bullying for spurring acts of violence, including the Columbine High School massacre. Read the full story…

Cyberbullying grows bigger and meaner with photos, video 

Ricky Alatorre doesn’t know which classmate surreptitiously hoisted a cellphone camera and snapped his picture or exactly when it happened. All Ricky, 16, knows is the fuzzy yet distinguishable portrait of him in English class showed up on MySpace, on a page that claimed to be his. And the fake profile, titled “The Rictionary,” not only identified his school but also said Ricky loved dictionaries — a swipe at his school smarts — and was gay (he’s not), one of the most common schoolyard taunts. Read the full story…

Disney bucks music industry downturn 

While many music industry executives are crying in their soup, Walt Disney Music Group’s Damon Whiteside is singing “Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.” Whiteside, senior vice president of marketing of Walt Disney Records, saw a whopping 60 percent rise in music sales from 2006 to 2007 because of the tween and young-teen music craze led by Disney star Miley Cyrus. Meanwhile, overall music industry sales were down 17 percent in the same period because of digital downloads and pirated music online. “It’s thanks to the tween and younger teens that the music business is staying alive,” Whiteside said here at the YPulse 2008 National Mashup, a two-day conference about teens and technology. Read the full story…

Teen Pregnancy: Why the U.S. Lags Behind Europe 

Of all the industrialized countries in the world, the U.S. has, by far, the highest instance of teenage pregnancies with a rate that more than doubles the nearest competitors.  After posting on the topic earlier this week, I did some further research and came up with some common sense answers as to why this is.  One of the best sources I found was Advocates for Youth.  Each summer since in 1998, Advocates for Youth and the University of North Carolina at Charlotte sponsor annual study tours to France, Germany, and the Netherlands to explore why adolescent sexual health outcomes are so much more positive in the three European countries than in the U.S.  The following italicized bulleted points are from their most recent findings.  Here I will go point and counter point with what the Europeans do successfully and our U.S. reality—buckle up! Read the full story… 

Cell phone is mom-avoidance device for teens

Tweens and teens are pushing parents to adopt text messaging so they don’t have to talk “live” over the cell phone, according to mobile phone executives. A typical teenager carrying a cell phone might let mom’s call roll over to voicemail and then immediately text her back, “What going on?,” according to Stephen Saiz, manager of consumer insight and strategy of the Walt Disney Internet Group’s North American mobile division. “Teens are pushing their parents to go on mobile because they don’t really want to communicate with them directly,” Saiz said here on a panel of mobile executives at the YPulse 2008 National Mashup, a two-day conference on teens and technology. He said later in an interview that his Disney division researches teens’ and parents’ behavior on the cell phone and with its mobile applications. The majority of older audiences using Disney mobile applications skew to mothers who are goaded there by their kids, he said. And most tweens and teens prefer to text message and instant chat with parents and friends rather than talk directly so that they can continue doing other things like play video games with friends, he said. Read the full story…

Turn off TV during meals or teens may get fat.

Everyone knows what too much television can do to the mind and what too little exercise can do to the body, but a Canadian study has now shown that the boob tube can also lead to an increase in how much we eat.  Studying childhood obesity, University of Toronto nutritionist Harvey Anderson found that kids who watched TV while eating lunch took in 228 extra calories than those who ate without the television on. Read the full story…

Hannah Montana in 3D. 

The hit Hannah Montana movie will be nearly inescapable on television this month in every dimension.Hannah Montana & Miley Cyrus: Best of Both Worlds Concert will come to Starz in standard- and high-definition starting 9 p.m. ET Saturday, July 26, the premium cable channel announced Thursday. The 3-D version of the film, which had a limited-engagement theater run earlier this year, will begin showing on the Starz on Demand and Starz HD on Demand channels on Sunday, July 27, along with the other two versions. Read the full story…

 
New study finds 1/3 of all entertainment is consumed on computers. 

