Research
data
Pediatrics
- Volume 104, Number 2 - August 1999, pp 341-343 Media
Education (RE9911) - AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS
Currently, the average American child or
adolescent spends >21 hours per week viewing television.6
This figure does not include time spent watching movies, listening
to music or watching music videos, playing video or computer games,
or surfing the Internet for recreational purposes
6. 1998 Report on Television.
New York, NY: Nielsen Media Research; 1998
In fact, the average young viewer is exposed to >14 000 sexual
references each year7,1
7. Strasburger VC. Adolescents and
the Media. Medical and Psychological Impact. Thousand Oaks, CA:
Sage; 1995
10. Strasburger VC. "Sex, drugs, rock 'n roll" and the media:
are the media responsible for adolescent behavior? Adolescent Medicine:
State of the Art Reviews. 1997;8:403-414
Increased television use is documented to be a significant factor
leading to obesity14 and may lead to decreased school achievement
as well.15
15. Morgan M. Television and school performance.
Adolescent Medicine: State of the Art Reviews. 1993;4:607-622
http://www.aap.org/policy/re9911.html
BMJ
2001;322:313-314 ( 10 February ) Editorials ‘The
obesity epidemic in
young children’ - Reduce television
viewing
and promote playing
Papers p 326
Bundred and colleagues report that among 3 to
4 year old English
children there
was a 60% increase
in
the prevalence
of being
overweight (having
a body mass index
>85th centile) and a 70% increase
in
the prevalence of
obesity (body
mass index
>95th centile) between 1989 and 1998.4
4. Bundred P, Kitchiner D, Buchan I. Prevalence of
overweight and obese children
between 1989 and 1998: population based series of cross sectional
studies. BMJ 2001; 322: 326-328
More than 60% of overweight children have at least one additional risk
factor for cardiovascular disease, such as raised blood
pressure, hyperlipidaemia, or hyperinsulinaemia,
and more than 20% have two or more risk factors.6
6. Freedman DS, Dietz WH, Srinivasan
SR, Berenson GS. The
relation of overweight to cardiovascular risk factors among
children and adolescents:
the Bogalusa
heart study. Pediatrics 1999; 103: 1175-1182
Most cases of type 2 diabetes in
children
and adolescents are attributable to obesity.7
7. Fagot-Campagna A, Pettit
DJ, Engelgau MM, Rios Burrows N, Geiss LS, Valdez R, et al.
Type 2 diabetes among North American
children and adolescents: an epidemiologic review
and a public health perspective. J Pediatr 2000; 136: 664-672
Although television viewing
seems to cause obesity
in
children
in
the
United States it is not clear how many of these
other factors
promote obesity
in
young
children.10
10. Dietz WH, Gortmaker SL. Do we fatten our
children at the
TV set? Obesity
and television viewing
in
children
and adolescents. Pediatrics 1985; 75: 807-812
Television advertising
of food directed at
young
children may help explain
why reduced television viewing
reduces rates of weight gain.16
16. Robinson TN. Reducing
childrens' televison viewing to prevent
obesity: a randomized trial. JAMA 1999; 282:
1561-1567
Reducing
the amount
of time that children
are allowed to watch television is one strategy that
offers children
opportunities for activity
‘Children’s TV stuffed with junk food adverts’ – Sean
Poulter (Consumer affairs correspondent) – Daily Mail, July 9, 2001
More than 90 per cent of food products
advertised during breaks in cartoons and quizzes contain alarming
levels of fat, salt and sugar.
More than 11 per cent of British children are overweight, a figure
which is rising sharply, while 53 per cent have tooth decay.
BMJ
1995;311:1568-1569 (9 December) - Letters
- Authors' reply
Data from the Office of Population
Censuses and Surveys quoted in a recent report on obesity
show that overweight (body mass index 25-30) increased
from 33% to 42% in men and from 24% to 29% in women between
1980 and 1991-2.1
The total number of overweight and obese people combined
(that is, those with a body mass index of >25) rose
from 39% to 54% in men and from 32% to 45% in women
1. Department of Health. Obesity: reversing the increasing problem
of obesity in England. London: DoH, 1995
Physical
activity levels in Oxford school children – CJK Henry, JD Webster-Gandy,
M Elia
They concluded that (based on heart rate monitoring) the children
studied had ‘surprisingly low levels of activity’
Physical activity levels in British children have concerned many researchers
and health professionals, especially as PE lessons, and in particular
competitive sports, are becoming a smaller part of the school day.
Significantly, television, computer games and sedentary hobbies are
becoming increasingly popular pastimes
Dietz & Gortmaker, 1985: Do we fatten our children at the television
set? Obesity and television viewing in children and adolescents
Report requested by Clinton after CDC found youth obesity had reached
epidemic proportions in Us. Doubling in percentage out of young people
since 1980
BMJ
2001;322:193 ( 27 January )
‘Spare the television and improve the child’ -
Scott Gottlieb New York
Kill your television
"Do you know we are ruled by T.V."
-- from the poem An American Prayer by Jim Morrison
"By the start of the year 1993, 98% of U.S. households own at
least one TV set, 64% have two or more sets."
-- Advertising Age
"I thank the Congress for reducing the chances that the hours
spent in church or synagogue or in discussion around the dinner table
about right and wrong and what can and cannot happen in the world
will not be undone by unthinking hours in front of a television set."
-- President Bill Clinton upon signing the Telecommunications Act
of 1996 on the V-chip, designed to help parents block out violence
on television.
"Children cannot learn to read by watching television. Television
is just background noise and a distraction."
-- First Lady Laura Bush during the Republican National Convention
in Philadelphia, July, 2000
The
Impact of Television & Video Entertainment on Student Achievement
in Reading and Writing. By Ron Kaufman
A study released in November, 1999 revealed that most children
between 2 and 18 years old are exposed to an average of 6 1/2 hours
of daily media exposure, of which television is the most dominant.
The study, sponsored by the Kaiser Family Foundation, shows that 88
percent of all U.S. households have two or more television sets; 60
percent have three or more sets; and 53 percent of all children have
a TV set in their room. The report states that about 7 out of 10 households
with children under 18 own a computer and 45 percent of those have
Internet access
The
report found that "youngsters who scored at the 'less contented'
end of the index reported more media exposure than those who scored
at the more contented end"
Do children come home from school and do their homework, or just play
video games with their friends all night? How much time do most children
today spend being creative by themselves?
‘American youth spend more time with media than with any single activity
other than sleeping’
How
Television Images Affect Children by Ron Kaufman
Fifty-seven percent of television programs
contain "psychologically harmful" violence, according to
a study funded by the cable television industry. The study, released
February 7, 1996, tracked 2,500 hours of television programming. This
was the largest sample ever analyzed by researchers.
Television programs have the power to influence a child's entire daily
schedule
A widely quoted figure is that, on average, a child watches between
four and five hours of television each weekday, and ten hours on Saturday
and Sunday. In a
July, 1996
speech, President Bill Clinton noted that, "a typical
child watches 25,000 hours of television before his or her 18th birthday.
Preschoolers watch 28 hours of television a week."
25,000 hours = 3.8hrs a day since born!
28hours = 4hrs a day
The typical child sits in front of the television about four hours
a day
In either case, the child spends more time with TV than he or she
spends talking to parents, playing with peers, attending school, or
reading books. TV time usurps family time, play time, and the reading
time that could promote language development
With funding from the National
Cable Television Association, a group of researchers at the University
of California at Santa Barbara reported in February, 1996 that 57
percent of TV programs contained violence
The researchers warned that "the risks of viewing the most common
depiction of televised violence include learning to behave violently,
becoming more desensitized to the harmful consequences of violence
and becoming more fearful of being attacked
Viewing large amounts of TV violence does not necessary cause a child
to act more violently, but it can contribute to promoting a view that
violence is commonplace in everyday life as well as creating a heightened
fear of being assaulted on the street
The UCLA report also concluded that television shows:
- Perpetrators
of violent acts go unpunished 73 percent of the time.
