Janine DeFao,

SF Chronicle, September 11, 2006



In an era of increasing niche programming on TV, women have the Oxygen network, men have Spike TV and some pets are even agog at Animal Planet.

Now, infants can pull up a bouncy chair, grab a bottle and have round-the-clock access to the nation's first channel for babies, BabyFirstTV, featuring three-minute segments designed for babies as young as 6 months.

The satellite channel, which debuted on Mother's Day, touts itself as a "learning experience" for babies and their parents with developmental benefits. But it has come under fire from child development experts who say the claims are false and fly in the face of the American Academy of Pediatrics' recommendation of no TV at all for children under age 2.

"I had that appalled, shocked reaction. (Babies) are these wide-open, defenseless, clueless targets," said Berkeley child psychologist Allen Kanner, co-founder of the national group Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, which has filed a false advertising complaint against the channel with the Federal Trade Commission.

But some parents have had the opposite response. Kathy King, a Sacramento-area mother of two, signed up after coming across a free trial.

"They were both mesmerized," the middle school science teacher said of her sons, 2-year-old Wyatt and 10-month-old Wesley.

BabyFirstTV is not alone. Early entrants into the market nearly a decade ago included the "Teletubbies" TV show from Britain, geared for 1- and 2-year-olds, and Baby Einstein, which sells DVDs for children as young as 1 month. PBS last year launched a 24-hour cable channel called Sprout for 2- to 5-year-olds. And Sesame Workshop, the nonprofit organization behind "Sesame Street," this spring released "Sesame Beginnings," DVDs for the under-2 crowd.

"Is it right for them to be watching? The fact of life is, they are watching," said BabyFirstTV co-founder Sharon Rechter. "Parents should watch with them appropriate programming they can enjoy."

Rechter, 31, now pregnant with her first child, said she started the satellite channel -- available on Dish Network and DirecTV for $10 a month -- when she saw a "great need" as her friends had babies. She estimated the market for children's DVDs and videos at $1.5 billion.

The commercial-free channel offers 44 series, including original programming and segments from top-selling videos such as Brainy Baby.

They range from a show that teaches sign language to a cartoon duck who guesses animal sounds to a black train chugging across a white background while classical music plays.

Rechter declined to release subscription figures for BabyFirstTV but said the Los Angeles company is meeting its business goals and plans to expand to cable next year. The company could not provide contact information for any Bay Area subscribers, but Rechter said California is one of its top markets.

A study this spring by the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation in Menlo Park found that 61 percent of American children under 2 watch TV or videos, and 43 percent watch every day. Nineteen percent of children under 1 and 29 percent of children ages 2 to 3 had televisions in their own rooms.

The study found that many parents believe television is beneficial, even educational, for their children despite the recommendation by the nation's pediatricians in 1999 that it remain off limits to children under 2.

The small amount of research on television watching for young children is inconclusive.

A Sesame Workshop study showed a positive relationship between viewing "Sesame Street" and preschoolers' achievement in reading and math, though other research shows a negative correlation between achievement and TV, said Vicky Rideout, director of the Kaiser foundation's Program for the Study of Entertainment Media and Health.

Rideout said a number of studies show children learn better by doing than by watching. Some research has shown that children mimic both violent and "pro-social" behavior seen on TV, while some links television with both obesity and attention problems, she said.

But "babies watching baby videos and DVDs is a huge unknown," she said.

"In essence, we're conducting a big experiment on this generation of kids before we know what the impact of these media are," Rideout said.

That's one reason the American Academy of Pediatrics has no plans to modify its recommendation that children under 2 engage in no "screen time" and that toddlers watch no more than two hours of quality programming each day, said pediatrician Don Shiffrin, who heads the group's communications committee.

"Children need to live in a three-dimensional world, not a two-dimensional world. They need interactions with caregivers, not a screen," said Shiffrin, of Bellevue, Wash.

Products such as Baby Einstein and Brainy Baby DVDs have been successful in convincing parents they can give children an edge, despite the lack of evidence, Shiffrin said.

BabyFirstTV bills itself as offering content "tailored to meet the needs of infants and children" through age 3.

The channel color-codes its various programs in seven categories from "encouraging children to develop language" to engaging children in "identifying patterns of thinking."

And its original segments, both animated and live-action, contain subtitles to help parents interact with children while watching, such as, "Name all the colors you see, and encourage your child to repeat after you."

The channel encourages parents to watch with their children, though Kaiser's Rideout said her research has shown that most parents rely on TV for their children when they need do things like take a shower or cook dinner.

King, the teacher who lives in the Sacramento suburb of Orangevale, said she often will watch BabyFirstTV with her sons.

"But sometimes it's a little helpful when you're trying to clean the kitchen and need to say, 'Give Mommy five minutes,' " King said.

She is not concerned about the American Academy of Pediatrics recommendation.

"I think it just comes down to parenting," she said. "If I thought it was detrimental to their brain development, they would not be watching."

The Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood, based in Boston, filed complaints in May and June with the Federal Trade Commission against BabyFirstTV, Baby Einstein and Brainy Baby, accusing them of making false and deceptive claims when they say their programs have educational and developmental benefits. It asked the FTC to prohibit the companies from making the claims and to require them to prominently display the pediatricians' warning.

Rechter downplayed the complaint against her company.

"I don't think we over-promise anything," she said.

One family that has no plans to tune in is Allen Kanner's.

His 21-month-old daughter, Cassidy Kanner-Gomes, doesn't watch any television or DVDs, yet Kanner still manages to take showers.

"She plays with toys or comes in and talks to me. I shower quickly," he said. "It hasn't been a big problem."