The Effect of Television Violence on Children
Television can be a powerful influence in developing value systems
and shaping behavior; The violence that children are constantly
subjected to on television can have very harmful affects if not
monitored carefully. More and more often parents are using television
as a means of entertaining their children when they are unable to, and
the amount of television that children are watching is a growing
concern in our society. While a large part of the concern is the
quantity of television that young people are viewing, a more pressing
issue is the quality that is offered to them. While cartoons may seem
to be harmless and humorous, that is not always the case. A good
portion of the violence that is on television is captured in Saturday
morning cartoons, when children are most likely to be captivated by
them. This proves to be highly dangerous with young minds because some
children at tender ages are unable to understand or grasp the concept
of reality versus fantasy. This leaves children at risk of
understanding cartoons to be real life and 'copy catting' their
heroes, that were praised for their actions.
As society begins to realize the full impact of violence on television
for young children they are starting to work towards making parents
more aware of what their child is viewing while they are out of the
room. Because every child and every household is different it is
difficult to measure how a single child will be impacted, by viewing
excessive violence on the screen. This is why it is imperative that
parents are the ones to take responsibility for what their child is
viewing as t...
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...re as other times it may take some simple explaining to help
the child understand that what they are seeing is not real. The key is
for parents to take an interest in their children's viewing habits and
to sit down and discuss what they are watching and the implications of
what they are seeing as well as monitoring the amount of time that
they are spending in front of the television set.
Without proper control, the television can be a very powerful and very
suggestive and dangerous mode of information. The violence that
children are constantly subjected to on television can have very
harmful effects if not monitored carefully. What kind of world would
we live in we all solved our problems by pulling out a sword and
fighting to the death, or kicking our opponents until eventually they
disappeared into a cloud of dust?
There are a lot of people who either wonder or believe that violent media is bad for people and mostly children. Not all violent media is bad. Sometimes when people have a stressful day they will play video games to let off steam. A few people like watching horror movies because of the thrill of being scared. But if you’re a kid with no friends or you are alone most of the time, you might enjoy comic books. They are filled with action and heroes. Doing any of these can give off a sense of adventure, thrill, and excitement. It doesn’t mean that you’re going to go off and start hurting people because of it. There is a lot of evidence that states the media affects viewers by encouraging violent behavior and weakening their creative ability. The question is whether the media is truly the problem, or is it the parental role that is the problem.
Television with its far reaching influence spreads across the globe. Its most important role is that of reporting the news and maintaining communication between people around the world. Television's most influential, yet most serious aspect is its shows for entertainment. Violent children's shows like Mighty Morphing Power Rangers and adult shows like NYPD Blue and Homicide almost always fail to show human beings being able to resolve their differences in a non-violent manner; instead they show a reckless attitude that promotes violent action first with reflection on the consequences later. Contemporary television creates a seemingly insatiable appetite for amusement of all kinds without regard for social or moral benefits (Schultze 41). Findings over the past twenty years by three Surgeon Generals, the Attorney General's Task Force on Family Violence, the American Medical Association, the National Institute of Mental Health, the American Psychiatric Association, the American Psychological Association, the American Academy of Pediatrics, and other medical authorities indicate that televised violence is harmful to all of us, but particularly to the mental health of children (Medved 70-71).
Young children, starting at about age three, begin to really watch a television program designed for their age. They will begin to imitate what they have seen on the television. Children ages six through about ten often do not fully understand the difference between reality, and what they see on T.V. (Ledingham). With that in mind, consider the violent content in television programs. A recent content analysis, The National Television Violence Survey, had several interesting findings in regard to violence in television programs:
Some people believe that it should be banned from stations that show children?s programs to prevent the exposure of those children. Sometimes children see a great amount of violence on television, they begin to think that this is right and start to imitate the acts that they see on television, which are not the things that the parents want the children to learn from. One example of this is a thirteen-year-old boy who shot his best friend?s father and then put salt in the wounds. When he was asked why he did this he said that he had seen the same thing on a movie the day before. Psychological research has shown three major effects of seeing 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. Children who watch a lot of TV are less aroused by violent scenes than are those who only watch a little; in other words, they're less bothered by violence in general, and less likely to anything wrong with it.
The responsibility of adults and of public policy to protect children from unnecessary and potentially harmful exposure to violence through the media and to protect children from television content and advertising practices that exploit their special vulnerability (Huston, Watkins, & Kunkel, 1989). Television and other media have the potential to be very effective educational tools for children. Research demonstrates that television viewing is a highly complex, cognitive activity, during which children are actively involved in learning (Anderson & Collins, 1988). Therefore, supports efforts to use media constructively to expand children's knowledge and promote the development of positiv...