- About
25 percent of violent acts involve handguns.
- Forty-seven
percent of violent situations present no harm to the victims and
58 percent depict no pain.
- Only
4 percent of violent programs show non violent alternatives to solve
programs.
- Premium
movie channels such as Time Warner's HBO and Viacom's Showtime had
the highest proportion (85 percent) of violent programming. The
broadcast networks had a much lower percentage of violence (44 percent).
Awareness
that excessive TV viewing is not benign and can have serious effects
on a child's behavior and attitude is important. Obviously, turning
off the set is the best solution
FCC Chairman Newton Minow called television a "vast wasteland."
Thirty years later, he spoke of the medium again: "In 1961 I
worried that my children would not benefit much from television, but
in 1991 I worry that my grandchildren will actually be harmed by it
"Television offers neither rest nor stimulation," Mander
says. "Television inhibits your ability to think, but it does
not lead to freedom of mind, relaxation or renewal. It leads to a
more exhausted mind. You may have time out from prior obsessive thought
patterns, but that's as far as television goes.
"The mind is never empty, the mind is filled. What's worse, it
is filled with someone else's obsessive thoughts and images … Why
do you think they call it programming?
http://www.turnoffyourtv.com/
SouthCoast
Today – 8/8/99 by Danielle Duclos
Cartoons aren't necessarily "safe" programming either.
Some, such as "Tom and Jerry," contain gratuitous violence.
The characters fall off cliffs and blow up their enemies with dynamite,
yet emerge from these catastrophes unscathed.
"Parents don't understand that developmentally, kids can't figure
out what's real and not real
Pediatricians say that although parents should regulate what youngsters
watch, the TV has become an electronic baby sitter in some homes,
replacing human contact.
"The kids who watch more TV are less social in the office and
tend to have a few more behavioral problems," Dr. Chesney said.
"I can tell the kids who've had more parental interaction."
http://www.s-t.com/daily/08-99/08-08-99/a01lo006.htm
'Monkey
see, monkey do' debate targets sex, violence - By Julia Keller - Dispatch
Television Critic
The average prime-time show, Levine charges,
has five violent acts per hour; cartoons have an average of 25 per
hour.
By early adolescence, she says, children have viewed more than 8,000
killings and 100,000 other violent acts on television
In a study released last month to the Ohio Department of Mental Health,
Professors Mark I. Singer and David B. Miller of Case Western Reserve
University reported that children in grades three through eight who
watch significantly more television than their peers display the highest
propensity toward psychological trauma
The Kaiser Family Foundation, a California advocacy group, analyzed
prime-time programs from the 1996-97 season and found that three of
four programs had sexual content and 30 percent made sex a primary
focus.
http://www.dispatch.com/news/special/tvkids/monside3.html
Huston,
et al., Big world, small screen, page 100
"Heavy-television viewers (four
hours a day or more) expend less effort on school work, have poorer
reading skills, play less well with friends, and have fewer hobbies
and activities than light viewers.
http://www.sccs.swarthmore.edu/users/97/jahall/thesis/rships/ebabysit.html
Children,
Adolescents, and Television (RE0043) - AMERICAN ACADEMY OF PEDIATRICS
According to recent Nielsen Media Research
data, the average child or adolescent watches an average of nearly
3 hours of television per day.2 This figure does not include
time spent watching videotapes or playing video games3
(a 1999 study found
that children spend an average of 6 hours 32 minutes per day with
various media combined).4
By the time the average person reaches age 70, he or she will have
spent the equivalent of 7 to 10 years watching television.5
One recent study found that 32% of 2- to 7-year-olds and 65% of 8-
to 18-year-olds have television sets in their bedrooms.4
Time spent with various media may displace other more active and meaningful
pursuits, such as reading, exercising, or playing with friends
1.American Academy of Pediatrics, Task Force on Children and Television.
Children, adolescents and television. News and Comment. December
1984;35:8
2.1998 Report on Television. New York, NY. Nielsen Media Research;
1998
3. Mares ML. Children's use of VCRs. Ann Am Acad Pol Soc Science.
1998;557:120-131
4. Roberts DF, Foehr UG, Rideout VJ, Brodie M. Kids and Media at
the New Millennium: A Comprehensive National Analysis of Children's
Media Use. Menlo Park, CA: The Henry J Kaiser Family Foundation
Report; 1999
5. Strasburger VC. Children, adolescents, and the media: five crucial
issues. Adolesc Med. 1993;4:479-493
Children and adolescents are particularly vulnerable to the messages
conveyed through television, which influence their perceptions and
behaviors.6 Many younger children cannot discriminate between
what they see and what is real
6. Gerbner G, Gross L, Morgan M, Signorielli N. Growing up with television:
the cultivation perspective. In: Bryant J, Zillmann D, eds. Media
Effects: Advances in Theory and Research. Hillsdale, NJ: Lawrence
Erlbaum; 1994:17-41
As much as 10% to 20% of real-life violence may be attributable to
media violence.22 The recently completed 3-year National
Television Violence Study found the following: 1) nearly two
thirds of all programming contains violence; 2) children's shows contain
the most violence; 3) portrayals of violence are usually glamorized;
and 4) perpetrators often go unpunished.23
22. Comstock GC, Strasburger VC.
Media violence: Q & A. Adolesc Med. 1993;4:495-509
23. Federman J, ed. National Television
Violence Study. Vol 3. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage; 1998
A longitudinal study found a positive correlation between television
and music video viewing and alcohol consumption among teens.29
29. Robinson TN, Chen HL, Killen JD. Television and music video
exposure and risk of adolescent alcohol use. Pediatrics [serial
online]. 1998;102:e54. Available at: http://www.pediatrics.org/cgi/content/full/102/5/e54.
Accessed May 2, 2000
http://www.aap.org/policy/re0043.html
A
Parent’s guide – use TV to your child’s advantage -
Dorothy G. Singer, Ed.D, Jerome L. Singer, Ph.
D., Diana M. Zuckerman, Ph.D.
Research on children and television cited in the book:
-Children who watch a lot of television spend less time in conversation
with parents and other family members.
-Children who watch a lot of television have difficulties developing
imagination and a playful attitude.
-Children who are heavy television viewers are often more aggressive
and have difficulties with day-to-day behaviors in kindergarten
The average number of hours spent viewing television varies from about
3 hours a day for preschoolers to 5 hours a day for elementary-school-aged
children. In addition, for a large segment of the school-aged population,
more time is spent in front of the screen than in school
Studies conducted by the Yale Family Television Research and Consultation
Center have found that:
-Children who watched more fantasy-violent programs were described
by their teachers as less cooperative, less successful in their relationships,
less happy, and less imaginative, regardless of their IQ scores.
-Children who watched more cartoons were rated by their teachers as
unenthusiastic about learning.
-Heavy television viewers were found to be more restless and showed
more behavior problems in school.
-Children who watched less TV tended to have more interest and participate
in more activities where they can learn to get along with other children,
as well as family members.
http://npin.org/library/1998/n00049/n00049.html
The
Journal of Psychology, July 1997 v131 n4
p411(5) - Children's attitudes toward violence on television. - Kirstin
J. Hough; Philip G. Erwin. Full Text: COPYRIGHT 1997 Helen Dwight
Reid Educational Foundation
On British television, for example, an
estimated average of one violent scene occurs every 16 min (Barlow
& Hill, 1985).
Children who spend more time watching television, especially violent
programs, are also more likely to show later aggression, restlessness,
and a belief in a "scary world" (Singer, Singer, & Rapacynski,1984).