36 percent of all entertainment is consumed on computers, according to Netpop Research, whose recent findings underscore the central role of the PC as a primary access point for entertainment, reports MarketingCharts. Teens and adults (those age 13-34) with broadband connections now spend more time in front of computers than watching blockbuster movies or reading novels and fashion magazines, the study found. In a typical month, according to Netpop, content consumed on desktop and laptop computers is responsible for. Read the full story…

Theaters planning on having night long showings of new Batman movie. 

In a frenzy, fans have bought so many late-night tickets for the July 18 opening of the next Batman movie that theaters in places like San Diego, Chicago, and even Eagan, Minn., are scheduling 6 a.m. screenings for those who can’t get in at midnight or 3 in the morning. Movie theaters have sometimes opened their doors at odd hours for their most highly anticipated films, say, an entry in the “Star Wars” series, and midnight shows have become part of the summer blockbuster ritual. Read the full story…

Teens find it easy to get heroin.

There is an alert for parents everywhere. A dangerous drug is lurking the halls of your child’s school. Health officials say heroin is quickly becoming the drug of choice not just for those who typically use it, but for high school students in search of a new high. Most parents have no idea how easy this is for their kids to get a hold of. The issue is a big concern in Portage and the focus of a meeting at the district’s Administration Building Thursday. The death of Amy Bousfield, a recent Portage Central graduate is shining light on a heroin problem among teens. The 18 year old recently died from overdosing on the drug. Read the full story…

 

USMagazine.com: Heidi Montag wants to record a Christian Album.

There is a different side to Heidi Montag that you don’t see on MTV’s The Hills, the 21-year-old budding singer tells USA Today. “I have been the most religious person since I was 2 years old. I always felt this crazy connection to God,” says Montag, who identifies herself as “kind of non-denominational Baptist.” Montag — who just released her latest single “Fashion” and frequently reads the Bible — says she even wants to record a Christian album. She adds that she once planned on devoting her life to God as a missionary in Africa.  Read the full story…

 

US News & World Report: Housing crisis popular with popular teens. 

While the housing bust is threatening to drag the entire economy into a debilitating recession, it’s great news for the teenage party scene.  With a wanton lack of sympathy for the mortgage meltdown and ensuing credit crisis, teenagers in one California community are using abandoned foreclosed homes as venues for unchaperoned—and presumably “raging”—drinking parties. Read the full story…

Minneapolis Star tribune: Teens who speed may soon meet cars that tattle.

Here’s one way to get teen drivers off the cell phone: Make them hook it up to the speedometer and automatically text Mom and Dad whenever the car is speeding.  The phones could conceivably keep track of such things as the number of passengers in the car, whether they’re wearing seatbelts and even monitor the volume of the stereo. Read the full story…

New York Times: Teen cruising declines as gas prices rise. 

For car-loving American teenagers, this is turning out to be the summer the cruising died. Kevin Ballschmiede, 16, pined for his 1999 Dodge Ram — “my pride and joy” — the other night as he hung out in a parking lot in this town outside Chicago. Given that filling the 26-gallon tank can now cost more than $100, he had left it at home and caught a ride.  From coast to coast, American teenagers appear to be driving less this summer. Police officers who keep watch on weekend cruising zones say fewer youths are spending their time driving around in circles, with more of them hanging out in parking lots, malls or movie theaters. Read the full story…

Kansas City Star: Growing modesty movement shows teens they can be stylish without revealing too much

Low-cut camis and short dresses may be the rage in fashion and celebrity magazines, but many young women say the styles expose too much, especially during summer. They’ve turned to faith-based organizations for help. The modesty movement, as it’s called, is gaining support from religious leaders who say it’s time to cover up. Religious groups have promoted modest-themed fashion shows and proms, and referred brides-to-be to shops that sell modest gowns. This month, hundreds attended the sold-out Pure Fashion Show at Arden Hills Resort Club & Spa in Sacramento, Calif. The Friday night show featured local teens from various churches modeling modest fashion from casual wear to evening formals. Read the full story…

TIME: Should you drink with your teen? 

