too much tv psychologically damages kids

[bcbm]

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Hiding the TV remote and games console controller is a good thing to do to kids if it's the only way to limit the time they spend in front of a screen, according to a study published Monday.

The study, published in the US journal Pediatrics, found that kids who spend hours each day in front of the TV or games console have more psychological difficulties like problems relating to peers, emotional issues, hyperactivity or conduct challenges, than kids who don't.

And contrary to what earlier studies have indicated, the negative impact of screen time was not remedied by increasing a child's physical activity levels, says the study conducted by researchers from the University of Bristol in Britain.

continued:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101011/ts_afp/healthmindchildrentelevisioncomputer

[¿Que?]

I think it's kind of sketchy to have children self-report on their television viewing time, although ultimately, kids who watch more TV will probably report more on average, so I don't know how much effect it would have on the conclusion of the study.

The thing I see as really problematic is how they sort of just look at abstract time in front of some kind of screen, as if every interaction between user and screen is the same. So I'm not sure how useful this study is, without at least some consideration into what shows are being watched, what games are being played, what social media is being used etc.

[bcbm]

i would imagine that whatever is being watched, there is still a negative impact if done for too long. the message doesn't change the medium.

[9]

continued:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20101011/ts_afp/healthmindchildrentelevisioncomputer

From the article:


The researchers found that children who spent two hours or more a day watching television or playing on a computer were more likely to get high scores on the questionnaire, indicating they had more psychological difficulties than kids who did not spend a lot of time in front of a screen.There is a correlation between spending hours in front of the television and having psychological difficulties, but it doesn't mean that watching a lot of television causes psychological difficulties. I'd imagine the underlying factors which lead to kids spending hours and hours of their day watching TV are probably more important with regard to explaining the psychological difficulties than the actual act of watching TV itself.

[¿Que?]

i would imagine that whatever is being watched, there is still a negative impact if done for too long. the message doesn't change the medium.
Sure, but what's the evidence that watching TV or game consoles is the cause or effect of those psychological problems.

[bcbm]

well i can't see how watching tv would help you learn to relate to your peers, deal with emotions, extend your attention span, etc and this research seems to suggest just that, but if you'd like to provide some other data? there are undoubtedly underlying reasons why this much tv is being watched but i doubt the tv helps.


Robinson noted that his own related research... found that limiting screen time reduced weight gain, aggression and consumer behaviors in kids.

"There are already lots of reasons to reduce kids' screen time and this is potentially another," said Robinson. "In our studies we find that giving children a screen-time budget and helping them stick to that budget is the most effective way to reduce their television, video game, computer and other screen time, and to improve their health as a result."http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/archives/2010/10/tv-and-kids-mental-health.html



A study (http://health.usnews.com/articles/health/healthday/2009/11/02/tv-may-increase-aggression-in-toddlers.html)of more than 3,000 3-year-olds found that those who watched television or were exposed to TV while others were watching, were at "increased risk for exhibiting aggressive behavior." Authors of a paper appearing in the Archives of Pediatrics & Adolescent Medicine believe there are many reasons for the link between TV and aggression. As explained by WebMD (http://children.webmd.com/news/20091102/tv-linked-to-more-child-aggression):

"Possible reasons are that children who see violence on television become desensitized to it; parents who don’t have limits on television may be less likely to have other rules, such as regular bedtimes; and when children are watching television, they are not participating in other activities that may benefit their social development, such as playing."

Numerous other studies in recent years have shown the potentially harmful effects of TV on children.http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/archives/2009/11/tv-watching-lin.html


Regardless of if you are overweight or physically fit, the hours you spend watching TV each day may be shortening your life according to findings (http://circ.ahajournals.org/cgi/content/abstract/CIRCULATIONAHA.109.894824v1?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&) published today in the American Heart Association journal Circulation.

