National Association of Educational Broadcasters Convention; National Association of Educational Broadcasters Convention - Rm 15 Session on Research: Dr. Presley Holmes, Chmn (Reel 2)

There are a couple of things that it could suffer from. Well it wasn't shrunk and that's the first thing and when we shrank it it still. It'd be in the low 70s. Shrunken. This does not establish a cause effect relationship between the predictor variables we have and the dependent variable. But it doesn't demonstrate that you can come along a second time and use the same predictors and get the same result the same glorious result. But it does seem to us. That it's a scheme worth considering. And if you want an authority to put on this I'd suggest you go to page 234. Date gauges Handbook of research on teaching and you'll find within a chapter by camel and Stanley what we take to Viet erect sanctioning of this kind of nonsense. So I think that with such a scheme another thing I'd like to mention in

closing I have to invoke the saints there a little bit for us in the presidential address which Lee J Cole Bach gave to the American Psychological Association in 1957. It seemed. That he was saying. Several things that can be nicely squared with the this kind of nonsense that we're engaging in. So there are I think rather obviously even if we don't know them there are reasons why people learn or fail to learn those things we try to teach them. We've beat our head against a wall for quite a while trying to find out what it was that was controlling learning and its effectiveness. We haven't had much luck so I think it is time for us to try something that a high risk that you're and see whether it works. This particular scheme if it will work again the way it worked this last time. Our confidence in it will go up by at least 50 percent. We won't be certain yet because there

are several reasons why it it could appear to be dandy and in fact would not be. But I think that we can. There must be some way surely that we can find out what it is that permits us to improve the effectiveness of the communications which we call teaching. At least for the time being we're going to be trying out this odd scheme and hoping that it will continue to work the way it did the first time. With that I quit. Thank you. Thank you very much Warren. I don't know if your reaction was the same as mine but I felt a little bit frustrated at not being able to get some of the conclusions or the reports to these some of these things he's doing. But at least it's serving the function that I hoped it would of piquing your interest. And we'll be looking forward to those reports in the coming weeks and months. Now it's my pleasure to introduce Dr. Richard Evans who is professor of psychology at the University of Houston.

This too I think is particularly appropriate an item in the paper yesterday featured on the front page had to do with the influence of television on kids and it makes them cranky and tired and so on and so forth. He I think is going to tell us about a more positive use of television in the prevention of juvenile delinquency. Richard up. With the limited time available I don't know how possible I could be anywhere but I think the time is already shrunken. But I do think that the report both of them are so interesting is a shame we didn't have enough time to go into them. However if I may make a suggestion that the pressure will be off me to read it long it probably by now not too exciting recent patient. Let me ask one of you to pass out these papers and what I haven't said you will read. In other words regressing to the print medium gentlemen that's

really what we're doing here. Now. I want to make a very fast retort here to Senator Senator Dodd because it's kind of interesting. A little anecdote here that in terms of our particular project we were involved in using television to deal with a very volatile complicated community social problem juvenile delinquency. And in the process of doing this we produced 12 1/2 hour programs designed to more or less interest the community in a very intensive action program that we were involved in. Perhaps some of you have heard the considerable discussion of the mobilization for youth program in New York City in which there's been a lot of accusations of communist infiltration and so on and so forth and. And I happen to be the director of the counterpart of this program in Houston. This was working with President Kennedy's committee on juvenile delinquency and youth crime.

I might say in Houston our problem is not kindness but infiltration Birchers but it's about the same kind of thing in a way. But there are a lot straight of this a little bit. We and one of the shows we actually got three parolees from a state institution for delinquents and one of the bright ideas I had was spontaneously right on the air to interview these persons this particular half hour was on television. Delinquency and the basic theme that our researchers are pretty well established was that there was no simple correlation between delinquency and television. And so by the way these shows were all going to be shown on all three commercial channels and most of them in prime time. Here was a case where an educational television station was producing programming for that. I had been able to persuade all three commercial channels to run these so we were taping we had no time to rerun the these are really spontaneous so I had these three delinquent kids

behind a screen which just simply revealed their cellulite and I began my great interviewing technique and start out by saying we'll ask each of them what caused you to become delinquent and we naturally felt that after several months in this school that they would recognize the real underlying problem and each and said Right on the air television. Not only that but they proceeded to align in some detail how they had learned by watching a certain TV show how to bring a lock on a car and all the rest of it. But with more intensive questioning we got them to agree with the party line I think. But. In all seriousness perhaps much more important than the very important dramatic and emotional catch were delinquency. That's about how our project is that it is really to me and to many of us connected with a model of how television can be used at the local level to deal with crucial social problems.