The data indicate there are fewer young drinkers, but a greater proportion of them are hard-core drinkers. Parents have helped create this paradox. Many parents seem torn between two competing impulses: officially, most say in surveys that they oppose any drinking by those under 21. But unofficially many also seem to think kids will be kids—after all, not so long ago, they were themselves drinking as teens. A few of these parents have even allowed their kids to have big drunken parties at home. Read the full story…

What Are Youth Watching on their Phones?  

There is a lot of noise about mobile video lately. Just the other day, MoCoNews reported that 90 percent of Venture Capitalists in a poll said mass adoption of mobile video will take off in the next five years, and 60 percent expect it will happen within the next three years. The question seems to be WHAT we will be watching. The answer could differ for teens and adults. The latter, it seems, enjoy watching mobile video in-transit or between activities. Mobile phones, in and of themselves, are, to some degree, founded on the principle of multi-tasking – i.e. being able to do certain things while involved in other activities. Read the full story…

AP: Poll: Schools not properly preparing kids. 

Half of Americans say U.S. schools are doing only a fair to poor job preparing kids for college and the work force. Even more feel that way about the skills kids need to survive as adults, an Associated Press poll released Friday finds.
“A lot of kids, when they get out school, are kind of lost,” said Jamie Norton, a firefighter in Gridley, Calif. “When you get out of high school, what are you educated to do?” Read the full story…

Teens, church hold different views of oral sex 

More than 10 years after President Clinton made the argument that oral sex isn’t really sex, a generation of adolescents seems to agree. Defining chastity was a prominent issue of two religious youth conferences earlier this month, one for Catholics in Boca Raton and another for Mormons in Miramar. Although church and school leaders say they have become more explicit in their teachings, 70 percent of 14- to 19-year-olds still don’t consider oral sex to be sex, according to a 2007 study in the Journal of Adolescent Health. Read the full story…

MultiMedia Intelligence: Teen Mobile Market Running Out of Steam as Subscribers Reach the Saturation Point.

The US 12-17 teen cellular subscribers surpassed 16 million in 2007, according to market research and consultancy firm MultiMedia Intelligence. This is up 12% from 2006.  By 2012, the number of teen subscribers will reach 17 million, a delta of only 1 million subscribers from 2007. Wireless penetration rates for teens are reaching saturation, resulting in stagnating growth. Since the teen market is not a multiple handset demographic, subscriber growth is forced to slow.  “The teen market has been the ‘golden child’ for cellular providers in the US,” according to Frank Dickson, Chief Research Officer for MultiMedia Intelligence. “In addition to growing subscribers, teen ARPU has been growing higher than that of the overall market. Teens simply use their phones to do more, from text messaging to purchasing premium content. However, pricing pressures and teen cellular saturation are bringing an end to the teen cellular gold rush.”  Read the full story…

Teens go green.

As evident from the large number of performers touring on bio-diesel buses, organic cotton T-shirts lining store racks and eco-friendly residences featured on reality shows, the world as teens know it is turning green. Teens are responding to the push for environmentalism by making green lifestyle changes and raising awareness about this prominent issue.

The first time I heard about Katy Perry’s song “I Kissed A Girl” it was being sung by numerous young people.  Whether they liked or disliked it (some of them informed me that they thought it was dumb…) it was still being sung to a degree that made me realize the extent of its catchiness.  Then I contemplated the lyrics.  It dawned on me that a girl was singing about kissing a girl and liking it.  Uh oh!  

Click to read more ...

TheStar.com:  Can subcultures still thrive in the glare of the digital age?

The underground, and especially the subcultures that inhabit it, have been much debated and examined since British academic Dick Hebdige published Subculture: The Meaning of Style (1979), a groundbreaking examination of the symbols and rituals of the punk subculture in London. Almost a decade after Subculture, in an essay reflecting on youth culture, Hebdige wrote: “Subculture forms up in the space between surveillance and the evasion of surveillance, it translates the fact of being under scrutiny into the pleasure of being watched. It is a hiding in the light.” Read the full story… 

Family meals turn teenaged girls away from drugs, alcohol 

Adolescent girls who sit down for frequent meals with their families are half as likely to smoke, drink and use marijuana as those who share family meals less often, according to a new study. “Part of it is just parents being more in touch with their kids, being able to see earlier on if their kids are veering down a path that might not be filled with healthy choices,” says Marla Eisenberg, lead author of the paper and a professor of pediatrics in the University of Minnesota’s medical school. Read the full story…

