Kids Risk Research Areas and Related News Coverage

Corporate commitment to children - With funding from the Annie E. Casey KIDS COUNT, we performed the first study to characterize the commitments of Fortune 1000 companies to children and released it at the first Kids Risk Symposium.

Entertainment media (movies, video games, and ratings) - We provided a rigorous, quantitative and science-based approach to assessing the content of entertainment media. We developed a Media and Kids guide that aims to help consumers take charge of media and a media deconstruction activity to empower kids to take charge of the media in their lives. Our numerous studies on movies and video games received extensive media coverage and led to two web editorials and Congressional Testimony:

Dr. Thompson and Dr. Michael Rich hosted Media and Child Health: Peril and Promise on October 5, 2001, and they co-Founded the Center on Media and Child Health at Children's Hospital Boston, which they announced in March 2003 at the first Kids Risk Symposium.

Environmental risks - We developed data and methods for improved characterizations of the environmental risks experienced by children. Dr. Thompson published "Changes in children’s exposure as a function of age and the relevance of age definitions for exposure and risk assessment" (PDF) based on her work as part of the EPA Risk Assessment Forum's Technical Workshop on "Issues Associated with Considering Developmental Changes in Behavior and Anatomy when Assessing Exposure to Children," which she Chaired in Washington, DC in July 2000. We also applied value-of-information methods to tiered chemical testing in the context of the EPA's Voluntary Children's Chemical Evaluation Program (VCCEP). Dr. Thompson served as a member of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Advisory Committee on Childhood Lead Poisoning Prevention, the core Peer Consultation Panel for the EPA's Voluntary Children's Chemical Evaluation Program (VCCEP), and the National Academy of Sciences Board on Environmental Studies and Toxicology and several of its study committees.

Health economics and valuation - We reviewed the peer-reviewed cost-effectiveness and cost-benefit analyses of pediatric interventions for the Public Health Policy Advisory Board. Professor Thompson wrote a commissioned discussion paper that helped the EPA's Office for Children's Health Protection as it developed its recommendations on children's health valuation issues. Dr. Thompson collaborated with Dr. Tracy Lieu (PI) on the CDC-Harvard Joint Initiative on Vaccine Economics (JIVE), which began with an effort to identify high-priority, emerging issues for economic research based on interviews and ranking the assessments of vaccine experts published in 2002 in Expert Review of Vaccines (see the complete lists of domestic ideas and global ideas). The JIVE cooperative agreement also supported some of our extensive research on polio, which received some media attention and led to one web editorial:

Injuries and injury prevention - Injuries represent the leading cause of mortality for children. Dr. Thompson published research on children's motor vehicle risks, particularly related to airbags and child restraint seats. Two of her papers published in Risk Analysis in 2002 addressed the need for consideration of variability (i.e., the real differences that exist between children and adults) and uncertainty in risk management. Dr. Lois Lee from Children's Hospital Boston and Professor Thompson explored the risks related to childhood drowning following up on Dr. Thompson's study of the role of baby bath seats in bath tub drowning, which she released at the first Kids Risk Symposium. Dr. Thompson also helped to quantify children's mouthing behavior.

Miscellaneous coverage
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