Blog 12

Understanding and Doing My Mid-Term 2

I looked up articles on watching television and it's affects on violence. I took some notes on it toward my mid-term essay. I actually am not sure w'at I'm really doing, but I'm trying. I have a lot to do to get this done.

My Notes
Interesting:
(link: http://www.myfavoriteezines.com/articles/TV-watching-pros-cons.html)
"In the book "Abandoned in the Wasteland: Children, Television and the First Amendment" another paradox of TV is mentioned; mainly, "Every day, all across the United States, a parade of louts, losers and con-men whom most people would never allow in their homes enter anyway, through television." That brings us to the next issue, TV violence.

Doesn't the extraordinary amount of violence on TV have an adverse impact on society? Oh, I know intellectuals like to disagree with that point. For instance, Dick Cavett mocked the TV-violence debate by quipping, "There's so much comedy on television. Does that cause comedy in the streets?" His remark makes a nice sound bite, but shows little understanding of sociology. We are socialized. We are taught how to think and feel by society, which consists of our parents, peers, schools, churches, role models, and, yes, TV. Of course it has an impact. To deny that is to say advertisers spend billions of dollars on TV ads that don't work. That's silly. TV ads influence us, and so does everything else that appears on TV.

TV creates great harm not only by its influence, but also by what it prevents. Marie Winn makes this point clear in her book "The Plug-In Drug." She writes, "The primary danger of the television screen lies not so much in the behavior it produces - although there is danger there - as in the behavior it prevents: the talks, the games, the family festivities and arguments..." The three hours a day that the average person spends watching TV could be used in countless ways to grow. Want to master the art of digital imaging, write poetry, learn how to play a keyboard, study a foreign language, learn how to dance, or just get out and meet some interesting people? All that and more is possible simply by turning off the TV and using that time more wisely. There's much talk about life extension. People want to live longer. A 20-year-old man who watches TV three hours a day until the age of 70, could have extended his life six and a quarter years merely by turning off the TV. Shutting it off not only gets you to live longer, but to live BETTER."
by Chuck Gallozzi from the article "TV Watching - Pros and Cons: Its Influence, Power and Effects"

(link: http://74.125.155.132/scholar?q=cache:8be4q_YreY8J:scholar.google.com/+watching+television+and+violence&hl=en&as_sdt=20000000000&as_vis=1)
NATURAL EXPOSURE TO TELEVISION AS A CAUSE OF AGGRESSION AND VIOLENCEIn 1973, a small Canadian town (called "Notel" by the investigators) acquired television for the first time. Theacquisition of television at such a late date was due to problems with signal reception rather than any hostilitytoward television. Joy et al, 20, investigated the impact of television on this virgin community, using as controlgroups two similar communities that already had television. In a double blind research design, a cohort of 45first and second grade students were observed prospectively over a period of 2 years for rates of objectivelymeasured noxious physical aggression (eg, hitting, shoving, and biting). Rates of physical aggression did notchange significantly among children in the two control communities. Two years after the introduction of televi-sion, rates of physical aggression among children in Notel had increased by 160% (P<.001).

In a 22 year prospective study of an age cohort in a semi rural US county (N=875) , Huesmann 21 observedwhether boys' television viewing at age 8 years predicted the seriousness of criminal acts committed by age 30.After controlling for the boys' baseline aggressiveness, intelligence, and socioeconomic status at age 8, it wasfound that the boys' television violence viewing at age 8 significantly predicted the seriousness of the crimes forwhich they were convicted by age 30 (P<.05).In a retrospective case control study, Kruttschnitt et al" compared 100 male felons imprisoned for violent crimesleg, homicide, rape, and assault) with 65 men without a history of violent offenses, matching for age, race, andcensus tract of residence at age 10 to 14 years. After controlling for school performance, exposure to prenatalviolence, and baseline level of criminality, it was found that the association between adult criminal violence andchildhood exposure to television violence approached statistical significance (P<.10).All Canadian and US studies of the effect of prolonged childhood exposure to television (2 years or more)demonstrate a positive relationship between earlier exposure to television and later physical aggressiveness,although not all studies reach statistical significance. g The critical period of exposure to television is preadoles-cent childhood. Later variations in exposure, in adolescence and adulthood, do not exert any additional ef-fect.23,24 However, the aggression enhancing effect of exposure to television is chronic, extending into lateradolescence and adulthood.8" This implies that any interventions should be designed for children and their caregivers rather than for the general adult population.These studies confirm what many Americans already believe on the basis of intuition. In a national opinion poll,43% of adult Americans affirm that television violence "plays a part in making America a violent society," andan additional 37% find the thesis at least plausible (only 16% frankly disbelieve the proposition).26 But how biga role does it I play? What is the effect of natural exposure to television on entire populations? To address thisissue, I took advantage of an historical experiment in the absence of television in South Africa prior to1975.8,25

Journal of the American Medical Association, June 10, 1992 Vol 267. No. 22
Television and Violence
The Scale of the Problem and Where to Go From Here
Brandon S. Centerwall, MD, MPH

(link: http://psycnet.apa.org/journals/amp/27/4/253/)