MediaPost: Overexposed: Kids See Too Many Alcohol Ads On Cable

Alcohol TV commercials are on the rise—and more young people are being exposed to them, especially on cable programs. Georgetown University’s Center on Alcohol Marketing and Youth (CAMY) says 12- to-20-year-olds witnessed nearly a 40% rise in alcohol messaging from 2001 to 2007. The group says exposure levels to these ads by young people are the highest since the group begin monitoring ads in 2001. But there is some progress—especially from one self-regulating approach from alcohol trade associations. Where 30% or more of a TV show’s audience is made up of underage drinkers—under age 21—the group notes that the percentage of alcohol product ads on these programs has been trimmed to 6.3% in 2007 from 11% in 2003. The main problem is cable TV. Read the full story…

New York Post: RETAILER SEES RED OVER RISQUE AD ‘SPEED DRESSING’ 

New York ad agency Saatchi & Saatchi is trying to contain the damage after a major client, JC Penney, took the firm to task over a fake viral ad that makes light of teen sex. The ad, called “Speed Dressing,” shows two teens practicing taking their clothes off - and then putting them back on quickly - in anticipation of eventually hooking up in the basement while mom is upstairs. The spot displays Penney’s logo and campaign slogan, “Every Day Matters.” Penney officials claim they became aware of the ad, which never aired on television, only after it popped up on YouTube and a slew of other Web sites over the weekend. Read the full story…

Red Herring: Report: Apple Killed Music Industry 

Apple’s iPod is partly to blame for the collapse of the music industry, according to a report Friday from researcher eMarketer. The Mac maker helped set the tone for a “rat’s nest of restrictions and incompatibilities” that have stalled the growth of digital music, according to Paul Verna, the author of the report. Revenue in the music industry continues to decline in part because of consumer confusion, the report said. A big part of the reason is music fans are asked to sort out the explosion of incompatible formats, players, restrictions, and retailers. That lack of simplicity  has slowed sales. Apple has been a “double-edged sword” for the industry, the report said. Its closed system works well for iPod users, “but leaves many frustrated consumers outside of that system.” Read the full story…

CNET: Kid Rock’s surprising take on illegal downloading 

Kid Rock’s sarcastic “just do it” YouTube rant on illegal downloading is funny and makes the point—illegal downloading is stealing. With a smile on his face Rock says, “I’m rich,” so sure it’s OK to steal my music. Oh, and while you’re at it, “Steal everything.” Steal an iPod, Steve Jobs is a billionaire, he’ll never miss it. Get yourself a Toyota, “They’re foreign” and the gas too, “You know how much money the oil companies make?” Rock shrugs it all off, “They’re not going to miss $30 or $40 worth of gas.”  Read the full story and watch the video… 

MSNBC: Religious Americans: My faith isn’t the only way 

America remains a nation of believers, but a new survey finds most Americans don’t feel their religion is the only way to eternal life — even if their faith tradition teaches otherwise.  The findings, released Monday in a survey of 35,000 adults, can either be taken as a positive sign of growing religious tolerance, or disturbing evidence that Americans dismiss or don’t know fundamental teachings of their own faiths.  Among the more startling numbers in the survey, conducted last year by the Pew Forum on Religion and Public Life: 57 percent of evangelical church attendees said they believe many religions can lead to eternal life, in conflict with traditional evangelical teaching.  Read the full story…

AP: Little `Barbie Brat’ bullies become concern 

Recess was Allie Long’s favorite part of the day until the second grade, when some of her friends on the playground pressured her to join their whisper campaign against a classmate. Allie shrugged. She didn’t want to hear their rumor or help spread it around. In an instant, her best friends since kindergarten became her tormenters. “They started taunting and teasing her,” said Allie’s mom, Trudy Ludwig. “She was on this play structure and they blocked all of the exits and wouldn’t let her off. They started moving closer to her. Allie just freaked out. One of the girls realized it was getting out of hand and got a teacher to help.” Bullying among adolescents has captured the attention of researchers, educators and parents alarmed by a parade of mean girls and cyber-bullies caught in mid-punch on viral video. But such aggression may not just happen in a whirl of adolescent hormones, some in the growing anti-bully movement argue. Read the full story…

Advertising Age: Hey, Buddy, Can I Bum a Snus Off You? 