Somewhat less encouraging are reports that parental control over children's
viewing has decreased over the past several decades and that those
children who are less subject to parental control (and more able to
avoid it) may be the ones who need it most (Barlow & Hill, 1985).
http://www.sou.edu/library/instruct/core/article4.htm
The
Message of Television - Written by Deb Linder -1998 Spring Term, EdTec
653, San Diego State University
The average American child spends
between twenty-five and thirty hours of a week watching television,
playing Nintendo, or using the computer.
Introducing television made young people more aggressive, harmed the
acquisition of reading skills, decreased creativity scores, and cut
participation in non-TV leisure activities (Redford, 1995).
http://edweb.sdsu.edu/Courses/EDTEC653/EDTEC653s98/TVMSG.htm
Lifestyle
patterns in children aged 5-7yrs. By S. Perwaiz, J. Warren, S. Bradshaw,
C.J.K. Henry – Local survey in Oxford!
68% of children watched TV in the
morning before school and 44% of children watched 1-2hrs TV each weekday
evening. Over all the weekend the average television viewing was 10hrs.
Overall average daily television was calculated to be 2.5hrs, similar
to recently reported figures (Livingstone & Bovill 1999)
The
Oxford Times – 29 June 2001-09-27
The researchers claim obesity could become a national epidemic if
nothing is done to curb children’s unhealthy lifestyles.
What’s
on, who’s watching, and what it means – G. Comstock, E Scharrer –
1999
Children
and teenagers who watch a great deal of TV perform poorly on standardized
achievement tests, and among the reasons are the usurpation of time
spent learning to read and the discouragement of book reading.
Film
violence and young offenders – A Pennell, K Browne – 1999
Ways
in which screen violence can effect behaviour include:
-imitation of violent roles and acts of aggression
-triggering aggressive impulses in predisposed individuals
-desensitizing feelings of sympathy towards victims
-creating an indifference to the use of violence
-creating a frame of mind that sees violent acts as a socially acceptable
response to stress and frustration
Diet
Watch article
Fat children are likely to become fat
adults, which increases their risk of gallstones, arthritis, diabetes,
breathing difficulties and hernias, not to mention the potentially
fatal trio of strokes, heart diseases and cancer.
Dr. Derrick Cutting has suggestions for getting children to substitute
one of their four hours of television viewing each day – on average
– into one of exercise. Global
Realisation
The cost of America’s obesity epidemic extends far
beyond emotional pain and low self-esteem. Obesity is now second only
to smoking as a cause of mortality in the United States. The CDC estimates
that about 180,000 Americans die every year as a direct result of
being overweight. Obesity has been linked
to heart disease, colon cancer, stomach cancer, breast cancer, diabetes,
arthritis, high blood pressure, infertility and strokes. A 1999 study
by American Cancer Society found that overweight people had a much
higher rate of premature death. Severely overweight people were four
times more likely to die young than people of normal weight. Moderately
overweight people were twice as likely to die young – The message
is we’re too fat and it’s killing us
The British now eat more fast food than any other nationality in Western
Europe. They also have the highest obesity rate
Profile:
The Armchair Sportsman – The Sunday Telegraph, 8th July
2001
Fatter and less active than any other generation
in history, we haul our blubbery hides into once pleasant pubs, where
grown men in greasy soccer shirts howl like dogs at television sets.
It
may be too early to craft an image of 21st-century man,
but he is likely to have advanced spine curvature and both hands on
the remote control.
"Ohm-Pah, Ohm-Pah, Doob-Tah-Dee-Dee.
What do you get from a glut of TV?
A pain in the neck, and an IQ of 3."
--
sung by the elfin helpers of Willie Wonka in the movie Charlie And
The Chocolate Factory
Reducing
Childrens’s Television Viewing to Prevent Obesity – A randomized controlled
trial – by Thomas N. Robinson
…As a result, there is a need for
innovative approaches to prevent obesity
There is a widespread speculation that television viewing is one of
the most easily modifiable causes of obesity among children. American
children spend more time watching television and video tapes and playing
video games than doing anything else except sleeping6
6. The Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania.
Television in the Home: The 1997 Survey of Parents and Children. Philadelphia:
University of Pennsylvania; 1997.
Two primary mechanisms by which television viewing contributes to
obesity have been suggested: reduced energy expenditure from displacement
of physical activity and increased dietary energy intake, either during
viewing or as a result of food advertising.
Cross-sectional epidemiological studies have consistently found relatively
weak positive associations between television viewing and child and
adolescent adiposity.
…previous prevention interventions that have attempted to increase
physical activity and decrease dietary fat and energy intake have
been relatively ineffective t reducing body fatness 4,5.
In contrast, this intervention targeting only television, videotape,
and video game use produced statistically significant and clinically
significant relative changes in BMI, triceps skin fold thickness,
waist circumference, and waist-to-hip ratio over a period of 7 months.
The changes occurred over the entire sample…
4. Resnicow K. School-based obesity prevention: population versus
high-risk interventions. Ann N Y Acad Sci. 1993;699:154-166
5. Resincow K, Robinson TN. School-based cardiovascular disease prevention
studies: review and synthesis. Ann Epidemiol. 1997;7(suppl 7):S14-S31.
… this study indicates that reducing television, videotape, and video
game use may be a promising, population-based approach to help prevent
childhood obesity.
Conclusion: Reducing television, videotape, and video game
use may be a promising, population-based approach to prevent childhood
obesity.
Results
from the 3rd National Health and Nutrition Examination
Survey, 1988-1994 – Crespo, Smit, Troiano, Bartlett, Macera, Andersen
The prevalence of overweight continues
to increase in the US adult population.1-3 In the 12 years
between the Second National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey
the prevalence of overweight in US adults increased from 25% to 33%.2
1.(Names) Overweight prevalence and trends for children adolescents:
the National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys, 1963 to 1991.
Arch Pediatr Adolesc Med. 1995;149:1085-1091
2. (Names) Increasing prevalence of overweight among US adults: the
National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys, 1960 to 1991. JAMA.
1994;272:205-211
3. Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. Youth risk behaviour
surveillance – United States, 1995. MMWR Morb Mortal Wkly Rep. 1996;45:1-63
Overall, 26% of American children reported watching 4 or more hours
of television per day; the rate was lower in girls (23%) than in boys
(29%).
Our report shows that television watching was associated with increased
skin fold thickness and BMI among US youth.
Strasbourg28 has calculated that the average high school
graduate will likely spend 15000 to 18000 hours in front of a television
but only 12000 hours in school. Next to sleeping, television watching
occupies the greatest amount of leisure time during childhood.27
We found that skin fold thickness increased in both boys and girls
as the amount of television watched increased. This finding is consistent
with an earlier study that found a significant relationship between
television watching and the prevalence of obesity in children. 26
28. Strasbourg VC. Children, adolescents, andtelevision. Pediatr
Rev. 1992;13:144-151
27. Dietz WH, Strasbourg VC. Children, adolescents, and television.
Curr Probl Pediatr. 1991;1:8-31
26. Dietz WH, Gortmaker SL. Do we fatten our children at the television
set? Paediatrics. 1985;75:807-812
Overweight children are more likely to become overweight adults than
their leaner counterparts.32-34
32. (Names) Do obese children become obese adults? Prev Med.
1993;22:167-177
33. (Names) The predictive value of childhood body mass index values
for overweight at age 35. Am J Clin Nutr. 1994;59:810-819
34. (Names) Predicting obesity in young adulthood from childhood and
parental obesity. N Engl J Med. 1997;337:869-873
Furthermore, the risks of obesity in adulthood appear to be greater
in persons who were overweight during childhood and adolescents.35.