In the six-year study involving 8,800 Australian adults, researchers found that people who watched more than four hours of TV a day had a 46 percent increased risk of death from any cause and were 80 percent more likely to die from cardiovascular disease than those who spent less than two hours a day watching TV. The results held even after factoring in health data such as diet, smoking and fitness regimen.http://scopeblog.stanford.edu/archives/2010/01/study-links-tim.html

[ContrarianLemming]

I think theres more to what they watch to, these studies have brought up increased agression, what do they watch though? I am skeptical that David Attenburough causes agression

Do you think spending time online is better? healthier?

I'm thinking it is, i certainly learn more.

[bcbm]

planet earth is pretty violent

ironically i am watching tv and on the computer at the same time while i post this, and have been for at least two hours.

[9]

there are undoubtedly underlying reasons why this much tv is being watched but i doubt the tv helps.

I'm sure that's probably true.

[ContrarianLemming]

planet earth is pretty violent

ironically i am watching tv and on the computer at the same time while i post this, and have been for at least two hours.

lol, I suppose it is..but it's relaxing violence.

I think I have very unhealthy habbits in TV, I almost always have my TV on as I'm on my laptop, I have it on right now.
I actually find it comforting, I feel better when it's on, though I'm not watching it, that bothers me

[¿Que?]

What I mostly think about this is that a lot of it has to do with the use of (language?) to communicate (ideas?). For example, I used to keep a music blog called ¡Social Critique!, and I used to spend a lot of time on it. I don't know what to think of that. It certainly wasn't the best or the worst thing I could have been doing.

[bcbm]

social technology opens up new avenues for communication and action but i also think it can serve to neutralize ideas, perhaps even more so than open up new possibilities.

[Amphictyonis]

JCT7h-jwCWA ^ Disturbing.

[ÑóẊîöʼn]

The problem with TV is that is a very passive medium on the part of the viewer. Aside from the physical health implications of sitting still for possibly hours, this makes television very didactic as a form of communication, even if what is communicated doesn't always permanently register.

Combined with the ubiquitous nature of TV, this makes it very open for purposes such as social manipulation and the normalisation of values seen on TV.

Does this mean that TV cannot possibly be used for genuinely beneficial purposes? Absolutely not! The same qualities that make TV an effective method for disseminating propaganda and the social values of the broadcasters also make it a potentially effective teaching tool.

[Plagueround]

I'm pretty sure I'm kind of fucked up from television, but I'm too lazy to really look into it.

[Amphictyonis]

The problem with TV is that is a very passive medium on the part of the viewer. Aside from the physical health implications of sitting still for possibly hours, this makes television very didactic as a form of communication, even if what is communicated doesn't always permanently register.

Combined with the ubiquitous nature of TV, this makes it very open for purposes such as social manipulation and the normalisation of values seen on TV.

Does this mean that TV cannot possibly be used for genuinely beneficial purposes? Absolutely not! The same qualities that make TV an effective method for disseminating propaganda and the social values of the broadcasters also make it a potentially effective teaching tool.

Watch the 'consuming kids' doc above. I vomited in my lap when I saw that a few months ago. Capitalism is being intertwined with our very being. It's sickening.

[Quail]

I'm not a child, but I find myself watching more TV when I'm feeling depressed, so maybe that can be the case with some of these children. I don't think that the correlation necessarily indicates that TV causes children to have psychological problems. It could be a two-way thing.

One of the things that I don't like about TV is that it doesn't really encourage children to think and be creative (or at least, most children's TV shows don't). It can be used for educational purposes too, but I don't think that watching the TV for hours on end is the best way to develop as a well-rounded individual - after all, children are still developing as people and need a wide range of experiences and stimuli.

[ckaihatsu]

[YouTube video -- 'Consuming Kids']


Y'all are just some jealous haters, that's all -- don't you wish *you* were part of a $700 billion economy when *you* were under 12 -- ?! Considering that kids are constrained to a nuclear family and are necessarily unemployed and without income it seems only fitting that they should have some "nag power", at least....

Hope you're at least *getting paid* by the liberals for your less-than-materialist stance here...(!)