Faced with rising taxes for cigarettes — in New York the price of a pack hit $9 — and ever-tightening smoking bans in places such as Los Angeles, where a bill threatens to force smokers out of all outdoor eating areas, Big Tobacco is trying a new approach to keep America’s dwindling 45 million smokers in the fold. The solution: snus (they are always curiously plural), a pinch of steam-cured tobacco nestled in a tiny tea-bag-like pouch. Snus don’t need to be spit out like traditional fermented dipping tobacco; they simply remain under your upper lip until you’ve gotten your nicotine fix.  Read the full story…

Advertising Age: In Google We Trust

The most reputable company in America: Google, which toppled Microsoft from the top perch in the 2007 Harris Interactive Reputation Quotient study released today — and sent it tumbling all the way down to No. 10. But what should be even more eye-opening to the companies rounding out the top 10 — which include Johnson & Johnson and General Mills — and the rest of the list is that Google’s victory shows that a company that spends nothing on advertising can still be the most positively perceived by consumers.  Read the full story…

Texting ‘addiction’ costing teens, parents

When the cell bill arrived, complete with a $300 payment notice, Travis Ramsay was in a state of disbelief. Travis Ramsay ran up a $300 mobile phone bill, mainly because of texting charges. “I was pretty mad,” the 13-year-old said. “I walked outside and punched the wall as hard as I could.” He was mad because even though the bill was his father’s name, Travis Ramsay had to pay it. After all, it was his text messaging that padded the amount due. Ramsay said when he started texting his friends, some who at times were standing right by him, and he didn’t realize the cost. Plus, he said, it was fun. Read the full story…

Emaxhealth: Strong Student Connection To School Community Key To Preventing Violence

In a report issued by McLean Hospital, the United States Secret Service and the United States Department of Education, researchers note that creating a positive school climate in which students believe the school staff genuinely wants to hear from them about threats or possible attacks is critical to preventing future Columbine-like school violence. The 15-page report “Prior Knowledge of Potential School-Based Violence: Information Students Learn May Prevent a Targeted Attack,” available at www.secretservice.gov , outlines the results of multiple interviews of bystanders to violent school attacks to determine how students with prior knowledge of school violence made decisions regarding what steps, if any, to take after learning the information. Read the full story…

New York Times: Starving Themselves, Cocktail in Hand

Manorexia. Orthorexia. Diabulimia. Binge Eating Disorder. All are dangerous variations on the eating disorders anorexia and bulimia, and have become buzzwords that are popping up on Web sites and blogs, on television and in newspaper articles. As celebrity magazines chronicle the glamorous and the suffering, therapists and a growing number of researchers are trying to treat and understand the conditions. The latest entry in the lexicon of food-related ills is drunkorexia, shorthand for a disturbing blend of behaviors: self-imposed starvation or bingeing and purging, combined with alcohol abuse.  Read the full story…

The National Post: Exposed G-string tied to today’s social values.

For hippies, it was the androgynous tunic; for modern teens, it is the exposed G-string. “There’s always a link between style and social values,” said Mariette Julien, a professor at L’Universite du Quebec a Montreal who presented a paper on the topic of teen dress at the country’s largest annual gathering of academics last week. “People aren’t conscious of the symbolism in their style of dress, but it remains very present.” Read the full story…

Other Headlines:

 

• Possible Gossip GIrl Spinoff
• Gen Y Fears Wrinkles: Cosmeceutical Sales To Hit $21 Billion
• Beloved Characters as Reimagined for the 21st Century
• Disney Revs Up Tween Star Machine
• Thai School gets bathrooms for transvestite students
• Why GTA IV Was the Beginning of the End
• Teen Choice Awards 2008 Nominations
• Sears teams with MTV to lure teens
• Facebook overtakes MySpace worldwide
• Disney’s “Camp Rock” racks up ratings
  
  

Teen survey shows virginity pledges can work.