36
35. (Names) Relationship of childhood weight status to morbidity
in adults. Public Health Rep. 1971;86:273-284
36. (Names) A 40-year history of overweight children in Stockholm:
lifetime overweight, morbidity, and mortality. Int J Obesity 1994;18:585-590
…children who watched the most television had more body fat and greater
BMIs than those who watched less than two hours per day. This underscores
the work of Epstein and colleagues, 37 who reported that
decreasing sedentary behaviours is a key ingredient to the successful
treatment of childhood obesity. Moreover, repeated exposure to television
commercials for food may prompt children to increase food consumption,
which ultimately leads to weight gain. 38
37. (Names) Effects of decreasing sedentary behaviours on activity
choice in obese children. Health Psychol. 1997;16:107-113
38. (Names) The development of children’s eating habits: the role
of television commercials. Health Educ. 1982;9:78-93
One quarter of all US children watch 4 or more hours of television
each day…Hours of television watching is related to both BMI and skin
fold thickness.
Results: The prevalence of obesity is lowest among children watching
1 or fewer hours of television a day, and highest among those watching
4 or more hours of television a day.
Television watching was positively associated with obesity among girls,
even after controlling for age, race/ethnicity, family income, weekly
physical activity, and energy intake.
Conclusion: As the prevalence of overweight increases, the
need to reduce sedentary behaviours and to promote a more active lifestyle
becomes essential.
Reducing
Television Viewing to Prevent Childhood Obesity - Principal Investigator:
Thomas Robinson, M.D., MPH, Other Investigators: Joel D. Killen, William
L. Haskell, Helena C. Kraemer, Donna Matheson, Leslie A. Pruitt -
Funding Agency:
National Institutes of Health,
Duration: 4/1/99-3/31/02
There is a pressing need for innovative
interventions to prevent obesity. There has been widespread speculation
that television viewing might be one of the most easily modifiable
causes of obesity among children
Excess
Television Viewing Linked to Obesity in Children – Lisa Hark,
The prevalence of obesity among children and adolescents continues
to rise, similar to the increase seen in adults, where 33% of the
population is obese. At present more than 11 million children and
teenagers are overweight,
In the most comprehensive study of its kind (3rd National
Health and… ) … consistent with previous findings, television viewing
was overall very high among children: 67% watched at least 2 hours
per day, and 26% watched 4 or more hours of television per day.
www.heartinfo.org/nutrition/tvkids4698.htm
Watching too much TV can increase your risk of heart disease –
Lisa Hark
Did you know that one third of US households have three or more TV
sets? This makes the number of TV sets close to the population of
people! Average TV viewing time for adults is over four hours a day
and over three hours a day for children.
TELEVISION
AND SOCIETY: - Viewing Ourselves in a Box - Shannon Kennedy
Given the average viewing time per-day,
per-home is 6 hours, 47 minutes and the statistics and effects of
television watching, it is easy to understand how our viewing habits
are hindering our health.1
1 Statistics
on Television's Impact. [cited March 31, 1998]. Available from
World Wide Web @http://www.essential.org/orgs/tvfa/stats.html (Link
down!)
Not only is watching television physically and mentally detrimental,
but also time consuming. If you multiply the total hours of television
watched annually by $5, time is money in the grand total of 1.25 trillion
dollars.2
2 Ibid.
Television is a drug. Television is addictive. Television is a destroyer
of lives
Not unlike drugs or alcohol, the television experience allows the
participant to blot out the real world and enter into a pleasurable
and passive mental state. The worries and anxieties of reality are
as effectively deferred by becoming absorbed in a television program
as by going on a 'trip' induced by drugs or alcohol. And just as alcoholics
are only vaguely aware of their addiction, feeling that they control
their drinking more than they really do ('I can cut it out any time
I want-I just like to have three or four drinks before dinner'), people
similarly overestimate their control over television watching
99% of the homes in the United States have at least one television
set, while 66% homes have three or more sets. There are 2.24 sets
in an average household, with 54% of American children having television
sets in their bedroom.7
7 Statistics
on Television's Impact. [cited March 31, 1998]. Available from
World Wide Web @http://www.essential.org/orgs/tvfa/stats.html
Before the time a child enrols in elementary school, they will have
viewed around 8,000 murders, and by the age of eighteen they will
have seen 200,00 acts of violence and 40,000 murders.11
11
Television's Impact on Health. [cited March 31, 1998]. Available
from World Wide Web @http://www.essential.org/orgs/tvfa/health.html
Some children have been known to build up an "immunity"
to the horror of violence, gradually accepting violence as a way to
solve problems, and identify with certain characters, victims and/or
victimizers.12
12
Children and TV Violence. [cited March 31, 1998]. Available
from World Wide Web @http://www.cmhcsys.com/factsfam/violence.htm
"The impact of TV violence may be immediately evident in the
child's behaviour or may surface years later, and young people can
even be affected when the family atmosphere shows no tendency toward
violence."14
14 Children
and TV Violence. [cited March 31, 1998].
Available from World Wide Web @http://www.cmhcsys.com/factsfam/violence.htm
Not only are there emotional and psychological side effects of television
watching, but there are also many physical side effects as well. Obesity,
sleep deprivation, and sensory development are only some, and while
each may only have a slight impact, the cumulated effect is life altering.
Television watching not only slows the body's metabolism but also
increases the desire to snack and consume foods of all types, mostly
ones advertised during the commercials. On average, one-third of American
adult are overweight, while there are 4.7 million severely overweight
children between the ages of six and seventeen.16
16
Television's Impact on Health. [cited March 31, 1998]. Available
from World Wide Web @http://www.essential.org/orgs/tvfa/health.html
Research has even concluded that while a person is watching television,
the body's metabolism is 14.5% lower than while the person is sleeping.17
17
Hardebeck, Daniel J. Television Facts. [cited March 31, 1998].
Available from World Wide Web @http://othello.localaccess.com/hardebeck/killtv2.htm
Children of all ages are staying up later and later in order to watch
television, with children as young as eight staying up until 11:30
p.m. on school nights. How are these late nights affecting the children?
The late nights are causing them to fall asleep during class, thus
limiting their attention span, and ultimately hindering the child's
learning ability
Lack of sleep hinders the immune system's ability to fight unwanted
cells, allowing the cells to multiply, divide and disperse into the
body.
When a child sits, silently, mesmerized by the television set, they
are not exercising their vocal cords, thus affecting their language
and speech development. Not only is their speech development hindered,
but since a child, or adult for that matter, can not verbally interact
with the television set, their communication skills and verbal fluency
are not maturing and becoming proficient as they normally should
Staring endlessly into a screen of flashing pictures also decreases
the eye's ability to focus resulting in blurred vision. While viewing,
the eyes are practically motionless and 'defocused' in order to take
in the whole screen. Constant movement is required for healthy eye
development. Visual exploration is necessary for developing the senses
of depth and perception. Since the sense of sight is maturing through
age twelve, excessive television viewing can seriously impair a child's
observational skills
Over the past thirty years, the Unites States has endured a declining
literacy rate, which for the most part began when television came
into popular and wide spread use.18
18
Green Mountain Waldorf School. "un-TV" guide. [cited
March 31, 1998]. Available from World Wide Web @http://netletter.com/GMWS/unTV/research.htm
Television has crept into every facet of our lives and although it
feels like there is no way to escape its control and effects, there
is still a way
Fight the Addiction and Turn Off the Set
http://www.loyola.edu/dept/philosophy/techne/tvkenedy.htm
Children's
Television Viewing And Obesity And Aggression - Broadcast Monday 4
June 2001 with Norman Swan
“What we found is over just a seven month period of time,
so really from the beginning to the end of a single school year in
these kids, kids in a school that received the curriculum, reduced
their body mass index, which is a measure of body fatness controlling
for height or adjusting for height, by about a half of a body mass
index unit and for a kid of average height in this class, that averaged
out to about 2 pounds (about a kilo)”.