And *this* is some simplistic behaviorism-type reasoning masquerading as social science -- couldn't they *at least* address the *content* of the programming, and the viewers' *interpretation*, or interaction, with the content???

What I *will* agree with is that less viewer *control* over programming means less self-selected *quality* viewing time, which means more of a conditioned learned-helplessness from watching TV....

And now you've just slipped into the land of the liberal soft-science psychology worldview mythos, people...!!!

(Now you, too, can be on the inside! Instructions for joining: [1] Think up a personalized type of anxiety you'd like to use. [2] Find the target population on which to impose this anxiety you've selected. [3] Now choose your scapegoatees by demographic category. [4] Displace the scapegoats' objective *material* situation and instead concentrate on whatever facts will help you sell the anxiety you've chosen to the target group -- example: Snacking is no longer about bridging nutritional needs between meals -- now it's a *problem* for *teens* that can only be solved by being 'informed adults' and buying the properly nutritionally balanced processed-food meals. [5] Welcome to the packaged food biz!)

[ckaihatsu]

While we're on the topic, I'd just like to further refine this critique and note that much of what passes for intellectualism and emotionalism in the bourgeois mass media is actually a *mis-generalization* of *individual* psychological traits, up into demographic categories. This Frankensteinian merging of psychology and sociology must be *irresistible* to the markets, splicing the personability and emotionalism of psychological themes with the broad perspectives afforded by sociology -- for an always-dramatic result -- and covering the concoction in a sheath of easy-to-digest demographic categories. Result? The viewer / consumer feels *all kinds* of smart, on a number of human-interest levels, without having to do much thinking. It's the equivalent of processed food, but for the mind....

[TheGodlessUtopian]

Everything is fine in moderation.Spending hours each day in front of the screen probably isn't going to do anything positive for you but at the same time it isn't going to make you a social reject.Any who argue otherwise are just fearmongering.

Besides whatever happened to Youth Rights? If an adult can watch hours upon hours of TV why not a child (and spare me the 'developmental' bullshit)?

[ckaihatsu]

Finally, in the interests of putting forth something *positive* and *constructive* to follow my critique of mass media melodrama, I'll posit that one may come to know more about a person by addressing their comprehensive *worldview* rather than by sorting them into abstract, idealized psychological traits.

To this end I've attached a framework for studying history in any place and period -- by extension this may be useful in seeing how *someone else* fills it in, for the present time, or for a point in history that they find personally meaningful....


History, Macro-Micro -- Precision

http://i45.tinypic.com/149030w.jpg


History, Macro-Micro

http://i48.tinypic.com/29vdjrl.jpg

[ryacku]

My god. My mother was right. Watching too much television isn't good for you.

[noble brown]

lol, I suppose it is..but it's relaxing violence.

I think I have very unhealthy habbits in TV, I almost always have my TV on as I'm on my laptop, I have it on right now.
I actually find it comforting, I feel better when it's on, though I'm not watching it, that bothers me

damn thats hilarious, mostly cause i got the same thing going on right now! and I am pissed! I hate HATE t.v! its a mind control device. I never even watch the thing. well technically i do but its always on one channel cause its the only channel that doesnt make me noxious, the science channel which is nonsense too but at least it sounds good, but i dont actually look at it, i barely listen to it, it kinda annoys me, but yet i dont turn it off cause if i do i keep wondering why its off. and that (keeping it off) is apparently less tolerable then knowing that I have the mind control on in my house, and willingly at that!

anyways, of course t.v messes up our kids. but i definetly dont need some lame study by some paid off group to tell me this. we are being actively programmed by this thing. i mean it is only one piece of the problem but it is a big socializer.

i mean its got me thinking i really like nikes and ipods and mcdonalds! not through some logical utilitarian reason but based on some subconscious emotional response thats been basically programmed. it just makes you sick to your stomach that someone has socially engineered you to be a consumer and not only that but a consumer willing to die for the freedom to be a consumer!