Of 1,517 adolescents ages 12 to 17 in 2001 when the research began, teenagers who vowed to remain virgins until they were married were less likely to be sexually active than others who didn’t make a pledge.

About one-quarter of the adolescents surveyed (23.8%) made a promise to wait until marriage to have sex; 34% had broken it by 2004, compared with 42% of those who didn’t make the pledge and had sex during that time.

Read the full story… 

Study: Teens Heed Parental Warnings against Drugs and Alcohol But Indulge When Left Unguided.

A new survey released by the Partnership for a Drug-Free America and the MetLife Foundation has found that parental guidance and example has a profound affect on their children’s use of alcohol and drugs, especially at such “coming-of-age” events as prom and graduation parties.

The survey indicates that when parents engage their children in discussions about alcohol and drug abuse the teens take their parents’ message to heart.

“Only 16 percent of teens whose parents set a zero tolerance policy reported their individual likelihood of using drugs or alcohol, whereas 45 percent of teens whose parents didn’t set such boundaries reported they were likely to drink or use drugs at prom or graduation parties this year,” the report states.

Read the full story… 

Teen girls fight body image battle. 

For teens, especially girls, it may be very difficult to accept themselves as normal in appearance.

Health care authorities say the “body image” that teens have of themselves is often distorted by visual media that relies heavily on images of thin women and muscular men.

Recent high school grad Madison Hayes, 18, said it is very common for girls to be critical of their appearance.

“On a daily basis I hear girls complain about things like their jeans giving them a muffin top; the little love handles above their hips,” she said. “Girls are so picky about how they look.”

Hayes said she believes media influences are probably 90 percent of the reason that young women think there is something wrong with their body shape.

Read the full story… 

Teens listen to less radio, more Ipods. 

Teenagers are beginning to desert radio in favor of music from personal devices and computers, according to Coleman Insights, which studied teens’ listening behavior in a major market.
Long observed by media pundits, the trend is finally having a measurable impact on audience size in the teenage demo. Specifically, Coleman found that 84% of the 14-17 cohort listen to music daily on an MP3 player, iPod, or computer, versus 78% for radio. Coleman described these results as evidence of a “tipping point” in audio consumption: “Coleman Insights has for the first time detected greater use of them than of FM radio in a few specific instances.”

Another Coleman study found the 15-17 cohort favors iPods and MP3 players as primary destinations for listening to music, with 41% choosing the personal devices, compared to just 22% for FM radio.

Read the full story… 

Living together: No big deal?

An analysis of cohabitation, marriage and divorce data from 13 countries, including the USA, shows that living together has become so mainstream that growing numbers of Americans view it as an alternative to marriage.

The National Marriage Project study of a sampling of Western European and Scandinavian nations, Australia, Canada and New Zealand found that cohabitation elsewhere is far more common and indeed viewed as an option to matrimony. The study found that anywhere from 15% to 30% of all couples identified themselves as living together, compared with about 10% right now in the USA.

“We’re still the most marrying of all these countries, but the data are clearly headed in the one common direction. It’s headed in the direction of cohabitation as an alternative,” says David Popenoe, the report’s author and co-director of the National Marriage Project at Rutgers University, which studies marriage and child well-being.

Read the whole story… 

Entertainment Weekly: How teens took over pop culture

Anyone who’s a teenager — or one of the many adults whose pop culture tastes lean in that direction — might want to blow off that summer job. Given how much teen entertainment will soon be gushing into the nation’s TiVo queues and iPod playlists, this might be the best time ever to be a fan of teen-tertainment. Whereas five years ago you’d have been stuck with only The O.C., now you’ll spend summer catching up on Gossip Girl while downloading new albums from Miley Cyrus, the Jonas Brothers, and Jesse McCartney. 

Read the full story… 

 

 What not to say to overweight teens.