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/talks/8.30/helthrpt/stories/s307657.htm
Does
Television Cause Childhood Obesity? - Thomas N. Robinson, MD,
MPH
Extrapolation of current viewing data (Nielsen Media Research,
Written Communication, February 1997) reveals that, between the ages
of 2 and 17 years, US children spend an average of more than 3 years
of their waking lives watching television, not including time spent
watching videos, playing video games, or using a computer
Two primary mechanisms have been proposed to link television viewing
and body fatness: reduced energy expenditure from displacement of
physical activity, and increased dietary energy intake, either during
viewing or in response to food advertising
http://jama.ama-assn.org/issues/v279n12/ffull/jed80013.html
Relationship
of physical activity and television watching with body weight and
level of fatness among children: results from the Third National Health
and Nutrition Examination Survey - Andersen RE, Crespo CJ, Bartlett
SJ, Cheskin LJ, Pratt M
Overall, 26% of US children watched 4
or more hours of television per day and 67% watched at least 2 hours
per day
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&Dopt=r&uid=9544768
Do
we fatten our children at the television set? Obesity and television
viewing in children and adolescents - Dietz WH Jr, Gortmaker SL
significant
associations of the time spent watching television and the prevalence
of obesity were observed. In 12- to 17-year-old adolescents, the prevalence
of obesity increased by 2% for each additional hour of television
viewed
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&Dopt=r&uid=3873060
Television
viewing as a cause of increasing obesity among children in the United
States, 1986-1990 - Gortmaker SL, Must A, Sobol AM, Peterson K, Colditz
GA, Dietz WH
We observed a strong dose-response relationship
between the prevalence of overweight in 1990 and hours of television
viewed. The odds of being overweight were 4.6 (95% confidence interval,
2.2 to 9.6) times greater for youth watching more than 5 hours of
television per day compared with those watching 0 to 2 hours
The adjusted odds of incidence were 8.3 (95% confidence interval,
2.6 to 26.5) times greater for youth watching more than 5 hours of
television per day compared with those watching for 0 to 2 hours.
Estimates of attributable risk indicate that more than 60% of overweight
incidence in this population can be linked to excess television viewing
time
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&Dopt=r&uid=8634729
The
development of children's eating habits: the role of television commercials
- Jeffrey
DB, McLellarn RW, Fox DT
A
number of self-report, survey, and correlation studies have found
that children watch on the average 28 hours of TV a week, see over
11,000 low-nutrition "junk" food ads a year on TV
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/htbin-post/Entrez/query?db=m&form=6&Dopt=r&uid=7169326
eFOOD
RAP, Volume 11, Number 6, March 16, 2001 - Elaine Lipscomb, William
D. Evers, PhD, RD
The researchers stated that their
observations were consistent with those of previous observations of
older children. Food preferences of preschool children tended to reflect
the television commercials they viewed. As a result of their study,
the researchers recommended that nutritionists and health educators
should advise parents to limit their children's exposure to television
commercials.
http://www.cfs.purdue.edu/extension/efr/efr11-06.htm
CNN
- Television's effects on kids: It can be harmful, August 20, 1999
The average child in the United States
spends about 25 hours a week in front of the television (including
the use of VCR), according to the latest annual Media in the Home
survey, conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center
Children under age 2, they say, should not watch television at all,
and older kids should not have televisions in their bedrooms.
Why such seemingly tight limitations? Over the past several decades
a number of studies have shown that there are several ways that television
can be harmful to the mental and physical health of children. That's
not to say that all television is bad for kids. In fact, a number
of quality children's shows…engage kids in positive ways. However,
when children watch television frequently and indiscriminately, the
effects can be detrimental.
More time spent watching these shows is linked with poorer school
performance overall and decreased scores on standardized tests. This
makes sense when you consider that more time spent in front of a television
means less time spent on homework or having stimulating interactions
with adults or other children. In addition, late-night TV watching
tires kids out so that they can't pay attention in school. Also, television
hands kids all the answers, promoting passive learning and short attention
spans. As a result, kids have difficulty concentrating and working
hard to solve a problem
The Media in the Home survey found that 28 percent of all children's
shows contained four-or-more incidents of violence per show
Heavy TV viewing, heavy kids - In fact, this past March the
American Medical Association held a special briefing in New York City
to alert parents about the well-proven link between TV viewing and
obesity
But the effects are reversible: Three studies have demonstrated that
overweight children lost weight as they decreased their TV viewing
http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9908/20/kids.tv.effects/
TV
cited as kids' obesity doubles – by LOIS BAKER
If there seem to be a lot more fat kids
around than, say, 20 years ago, it is not an illusion, and it should
come as no surprise that television-watching appears largely to blame.
A study in the current issue of Archives of Pediatric and Adolescent
Medicine, authored by a UB epidemiologist, found that obesity among
children between the ages of 8 and 16 has more than doubled in one
generation.
The findings also showed that children who watched the most television
were the fattest
…said Carlos Crespo, associate professor of social and preventive
medicine and first author of the study. "At the same time, we
should have a national health objective of limiting children to two
hours or less of television watching a day."
- Nearly
half of U.S. children between the ages of 8 and 16 watch more than
two hours of television a day.
- The
prevalence of obesity increased as hours of TV watching increased.
- The
number of calories consumed increased as the number of hours of
TV watching increase
http://www.buffalo.edu/reporter/vol32/vol32n24/n3.html
SATURDAY
MORNING CHILDREN'S TELEVISION SHOWS MAY ENCOURAGE POOR EATING HABITS
Children in the United States spend
more time watching television than any other single activity except
sleeping. By the time they are 70, today's children will have watched
television for a full seven years of their lives
It's estimated children view as many as three hours of food commercials
a week, says Struempler (Dr. Barbara Struempler, an Extension nutritionist
with the Alabama Cooperative Extension System)
http://www.aces.edu/dept/extcomm/newspaper/sattv.html
USA
TODAY - Fight childhood obesity: Turn off the TV - By Dr. Jonathan
Sackier and John Morgan
Nielsen Media Research indicates that
children typically spend nearly four hours a day in front of the set.
That's almost two months of non-stop TV per year. Aside from sleeping,
they're watching television or playing video games more than any other
single activity in their lives. And the more they watch, the fatter
they get
Tele-chubbies - In a study recently released
in the Journal of the American Medical Association,
researchers at Stanford University demonstrated a direct link between
watching television and body weight
Kids who reduced their television involvement exhibited statistically
significant decreases in measures of obesity
Numerous studies show that obesity is linked to life-threatening conditions
known as co-morbidities. These include high blood pressure, Type II
diabetes, colon cancer and elevated cholesterol levels. While these
factors are generally associated with sedentary adult lifestyles,
experts are alarmed by the growing incidence of these conditions in
children
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta
(CDC), obesity will contribute to about 300,000 deaths this year.
"It's probably only exceeded by smoking in its contribution to
death," says CDC director Dr. Jeffrey Koplan
Instead of lighting up, perhaps they should set fire to their remotes
and joysticks
With 55% of Americans overweight and costs associated with obesity
skyrocketing, this is a fiscal crisis that America's strained health
system an ill-afford. So if you're overweight, there has never been
a better time to kill your TV (throw the remote in the trash and take
a walk)
http://www.usatoday.com/life/health/doctor/lhdoc069.htm
News
Channel5 – Study: Children watch too much television
Researchers found that one-quarter of children
under 3 years old and 40% of 2-year olds watch at least three hours
of television a day.