This is this is a point of view that I have not expressed in any great detail in this paper. But one of the those of us who've been kinds of students of the Educational Television movement are quite impressed with the fact that the local utilization of this medium has not been emphasized sufficiently far to much of the funds have gone into national efforts which create programming that's probably not target sophisticated in terms of local needs. In fact probably a good deal this program even earlier research showed as many of you as also realize that not really hit the target appropriately not only nationally but locally. And so when we got this Grant and in this proposal I had had a kind of a dream of seeing of with a really large and fairly unlimited budget I'd say fairly It's really not fair with the commercial budget but with a large budget. What could we do with educational television using as far as that goes not just the educational channel but the commercial channels as well to really involve the community

in a serious social problem. By the way I'm very happy to announce that talking to Tom Clements not long ago that he's interested in some of this perhaps something on this order with with the new anti-poverty problem as well so at least the problem itself is relatively irrelevant delinquency have to be one that people react to but it's really what can be done to really use this medium and as a means of community involvement. And so we were rather excited when we got this Grant and were able to proceed and essentially what we did was to try to do three films that were documentaries that made made things clearer but very dramatically we had very very effective cooperation from all the agencies the community and the three films. We're designed to really hit hard at several facets of the delinquency problem and particularly localized in our community and emphasize the importance of a community program that of the sort that we were with evolved with. I was able to get together a very fine team of social workers cultural

anthropologists sociologists and others like colleges to work with us on this. And plus the very fine production film production resources of Jim Barrett. University of Houston and the great assistance of Channel 8 our education station in Houston and I think we came up with something that created some kind of an impact now. Essentially I don't want to go into all the details of the programming. I don't want to go into the project in general but I do want to say that I want to challenge very directly Senator Goldwater's recent statement that current psychology and social psychology has advocated the idea that changing social conditions will change the personality of delinquents. This is categorically untrue I can show him our report which came up with exactly the opposite approach it's a it's a neighborhood development itself development program that we were involved with and completely and diametrically opposed to the view that the senator recently mentioned this is going to a public opportunity to react to the state and that disturbs a lot of us in this field because he has not been reading the literature for about 25 years I believe judging from that statement.

At any rate let me just simply read to you some of the research results very quickly to evaluate. The impact of the series response and 500 television homes in the greater Houston area selected in terms of a probability area sampling method were interviewed in depth utilizing an array of fixed alternative and open end questions. Results suggest that 44 percent of the television homes were tuned in to one or more programs in the series not keep in mind that we have here a market of probably close to a half million television homes the greater Houston area and remember these were on all three commercial channels of this group. Ninety nine percent regarded the program as interesting with 58 percent and equal to 9000 regarding them as more interesting than most television programs. Comparing a sample of those that saw on one of the programs 50 percent percent or end of 279 with those who saw form or twa percent and of 58. Some typically some chemicals to to Stickley significant differences suggest that frequent viewers the series tend to be

between thirty and forty nine years of age. Professionals are skilled workers of higher income and more likely to participate in community activities such results as well as other suggested responsible active members of the community where those who frequently watch the delinquency series frequent viewers also are significantly more likely to admit having personal contact with a delinquent youngster. Of particular significance in terms of the goals of the television series to inform viewers of the nature of the project and break down over simplified conceptions of the cause and nature of delinquency the distribution of responses to many items indicated that frequent viewers were significantly less likely to hold stereotyped notions regarding the cause of delinquency and were clearly more aware of the project and its goals. As a final indication of the impact it might be pointed out that 38 percent of respondents who have seen only one of the programs discussed with others while 72 percent of respondents who saw for more of the program discussing with others now this is it. This fanning out effect which we had reported earlier as a possibility for impact of educational programs in general.

It is this numbers game a counting audience persay is not nearly as crucial as what happens after a viewer sees a program. We first were able report on this kind of impact in a study we did many years ago to members of our audience here Dr. Schwartz or not to me may remember this. We had the Houston School Board was a kind of a pioneer effort to to use community television. We found that the there were probably four or five times as much impact and this is the typically number of viewers would indicate more recently in television human behavior. Still Stacy Adams expands this notion a factor in who is Prize winning entry in this. As you know the advertising Council's warty expanded this into a very interesting model I want to call the attention researchers and audience areas to not ignore this this kind of fanning out effect. I think we fall into the same trap that the advertising agencies do is they misuse the rating services by discounting numbers. Again I'd like to also cross prefer to paper on the rating services which

some you may recall that was published that I did any B Journal a few years ago. And any rate I want to emphasize that. Seventy two percent of respondents a song for more of the program discuss with others. In other words we were getting into the community fanning out getting impact this is a very crucial variable of those who did not see any of the programs 18 percent heard about them from others which is a very good illustration. What we're saying this indicates accomplishment of course the highly desirable goal of television programming communication beyond the actual audience. The impact of the television series as reflected above was undoubtedly facilitated by the use of daily newspapers who gave continuing and significant support to the television effort as well as the rest of the project again. Let me call attention to some of you who have access to your press relations people and so on that there is indifference with the press when it comes to education a television programme that can be broken down very quickly. One technique we used was to actually involve the press very actively in the entire project and even let them screen some of our preview