Television programs that are targeted towards children, such as cartoons, can affect children in both positive and negative ways. I examined a variety of cartoons on both commercial and public television to observe the content of children's programming and determine the effects, both positive and negative, that programs have on children. The cartoons contain a wide variety of subject matters that can influence children in many different ways. I found that the majority of cartoons choose to use violence and inappropriate subject matter to entertain children. These images and stories can have a tremendous negative impact on children because the violence is rewarded without consequences, is glorified, and idealized. Children look up to the characters that have a negative impact by distorting their views on conflict resolution. There are, however, cartoons that contain little or no violence and often try to incorporate educational lessons that concern values and morals that are important for children to learn, thus having a positive impact.
Most American's would agree that children watch a lot of TV. It's common to see a child sitting in front of the TV on a Saturday morning with their Coco Pebbles watching their favorite superhero. This sounds harmless enough. However, many parents and teachers across the country are worried about the cartoons their children are watching. They feel that the cartoons have become too violent and are having negative long-term effects on children. It is common to see young boys pretending to shoot one another, while jumping on the couch and hiding in closets as a sort of make-believe fort. But parents say that children are learning these behaviors from cartoons and imitating them. Others however, disagree, they say that violence in cartoons does not effect children and that children need this world of fantasy in their lives. They say that children would show these same behaviors regardless of the content of the cartoons they watch.
One Saturday morning when I was five years old, I was watching an episode of the Roadrunner on television. As Wile Coyote was pushed off a cliff by the roadrunner for the fourth or fifth time, I started laughing uncontrollably. I then watched a Bugs Bunny show and started laughing whenever I saw Elmer Fudd shoot Daffy Duck and his bill went twirling around his head. The next day, I pushed my brother off a cliff and shot my dog to see ifs its head would twirl around.
Children daily see hundreds of violent acts on television. Most parents notice the obvious acts of gore and try to avoid those types of shows; however, what parents do not realize is that cartoons contain just as much, if not more, violence per episode. When parents see shows such as “SpongeBob SquarePants,” for example, they seem more comical rather than violent, and do not grab the parents’ attention. However, children are more prone to being frightened by violence due to the fact that they are much more literal than older children and adults (Drinka 1).
Someone is seriously going to get hurt or worse. Turn on a television set and pick a channel at random; the odds are better than fifty-fifty that the program will expose children to violent material. Naturally kids are attracted to things that captures their attention. What was a major contribution to a fun childhood? Cartoons! Cartoons are very fun to watch and learn from. However, there is something that all cartoons have in common and that is hilarious violence.
There’s an ancient chinese proverb that states “A child’s life is like a piece of paper on which everyone who passes by leaves an impression” (Great-Quotes.com.) People blindly believe that children are easily influenced by violent cartoons on television. From generation to generation parents are always warned not to allow their kids to watch too much violent cartoons. What kids watch- and not just how much- matters when it comes to television viewing (Rochman.) But just how true is that? Research on the negative influences of cartoons on children is inconclusive and complex.
Television, which was nonexistent just a few decades ago, has become an integral part of our daily lives. There are thousands of shows to choose from, varying from soap operas to cooking shows to science fiction. These can all be easily accessed with just the click of a button. If what you want to watch is not on, you can access just about every show there has been through the Internet. This is convenient in our growing need for constant entertainment. However, this ease of access presents problems. The ability to watch any show at any time applies to children as well. Because of this it has become increasingly difficult to monitor what children watch. The result is the increased exposure of youth to violence. This is not limited to cartoon characters blowing each other up; there are many shows that depict explicit, realistic violence. Statistics show that the average American child, by the time they are 18, will have witnessed 40,000 murders on TV. The question arises as to whether watching shows that show violence can have a negative effect on children. Violent shows desensitize children, encouraging the use of force to solve problems, and can even lead to children exhibiting violence.
This literature review is based on the effects of television violence on children. More specifically, it deals with the relationship found between television violence and aggression found in young children. I chose this topic because I found it interesting to learn that studies have indeed found a connection between television viewing and the behavior of people, especially children. The first study reviewed is entitled "Television Violence and Children's Aggression: Testing the Priming.
Furthermore, television violence causes aggressive behavior in children. Many people believe that children who watch violent television programs exhibit more aggressive behavior than that exhibited by children who do not (Kinnear 23). According to the results of many studies and reports, violence on television can lead to aggressive behavior in children (Langone 50). Also, when television was introduced into a community of children for the first time, researchers observed a rise in the level of physical and verbal aggression among these children (Langone 51). The more television violence viewed by a child, the more aggressive the child is (“Children” 1).
...onditions that ensure an adequate counterbalance increasing consumption in some cases, end up having a negative effect on children. Children learn best through demonstration followed by imitation, with rewards for doing things the right way. While not all are affected the same way, it can be said that, in general, violence in the media affects attitudes, values and behaviors of users. You run the risk that children end up understanding that it is reasonably practicable to resort to violence. The fear is that the models of aggressive behavior can be considered suitable. Thus, in an investigation, a good proportion of children (third) defined as normal acts of violence they had seen him mightily little. It is not; here is a risk of direct imitation, but rather a change in terms of reference: where extreme violence appears to be normal any more light may seem harmless.