Violent Television's Influlence on Children's Behaviour
Concern about children and popular media has a long history. Plato
proposed to ban poets from his ideal republic, because he feared that
their stories about immoral behaviour would corrupt young minds. In
modern times, moral pressure groups have tried to 'protect' children
from popular literature, the music hall, the cinema, comics,
television and 'video nasties'. It's important to see the issue of TV
violence and children's behaviour in a broader social, cultural and
historical context. Why is it such a popular subject? This isn't often
the fate of academic research issues. Well, it may be partly that it's
a convenient scapegoat. Blaming the media can serve to divert
attention from other causes of change, and so claims about the
'effects of television' can be massively exaggerated.
At the same time, we can hardly ignore the fact that TV does feature
aggressive and violent behaviour. One commentator notes that by the
age of 14 the average American child has seen 11,000 murders on TV
(Harris, 1989). In fact, studies have shown that violence is much less
prevalent on British TV than on American TV (Gunter & McAleer, 1990).
However, the type of programme matters: there's more violence in
cartoons than in many other fictional programmes, but children do
discriminate between cartoon violence and more 'realistic' violence.
NeverthelEss, violence is commonplace even on British TV.
There has been a considerable amount of research into
inter-relationships between the viewing of violent films, videos and
TV programmes and aggressive behaviour by the viewers of such
material, in par...
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...ent of more
time than you have as an undergraduate student:
§ Watch out for those who present children as passive viewers, and who
make no allowance for individuality or varied contexts.
§ And you can also criticize researchers' definitions of violence
which aren't those of the viewers involved.
§ No methodology is without its disadvantages, and specific research
projects are rarely without failings: you are in a better position to
point these out than the researchers are. What factors does a specific
study leave out?
§ You may also check any generalisations cautiously against your own
experience as a viewer, and maybe as someone with younger siblings.
And don't neglect the similar expertise which surrounds you amongst
your fellow-students. However, beware of generalising from your own
experience.