TV
Watching, Childhood Obesity Linked - The Journal of the American Medical
Association (1998;279(12):938-942, 959-960)
A study by researchers at Johns Hopkins
University School of Medicine, along with experts at the CDC and the
National Institutes of Health, concludes that a child's weight increases
with the number of hours he or she spends watching television each
day
The study also showed that 26% of US children watched 4 or more hours
of television per day
The study's authors point out that the average high school graduate
will likely spend 15,000 to 18,000 hours in front of a television
but only 12,000 hours in school
http://www.mercola.com/1998/mar/30/tv_and_obesity_in_children.htm
Washington
State University - Research Review: Television and Violence,
Issue #3 Fall 1994
Research has been conducted for over thirty years on
the effects of viewing violent acts on television and its influence
on aggressive behaviour
More children have television in their homes in the U.S. than they
have indoor plumbing (Dorr, 1986).
The American Pediatric Association (1990) states that at the time
a child graduates from high school in the U.S. they will have spent
more time watching television than any other single activity, other
than sleeping.
According to a study by the American Psychological Association (1992),
the average American child watches 8,000 murders and 100,000 other
assorted acts of violence before finishing elementary school
Television should be a way to entertain, educate, and teach our kids
how to grow, not a way to teach them how to shoot to kill. - Hon.
Ernest Hollings U.S. Senator (Democrat, South Carolina)
American Pediatric Association. (1990). Policy statement: Children,
adolescents and television. Pediatric, 85, 1119-1120
Dorr, A. (1986). Television and children: A special medium for
a special audience. Newbury Park, CA: Sage
Television
Violence and Behavior: A Research Summary. ERIC Digest. - THIS DIGEST
WAS CREATED BY ERIC, THE EDUCATIONAL RESOURCES INFORMATION CENTER.
A Washington Post article (Oldenburg,
1992), states that "the preponderance of evidence from more than
3,000 research studies over two decades shows that the violence portrayed
on television influences the attitudes and behaviour of children who
watch it."
Oldenburg, D. (1992, April 7). Primal screen-kids: TV violence and
real-life behaviour. WASHINGTON POST, p. E5
"Aggressive behaviour is related to the total amount of television
watched, not only to the amount of violent television watched (Eron
& Huesmann, 1986; Wright & Huston, 1983)" (p. 65).
Of these, Signorielli (1991) considers the third scenario to be the
most insidious: "Research...has revealed that violence on television
plays an important role in communicating the social order and in leading
to perceptions of the world as a mean and dangerous place. Symbolic
victimization on television and real world fear among women and minorities,
even if contrary to the facts, are highly related (Morgan, 1983).
http://www.ed.gov/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed366329.html
‘Family
and Relationships’ - Children and Television Violence
By observing these youngsters until
they were 30 years old, Dr. Eron found that the ones who'd watched
a lot of television when they were eight years old were more likely
to be arrested and prosecuted for criminal acts as adults
said Dorothy Cantor, PsyD, former president of the
American Psychological
Association. "We live in an era where both parents
are often working and children have more unsupervised time. Parents
need help in monitoring the amount of television
http://helping.apa.org/family/kidtvviol.html
Public
Affairs - Violence on Television
Children may become less sensitive to the
pain and suffering of others
Children may be more fearful of the world around them
Children may be more likely to behave in aggressive or harmful ways
toward others.
http://www.apa.org/pubinfo/violence.html
Television
Violence: Content, Context, and Consequences. ERIC Digest
According to Eron (1992), "there can
no longer be any doubt that heavy exposure to televised violence is
one of the causes of aggressive behaviour, crime, and violence in
society. The evidence comes from both the laboratory and real-life
studies. Television violence affects youngsters of all ages, of both
genders, at all socio-economic levels and all levels of intelligence.
The effect is not limited to children who are already disposed to
being aggressive and is not restricted to this country"
Eron, L. D. (1992).
The impact of televised violence. Testimony
on behalf of the American Psychological Association before the Senate
Committee on Governmental Affairs, CONGRESSIONAL RECORD, June 18,
1992
http://www.ed.gov/databases/ERIC_Digests/ed414078.html
Two
New Studies on Television Violence and Their Significance for the
Kids' TV Debate -The UCLA
Television Violence Monitoring Report (September 1995)
UCLA Center for Communication Policy, National Violence
Study (February,1996) Mediascope, Inc.
Perpetrators go unpunished in 73% of all violent scenes
One out of four violent interactions involve the use of handguns.
Only 4% of violent programs emphasize an anti-violent theme
http://www.cep.org/tvviolence.html
National
Television Violence Study, Year One: 1994-95
This study is the most elaborate and comprehensive assessment ever
conducted of the context in which violence appears on TV
The analysis identified three primary types of harmful effects associated
with viewing violence:
Learning aggressive attitudes and behaviours
Becoming desensitized to real world violence
Developing a fear of being victimized by violence
Perpetrators go unpunished in 73% of all violent scenes
In all 47% of violent interactions show no harm to victims, and 58%
show no pain.
A total of 25% of violent interactions on TV involve handguns.
Only 4% of violent programs emphasize an anti-violence theme
The "industry norm" for violence on TV is 57% of programming,
but there are notable differences in how violence is presented across
TV channels - Premium cable channels: 85% of programming is
violent, with the highest risk of harmful effect
http://www.media-awareness.ca/eng/med/home/resource/ntvs.htm#over
IMPACT
OF TELEVISED VIOLENCE - by John P. Murray, Ph.D (Professor and Director,
School of Family Studies and Human Services - Kansas State University)
(Nielsen, 1988), the typical American
household has the television set on for more than seven hours each
day and children age 2 to 11 spend an average of 28 hours per week
viewing (Andreasen, 1990; Condry, 1989; Liebert & Sprafkin, 1988
A recent survey by the Center for Media and Public Affairs (Lichter
& Amundson, 1992) identified 1,846 violent scenes broadcast and
cablecast between 6 a.m. to midnight on one day in Washington, D.C
The weight of evidence from correlational studies is fairly consistent:
viewing and/or preference for violent television is related to aggressive
attitudes, values and behaviours
In summarizing the extent of the effects, we agree with Comstock (Comstock
& Paik, 1991) that there are multiple ways in which television
and film violence influence the viewer
most researchers would agree with the conclusion contained in the
report by the National Institute of Mental Health (1982), which suggests
that there is a consensus developing among members of the research
community that "...violence on television does lead to aggressive
behavior by children and teenagers who watch the programs. This conclusion
is based on laboratory experiments and on field studies.
Although there are differing views on the impact of TV violence, one
very strong summary is provided by Eron (1992) in his recent Congressional
testimony:
“There can no longer be any doubt that heavy exposure to televised
violence is one of the causes of aggressive behavior, crime and violence
in society. The evidence comes from both the laboratory and real-life
studies. Television violence affects youngsters of all ages, of both
genders, at all socio-economic levels and all levels of intelligence.
The effect is not limited to children who are already disposed to
being aggressive and is not restricted to this country. The fact that
we get this same finding of a relationship between television violence
and aggression in children in study after study, in one country after
another, cannot be ignored. The causal effect of television violence
on aggression, even though it is not very large, exists. It cannot
be denied or explained away. We have demonstrated this causal effect
outside the laboratory in real-life among many different children.
We have come to believe that a vicious cycle exists in which television
violence makes children more aggressive and these aggressive children
turn to watching more violence to justify their own behavior."
(p. 1)
So too, the recent report by the American Psychological Association
Task Force on Television and Society (Huston, et al., 1992) adds:
"...the behavior patterns established in childhood and adolescence
are the foundation for lifelong patterns manifested in adulthood"
(p. 57).
Comstock, G. & Paik, H. (1991). Television and the American child.
