The functional assessment of media in child and adolescent psychiatric treatment.

Clinicians and parents share a responsibility to educate themselves in how young people communicate with each other and how it impacts on communication with the adults in their lives. The greater fluency that clinicians have with the world of youth, the easier it is to begin a meaningful dialogue with young people. Such a dialogue always has been the purview of clinicians interested in the developmental trajectory of their young patients. The enormity of media exposure and the changes that characterize current media formats make such a dialogue important and challenging. From watching video clips to listening to music, this assessment affords clinicians a snapshot into the milieu of the modern young world. The dialogue is "virtually" always well worth the effort.