Captioning of Non-Speech Information in Children’s Programming on Pbskids.org

Abstract

The availability of closed captions in children’s programming has increased in recent years. However, quality, consistency, and other aspects of closed captions is still lacking, especially with non-speech information (NSI). The Described and Captioned Media Program (DCMP) provides a Captioning Key to assist with these aspects, yet there is little research looking at how well current closed captions follow the suggestions within the Captioning Key. This study provides a more in-depth look at closed captioning practices related to NSI among currently produced children’s programming distributed through pbskids.org. As PBS KIDS is a DCMP Partner and has shown to be a leader in captioning, it should be an exemplar in this area. The results give benchmarks for future research in captioned NSI and show that captions in current programming on pbskids.org typically contain a high prevalence of captioned NSI, with Speaker IDs being most prevalent among the majority of episodes. Also, while consistency of captioned NSI is high within each episode, it is not across the sample, and compliance with DCMP’s Captioning Key is minimal. This points to the need for more standardization among captions in children’s programming distributed by PBS KIDS which could be improved with the adoption of the Captioning Key or a variation tailored toward children’s programming.