San Diego, CA: Academic Press
Eron, L. (1992). The impact of televised violence. Testimony on behalf
of the American Psychological Association before the Senate Committee
on Governmental Affairs, June 18, 1992
National Institute of Mental Health (1982). Television and behavior:
Ten years of scientific progress and implications for the eighties
(vol. 1), Summary report. Washington, DC: United States Government
Printing Office
Paik, H. & Comstock, G. (1994). The effects of television violence
on antisocial behavior: A meta-analysis. Communication Research, 21
(4), 516-546.
http://www.ksu.edu/humec/impact.htm
Influence
of Television Violence on Children
Some researchers and theorists believe
that violence on television is inextricably linked to human aggression
while do not believe a conclusive body of evidence exists to justify
this view. In a recent study in the Journal of Broadcasting
and Electronic Media (1995), it was found that good characters, or
heroes, commit 40% of violent acts; More than one third of programs
feature bad characters who aren’t punished and physical aggression
that is condoned; and that more than 70% of aggressors show no remorse
for their violence and experience no criticisms or penalty when violence
occurs
In sum, according to the social learning theory, television violence
has an impact on expressed levels of aggression in children by the
following process; children learn to be aggressive by watching actors
on television and then model the actors aggressive behaviours. Television
violence can make children more accepting of aggressive behaviour,
that is, they become desensitised to the effects of violence (possibly
through habituation). (Lande, 1993). The theory and research supporting
a bidirectional relationship between television violence and aggression
is consistent with social learning theories which articulate the reciprocal
effects of environmental variables and qualities of the individual.
(Mischel, 1979).
Lande, G. R., (1993) The Video Violence Debate. Hospital and Community
Psychiatry, 44, 347-351
Mischel, W. (1979). On the interface of cognition and personality:
Beyond the person-situation debate. American Psychologist, 34, 740-754.
http://members.internettrash.com/gnomespapers/psy_TelevisionViolenceOnChildren2.htm
How
Television Images Affect Children - by Ron Kaufman
Fifty-seven percent of television programs
contain "psychologically harmful" violence, according to
a study funded by the cable television industry. The study, released
February 7, 1996, tracked 2,500 hours of television programming. This
was the largest sample ever analyzed by researchers.
When a child is placed in front of the television his focus cannot
be diverted and his gaze cannot be broken. That child only has eyes
for the video screen. The bright colors, quick movements and sudden
flashes capture the child's attention. Only the rare child finds the
television completely uninteresting. Even if only cartoons are watched,
most children find the images presented on the television set mesmerizing.
Television programs have the power to influence a child's entire daily
schedule
A widely quoted figure is that, on average, a child watches between
four and five hours of television each weekday, and ten hours on Saturday
and Sunday. In a
July, 1996
speech, President Bill Clinton noted that, "a typical
child watches 25,000 hours of television before his or her 18th birthday.
Preschoolers watch 28 hours of television a week."
writes Moody. "The typical child sits in front of the television
about four hours a day -- and for children in lower socioeconomic
families the amount of time thus spent is even greater. In either
case, the child spends more time with TV than he or she spends talking
to parents, playing with peers, attending school, or reading books.
TV time usurps family time, play time, and the reading time that could
promote language development."
"Just like the operating room light, television creates an environment
that assaults and overwhelms the child; he can respond to it only
by bringing into play his shutdown mechanism, and thus become more
passive," states a pediatrician quoted in the Moody book
But if the most recent survey is accurate, the odds are that what
children are watching is probably violent. With funding from the National
Cable Television Association, a group of researchers at the University
of California at Santa Barbara reported in February, 1996 that 57
percent of TV programs contained violence.
The researchers warned that "the risks of viewing the most common
depiction of televised violence include learning to behave violently,
becoming more desensitized to the harmful consequences of violence
and becoming more fearful of being attacked."
This is an important point. Viewing large amounts of TV violence does
not necessary cause a child to act more violently, but it can contribute
to promoting a view that violence is commonplace in everyday life
as well as creating a heightened fear of being assaulted on the street.
The UCLA report also concluded that television shows:
- Perpetrators
of violent acts go unpunished 73 percent of the time.
- About
25 percent of violent acts involve handguns.
- Forty-seven
percent of violent situations present no harm to the victims and
58 percent depict no pain.
- Only
4 percent of violent programs show non violent alternatives to solve
programs.
- Premium
movie channels such as Time Warner's HBO and Viacom's Showtime had
the highest proportion (85 percent) of violent programming. The
broadcast networks had a much lower percentage of violence (44 percent).
With
the government finally taking steps to improve children's television,
the focus then must turn to parents. Awareness that excessive TV viewing
is not benign and can have serious effects on a child's behaviour
and attitude is important. Obviously, turning off the set is the best
solution
http://www.netreach.net/~kaufman/children.html
Reducing
children's television viewing to prevent obesity
It has been speculated that television
viewing is one of the most easily modifiable causes of obesity among
children. Television viewing may reduce energy expenditure and increase
dietary energy intake.
http://www.jr2.ox.ac.uk/bandolier/booth/hliving/ObTV.html
Why
parents say they don’t limit TV - by Christine Della Maggiora,
Consultant to LimiTV
if you’ve conditioned your children
to watch TV so that they leave you alone, it means they haven’t learned
how to play independently
"Academic achievement drops sharply for children who watch more
than 10 hours a week of TV, according to the report "Strong
Families, Strong Schools," from the U.S. Department
of Education, December 1994
American children spend more time watching TV than they do in school,
according to Drs.
Sege and Dietz
in Pediatrics, October 1994.
North Carolina fourth graders watch an average of four hours of TV
per day, and 25% of the children watch six hours or more. (1992
Study.)
http://www.limitv.org/why.htm
The
Reflection on the Screen: Television's Image of Children - by Katharine
Heintz-Knowles (Assistant Professor of Communications - University
of Washington)
By the time a child today graduates from
high school, he or she will have spent more time in front of a television
set than in a classroom
Unfortunately, experts agree that television can have a negative effect
on children, encouraging anti-social behaviour such as dishonesty
or violence
Television lags behind, however, in portraying children from minority
groups, with fewer than 3% of child characters on commercial television
being Hispanic/Latino. The absence of minority characters could leave
children from these groups without significant role models, and could
lead children of all ethnic groups to form a skewed vision of their
community and their place in it
http://www.childrennow.org/media/mc95/content_study.html
May
4, 2001 - TV Networks "Family Hour" Has Least Diverse Prime
Time Programming
“Television programming is not accurately
depicting the benefits that diversity brings to out culture and society,”
said Patti Miller, director of Children Now’s Children & The Media
program. “In particular, by both the type and frequency of minority
portrayals, prime time television and political life,” she said.
http://www.laprensa-sandiego.org/archieve/may04/family.htm
Top-selling
Video Games ‘Unhealthy’ for Girls, Study Shows Parents cautioned about
game content
Of the games that contained female characters:
38% displayed those characters with significant body exposure: 23%
exposed breasts or cleavage, 31% exposed thighs, 15% exposed behinds
and 31% exposed stomachs or midriffs.
In addition, 38% of female game characters had "large" breasts
and 46% had "unusually small" waists.
54% involved those characters "fighting" or "being
violent." Overall, 46% of games included violence
In 1999, video and PC games sales in the United States totalled $6.1
billion, according to the Interactive Digital Software Association,
an industry group. This year, the estimated percentage of female games
console users was 30%. Last year children spent an average of one
and a half hours a day using computers or video games, according to
research by the Kaiser Family Foundation.
http://www.childrennow.org/newsroom/news-00/pr-12-12-00.htm
THE
INFLUENCE OF TELEVISION ON CHILDREN’S GENDER ROLE SOCIALIZATION: A
REVIEW OF THE LITERATURE by Susan D. Witt, Ph.D. - The University
of Akron
The gender biased and gender stereotyped behaviors and attitudes
that developing young people are exposed to on television will have
an impact on their perception of male and female roles in our society
Television, however, is perhaps the form of media most influential
in shaping ideas of appropriate sex roles (Lauer & Lauer, 1994)
Studies have shown preschoolers spend an average of nearly 30 hours
a week watching television; it is suggested children spend more time
watching television than they spend on anything else except sleeping
(Aulette, 1994; Kaplan, 1991; Anderson, Lorch, Field, Collins &
Nathan, 1986). Nielsen Media Research has found that by the
time children are sixteen years old, they have spent more time watching
television than going to school (Nielsen Media Research as cited in
Basow, 1992).
