TV and Children
81% of children
ages 2-7 
watch
TV alone and unsupervised
70%
of day care centers use TV during a typical day
54%
of 4-6 year-olds who, when asked to choose between watching TV and spending
time with their fathers, said they would prefer to watch television
It
has been shown that children who watch TV more than 10 hours a week suffer
negative academic effects
The
average American child ages 2-11 watches television 20 hours a week
TV and Violence
By
age 18, the average American child sees 200,000 violent acts on TV.
By
age 18, children witnesses almost 20,000 murders on TV — most by handguns.
73%
of the time the people in TV dramas who commit violent acts go unpunished.
47%
percent of violent situations show no real harm to the victims, and 58 percent
show no real pain.
Only
4 percent of violent programs show nonviolent alternatives to solve programs.
80%
of Hollywood executives think there is a link between TV violence and real-life
violence.
TV and Obesity
During
Saturday morning cartoons there are typically more than 200 "junk-
food" commercials.
At
least 12 medical studies link excessive television watching to increasing
rates of obesity.
In
1963, 4.5% of children ages 6 to 11 were seriously overweight; by 2001, this
percentage had more than tripled.
TV and Commercials
Before
graduating high school the average U.S. child will see 360,000 commercials.
By
age 65, this number will expand to two-million commercials.
The
number of commercials in TV programs per hour has been increasing each
year.
Although
these figures are for U.S. audiences and involve U.S. programming, Canada
and most European countries are not too far behind in many of these
statistics.
It has been found that most viewers do not
turn on television to watch a specific program. They simply decide to "watch
television" and then find a program that looks interesting. This is
least-objectionable-program (LOP) model of television viewing we introduced
earlier. 
We also know that most
children and adults watch TV in a kind of relaxed, transfixed state of awareness.
In the view of some psychologists the fact that people aren't critically
thinking about what they are seeing while in this state means that situations
(and commercials) are passively accepted on somewhat of an unconscious level.
Some go so far as to say that because of this, TV has a kind of hypnotic
influence.
Why We Watch TV
We
like to be entertained. We like excitement. We like to see handsome men and
sexy women. We like to vicariously (and safely) experience the experiences
of other people. We like to be drawn into fantasy worlds that we will probably
never be able to experience first hand.
But, maybe most of all, we like to passively relax in front of "the
tube," select our vicarious experiences, and let them flood over us without
any real effort on our part.
What's wrong with that?
Nothing, in moderation. In fact, to stay mentally and physically
healthy, it's important to spend some time relaxing each day.
Plus, it's been proven that it's healthy to laugh and release
our tensions. With TV we can enjoy the humorous escapades of our TV friends.
And
then there's the information we gain from TV.
We first realized the impact of TV during the mid-1900s. U.S.
citizens had been reading about the civil rights struggle for decades. But,
it was only when TV came along in the 50s and 60s and viewers saw in TV news
footage what was really happening, that the country amassed political pressure
to take action to change things.
U.S. citizens had also read about war for decades. But when they
started seeing newsreel footage of dead, maimed, and wounded American soldiers
every night on TV as a result of the Vietnam war, the majority of the country
soon tuned against the war.
All
these things had been reported in great detail in newspapers for decades; but
reading about them was one thing, seeing them was another.
Before television, children had no idea what most foreign countries
or their peoples looked like, or how they lived. Most exotic animals and fish
were only names in books. Letters, numbers, and words were things that you
started learning when you got to first grade. However, because of television,
most children are now familiar with these things even before they start school.
"Free TV" Is Not Exactly
Free
Of
course, in countries like the United States where most TV relies on commercials
to exist, viewers pay a price for their "free TV."
We are approaching the 50% level on TV -- half of the programming is taken
up with commercials.
Not all commercials are in breaks from programming; some are
in the programs, themselves. This is called product placement, and
it may simply be a conspicuous can of Coke, or a cup of Starbuck's coffee held
by an actor. Advertisers pay for this visibility.
This advertising cost is the added cost of goods and services
that we buy, and it amounts to hundreds of millions of dollars a year.
But there are also other "costs."
Critics say that commercials make us materialistic and suggest
that happiness and well-being revolve around material possessions. Commercials
often pair happiness with products we need to buy.
Examples they give are the simplistic scenarios we often see
in commercials. If you have a disappointing love life you can solve the problem
by changing to a new brand of toothpaste, a new breath mint, a new brand of
jeans, or a different shampoo.
Although you may laugh and assume that these commercial messages
don't affect you, advertisers know they do. They don't pay a million-dollars
a minute for a commercial on the remote chance that it might increase sales — they
know it will.
How many tubes of toothpaste do you have to sell in 30 seconds
to pay for that million-dollar commercial? Such is the power of television.
The Beginning of Television Research
In
case you wondered what the illustration was all about at the beginning of this
module, the event depicted marked the beginning of some serious research into
the effects of television.
Of course, people were concerned about the effects of television
from "day one," but many people just said that they couldn't be much
different from the effects of radio.
However, early in TV's history a particular televised event showed
that these two forms of electronic mass media were, in fact, quite different.
That
event was a debate between the leading candidates for U.S. president in 1960,
Richard M. Nixon and John F. Kennedy.
Before the debates, most polls showed Kennedy trailing Nixon
in popularity. Even with his Boston accent, and Catholic background (both of
which some voters objected to) Kennedy moved ahead of Nixon during the debates,
and a short time later was elected president.
In the minds of many the debates made the difference. Kennedy
came across as much more at ease and "presidential." Nixon looked
fidgety and ill-at-ease. 
But
the story doesn't end there.
The people who only listened to the debates on the radio had
the reverse impression.
To them Nixon seemed more articulate and more in command of the
issues. Fortunately, for Kennedy, most people followed the debates on television.
Some people feel that if Nixon had insisted on confining the
debates to radio, he would have won the election.
After it became apparent what happened, political
consultants quickly started studying the elements of a "winning TV image" and
social scientists launched numerous studies into how television affects viewers.
In
the next module we'll look some of these issues in
more detail.
television set