programs and so on and when they came up with a tremendous coverage of this I'd like to think perhaps more coverage in any educational programming effort in the community. For example after a press preview of the first program of series the Houston Chronicle's radio tell the gender devote an entire column to the project and I quote the column here I just to give you a sample of response I don't want to go into reading all this is so me. Now I like to also bring out something else. Piper Gunn of the Boston station I had occasion to chat with him not long ago. We phone as a matter of fact in Boston very briefly but he this time was very concerned about something that I think is very exciting. He apparently is moving along in a similar direction with something dealing with delinquency in Boston and one of the warnings I gave him was that we've got to be prepared if we bring these new media like television into the community that we're going to get very much the same kind of resistance that we do in university faculty some of you may recall the study we did on the university faculty in Educational Television hostility

resistance and change and so on and so forth we did this factor analysis of about 300 variables you recall and shrunk around shrunk. We found some pretty good evidence that the the picture here of the impact. This on university faculties is basically negative. We have a resisting professor who elect likely to be the most insecure among the more insecure people on the back alleys who are individuals who are tired there will be one factor variable we can cover with kind of institutional bound that they're not. They don't seem to see them see their own role beyond the institution they're in and so on. Whereas all supporting this other group tend to be much more outgoing more secure people generally more productive of course. But what we found also is that this extreme hostile group has infiltrated very effectively the large middle group who presumably could be persuaded either wait. Now interestingly enough the same model of reaction was allowed as we moved into the community. If you notice right now during the united fun campaign you notice all the community agencies and if you do a kind of systematic

study which we did it part of our delinquency project of what agencies really do. Why is threatens and by the way we never publish these results or threaten him so much because they don't know what they really do very well. We keep giving them a great deal of money to do a lot but they don't really know what they do frankly. And evaluation very seldom do. But the point is the way we found that bringing this new medium where all this is going to be brought out in the open where this is going to be discussed caused a real turmoil. The one thing we have to do is to involve leave for example some of the social work community in the planning of these films. And every time we mention agency they want to cut something out and put something else then and and they've gotten one of the local television stations so concerned about this. Jack Harris the manager of a very successful NBC affiliate in Houston he was one of only one of three commercial stations that actually cut something out of the film because of the pressure we in one of our delinquency films the only one which is kind of sensational and powerful as a means of getting an initial reaction we have a lot of blood in the

scene with rape and so on but done very carefully. In terms of a fairly sophisticated context. And so he got the one of his staff up there. One of the nonstick stamp with a disclaimer saying we hold no responsibility for the content of this program and we have discreetly taken areas out and saw all this naturally increase our audience considerably. And of course the two other the two other two other commercial channels did not do this but the point is that this kind of pressure is quite reminiscent of exactly the kinds of fears and anxiety that are present within universities you see when professors go on TV they're worried to death of the whole world watching everything they say and going to discuss something like prejudice or evolution or sex or something that the world's going to come to an end. Those of us who've been watching this for a number of years know that nothing of the sort is true that a person could present a view with a kind of academic objectivity. He can get away with murder more or less and really does most of the time. But in all seriousness I think you can you can readily see that this is a very important thing to consider that you're

going to find with this resistance to cultural innovations in the media and the word this is what I'm beginning to believe now will probably be developing in a later paper is not limited at all to our university environment. What the educational television movement to a great degree I'm beginning to believe is simply caught up with a broader scale resistance to culture innovation in the culture and it is very similar to within many different groups we work closely with educational institutions but I think we'd find the same resistance when you begin to use these methods with social work communities with medical groups etc. etc.. And so this is another kind of instinct fighting. We are by the way under a more current grant from us so we going to expand our Paki resistance study into a book we're working on this now and we may be getting data from about 13 additional campuses to see how generalizable the results are. But certainly these results certainly turned out to be quite generalizable to the social work community social agency group and so on. Now it doesn't mean that they cannot be brought into these things

be involved and they should be. But at least this is a kind of a possibility. Well I don't want to dwell time I just bought up here I just want to say that on the other paper which we will get to it all really deals with another project in which the National Science Foundation project which we're doing film teaching interviews with the probably the world's greatest contributors to the behavioral sciences and some of you already know we began this project some years ago John midis here was involved with us this in which we were saying that we're lucky enough to be able to sell filmed interviews with Carl Young and Ernest Jones and subsequently. Developed a kind of a theoretical model of what we were doing here we find that we have now developed a kind of a structure perhaps someplace between teaching machine and more or less didactic lecturing which lends itself surprisingly well by using distinguished contributors interviewed by a professor as a teaching device or early or early evaluation of this technique has been quite successful

in a lot separating at least the promise here I don't say it's conclusive at all but we see some promise here and we're continuing this project now and we as you know as a listener We have many many more of these films now we're doing books based on these and so on and so forth and as a technique you might look into this. I would certainly challenge the others of you in other disciplines to pursue this further and come up with a good deal more research on how you can program interviewing in a more let's bring a kind of a personality dimension into programming. Talking with B.F. Skinner who is one of our interviewees about this point he felt it's kind of interesting that back one of his comments in the state's early program this pretty well which I took the compliment meaning I felt that I got to say I wanted to say that's not really true. But there is some promise here we feel and I would suggest and challenge somebody to look into this. Anyway thank you very much. One of them you're.