By the time children graduate from high school, they have witnessed
13,000 violent deaths on television (Gerbner & Gross, 1980).
If the child frequently is faced with gender biases and gender stereotypes,
this knowledge will be incorporated and influence perceptions regarding
men and women. Keeping in mind young children with developing
minds watch many hours of television, and recalling television reinforces
gender stereotypes, it is not surprising children come away from this
television experience with firmly held beliefs
It is also true children who view pro social behaviors on television
are likely to exhibit those types of behaviors themselves.
Young children will imitate and repeat behaviors they see on television.
Because children are influenced by gender stereotyped role models
they see on television, they will also exhibit gender biased behaviors
and develop gender biased attitudes that they see modelled on television.
the National Institute of Mental Health has determined: In male-female
interaction, men are usually more dominant. For men, the emphasis
is on strength, performance, and skill; for women, it is on attractiveness
and desirability.
(National Institute of Mental Health as cited in Lauer & Lauer,
1994, p. 73).
A study of Saturday morning cartoons found females were pictured less
often than males, were less active than males, played fewer
roles than males, played fewer lead roles than males, and worked primarily
in the home (Streicher, 1974).
Those who make decisions regarding children’s programming have determined
action and violence should dominate children’s television (Watson
as cited in Basow, 1992).
About two-thirds of characters in television programs are male.
From the 1950s through the 1990s, this figure has remained stable
(Seidman, 1999; Huston, Donnerstein, Fairchild, Feshbach, Katz, Murray,
Rubenstein, Wilcox, & Zuckerman, 1992; Condry, 1989)
Men are twice as likely as women to be shown as competent and able
to solve problems (Boyer, 1986).
Frequently women are portrayed as objects of lust (Seidman, 1999;
Basow, 1992). Women are four times more likely than men to be
provocatively dressed (Atkin, Moorman, & Lin, 1991); while men
are almost always fully clothed (Tavris & Wade, 1984).
Another aspect of television advertising which is overwhelmingly a
masculine province is voiceovers and narration, in which 83-90% of
the voices are male (Basow, 1992).
Because children model behavior they see on television, they are likely
to perpetuate gender stereotypes they view (Strasburger, 1995; Basow,
1992).
Research indicates that television has a socializing influence on
children regarding their attitudes toward gender roles.
Anderson, D. R., Lorch, E. P., Field, D. E., Collins, P., & Nathan,
J. G. (1986). Television viewing at home:
Age trends in visual attention and time with TV. Child
Development, 57, 1024-1033.
Atkin, D. J., Moorman, J., & Lin, C. A. (1991). Ready for
prime time: Network series devoted to working women in
the 1980s. Sex Roles, 25, 677-685.
Aulette, J. R. (1994). Changing families. Belmont, CA:
Wadsworth Publishing Company
Basow, S. A. (1992). Gender stereotypes and roles, 3rd ed.
Pacific Grove, CA: Brooks/ Cole Publishing Company
Boyer, P. J. (1986). TV turns to the hard boiled male.
New York Times, February 16, p. H1 and H29
Condry, J. (1989). The psychology of television. Hillsdale,
NJ: Erlbaum
Gerbner, G. & Gross, L. (1976). The scary world of TV’s
heavy viewer. Psychology Today, April, 41-45
Huston, A. C., Donnerstein, E., Fairchild, H., Feshbach, N. D., Katz,
P., Murray, J. P., Rubenstein, E. A., Wilcox, B. L., & Zuckerman,
D. (1992). Big world, small screen: The role of
television in American society. Lincoln: University of
Nebraska Press.
Kaplan, P. (1991). A child’s odyssey. St. Paul: West Publishing
Co.
Lauer, R. H. & Lauer, J.
C. (1994). Marriage and family:
The quest for intimacy. Madison, WI: Brown &
Benchmark
Seidman, S. A. (1999).
Revisiting sex role stereotyping in
MTV videos. International Journal of Instructional Media, 26,
11-22
Strasburger, V. C. (1995). Adolescents and the Media.
Newbury Park, CA: Sage
Streicher, H. (1974). The girls in the cartoons. Journal
of Communication, 24, 125- 129
http://ibelgique.ifrance.com/sociomedia/THE%20INFLUENCE%20OF%20TELEVISION%20ON%20CHILDREN.htm
February
1999 Bulletin - Television’s Effects on Children
More than 30 years of research has shown
that excessive TV watching by children can interfere with the development
of intelligence, thinking skills and imagination; it can slow down
the development of reading and speaking skills; it can cultivate violent
or aggressive behavior; and may even contribute to ADD/ADHD
http://www.ncpta.org/Bulletin/FEB99/feb99tveffects.html
Effects
of Television on Children – Dale Carnegie & Associates, Inc.
The typical American household has a TV
turned on for about 7 hours each day
By the time youngsters graduate from high school, they will have spent
11,000 hours in school, but over 15,000 hours watching TV
20-25 violent acts occur each hour on Saturday morning “children’s
programs”
before children complete elementary school, many will see about 20,000
murders and more than 80,000 other assaults Hate
on the Internet – by Dr. Karen Mock and Lisa Armony
Unfortunately,
the very mechanisms that make the Internet an exciting educational
tool also render it a dangerous, albeit efficient means or promoting
hatred against racial and religious minorities
Television, video cassettes, video tape recorder/players, video games,
and personal computers all form an encompassing electronic representational
system whose various forms “interface” to constitute an alternate
and absolute world that uniquely incorporates the spectator/user in
a spatially decentred, weakly temporalized and quasidisembodied state
Number
Of Homes 'On-Line' Continue To Rise
Almost four million homes have connected
to the Internet in the past twelve months according to Oftel's latest
quarterly research published today.
Conducted in May 2001, the survey reveals that 10 million homes now
have an Internet connection, a rise from six million in May 2000 and
eight and a half million in February 2001. An increasing number of
UK homes are also choosing fully un metered products with 24% of households
connected to the Internet in this way compared with 18% in February
2001
http://www.mori.com/polls/2001/oftel.shtml
Two-fifths
(40%) of UK households now have internet access. This amounts
to 10m homes, up from 6m a year ago. Around a third (35%) of households
use some kind of un metered access product, such as BT Anytime or
AOL
The triceps skin fold thickness (used to estimate fatness) rose, in
England, by a tenth in boys and by half as much (5%) in girls. In
all, a third of children are overweight and one in 10 is obese
Children spend up to 70 hours a week online
Just fourteen per cent of parents ban the use of the internet as a
form of punishment, compared with twenty eight per cent for grounding,
eighteen per cent for "no treats", sixteen per cent TV banning,
ten per cent withholding pocket money and five per cent chores
http://www.mori.com/digest/2001/pd010803.shtml
Children
& Television: Frequently Asked Questions 1.
How much TV do most children watch?
Most children watch an average of 3 to 4 hours of TV per day,
approximately 28 hours each week.
Watching TV is the #1 after-school activity for 6 to 17 year olds.
Each year most children spend about 1500 hours in front of the TV
and 900 hours in the classroom.
By age 70, most people will have spent about 10 years watching TV.
2. How much TV violence do most children watch?
By the time children complete elementary school, the average child
will witness more than 100,000 acts of violence on TV, including 8,000
murders. These numbers double to 200,000 acts of violence and
16,000 murders by the time they graduate from high school. Prime-time
TV contains about 5 violent acts per hour compared to an
