The Television: A Boon or a Bane to Society

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Call it the ‘idiot box’, call it the ‘window to the world’, call it by whatever name, it is an undeniable fact that the television has come to rule the world in a powerful way. The television has developed as a major social force, shaping the growth of children, bringing new exposure to adults, and swaying public opinions.

It is a media serving in a versatile manner: as an advertising medium, an entertainment medium, a public discussion platform, a weather forecast station, a center for cultural arts and music, and as a source of news and education. Various studies have been undertaken to examine the power of television as a social force and they all underline the fact that the television has a major impact on society – sometimes in a positive way and sometimes in a negative way. Thesis Statement: The innumerable benefits wrought by the advent of television far outweigh the negative aspects.

The positive social impacts of television are many. Television is a like a window to the world from each and every home on the planet. It brings in live news and information from around the world and even from outer space and depths of oceans. It highlights social problems to create a public awareness. The programs on starvation in Africa, abuse of Iraqi prisoners and coverage of the Iraq war are recent programs that have helped create global awareness.

Reading about thousands of children starving in Africa or some other country is one thing; actually seeing the misery is quite another. Television news is different from newspaper and print media as it brings in exact color, sound, time sequences and feelings of events. In democracies television is used for election campaigning and also for public discussion of electoral issues thereby allowing people to make informed choices. Through live coverage of certain events, television makes us all eyewitnesses to crucial events around the world.

This promotes formation of individual opinion around the world. Television is often decried as a negative influence on the sexual attitudes and behavior of America’s adolescents. A national sample of adolescents who regularly watched the television program Friends were surveyed about an episode that portrayed a pregnancy resulting from condom failure. Of 506 adolescents (age range, 12-17) who were surveyed, at least 155 had viewed the episode; 65% of viewers remembered the condom failure. Among those who changed their perceptions of condom efficacy as a result of watching, similar proportions came to view condoms as either more or less effective than they had previously believed. Ten percent discussed condom efficacy with adults after watching the show. This study just illustrates the effect that television can have on society as a whole.

But those who argue that television is harmful often cite the finding that television is harmful to children. Studies do show that even children below three can be affected by television. (Singer 40). According to a study in the July issue of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, television viewing before the age of three may have adverse effects on subsequent cognitive development (Singer 40). The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends no screen time for children younger than two and only high quality, age-appropriate viewing thereafter. Moreover, television has been viewed as being used to create a materialistic culture. According to Christen Fitzerald, television has polluted society by introducing “different ways of being, dressing, speaking and acting – vulgar, egalitarian, and immoral”.

However, while it might be true that children below three years must be exposed to indiscriminate television viewing, Frederick J. Zimmerman, Ph.D., and Dimitri A Christakis, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Washington, Seattle, have found that television viewing between ages three to five years is beneficial in terms of outcomes of reading recognition and short-term memory. They say that parents should learn to manage the context of television viewing to maximize its potential benefit for their children. Marie Winn, author of “The Plug-in: Television, Computers and Family Life” says that children are more affected by the time devoted to television watching than to the actual content of these programs.

Thus time spent on TV watching affects children a lot and its not about the content at all. Educational programming can develop young children’s socialization and learning skills. News, current events and historical programming can help make young people more aware of other cultures and people. Documentaries can help develop critical thinking about society and the world. Moreover, a study titled “Student Achievement in California Schools” it was found that “children of professional and semi-professionals, even those that viewed four or more hours a day, did much better than children of the skilled and unskilled who watched little or no television” (Berger 174).

As for arguments pointed out by Christian Fitzgerald regarding vulgar dressing, speaking and acting, one must remember that culture as a whole is evolving gradually. During this gradual process made things acceptable now that were unacceptable years ago.

Television also provides much needed escape and relaxation to children and adults. Television audiences can become awestruck with the beauty and grace of the arts or get caught up in the frenzy and excitement of an athletic event. Shrum says: “Entertainment provides at least three gratifications according to Berger. These three gratifications are: “a respite from the anxieties and pressures of everyday life; the opportunity to compare oneself with the demeanor, possessions and behavior of others; and a means of keeping up with what is transpiring in the world” (Berger 193). These gratifications have been particularly well documented in the case of television (Berger 193).

According to a research conducted by R. Gorney, D. Love and G. Steele (174), in which they studied the effects of a week’s viewing of five types of television programs, including those with predominantly helpful or hurtful content, on the aggressive mood and hurtful behavior of adult men. Their findings show that there is a “significant decrease in aggressive mood and lower levels of hurtful behavior in viewers of helpful programs”(Gorney, 174-177).

Further, television brings in the latest in ideas and information around the globe in the realms of health, science, and technology. Without advertisements on television, no one would know about new products in the market, the latest offers and jobs. Included in this category are new products and services that will make our life easier or safer, new recipes, important safety procedures, and even instructions on home improvement and repair. In today’s competitive, information-centered world, to stand still is to fall behind.

Further, critics of television generally make the following arguments: television debases the arts and audience tastes, undermines moral standards, encourages escapism, engages in economic exploitation, exhibits a liberal bias, sets up false images of reality and distorts reality through omission. () All these arguments come true depending on certain conditions and it is the responsibility of the television producers and policy makers of television programming to see to it that these accusations do not become the standard.

Although there are many moral issues related to media content, sex and violence create the greatest debates. Many consider casual sex a sin and leading to life-threatening disease and unwanted pregnancies. However, it should be remembered sex education through the media is largely responsible for the two-decade decline in the rate of unwanted pregnancies in the United States. (Davis 1). “Regarding violence on television, U.S. children typically see 16,000 murders on TV by the time they are 18” (Davis 1). Most of these murders appear to be without consequence and most are represented as the ready “solution” to a problem.

The results of one of the most extensive studies ever done on the subject of violence and TV were released in 2003. It has been concluded that those who as children were exposed to violent TV shows were much more likely to later be convicted of crime. (Williams 55) Researchers said that, “Media violence can affect any child from any family,” regardless of social class or parenting. Further, the study exposed that girls who watched a large amount of violence tended to exhibit hysterical behavior with their husbands and boys who grew up watching violence tended to become physically abusive husbands. A summary of much of the research and its consequences can be found in the book Visual Intelligence—Perception, Image, and Manipulation in Visual Communication by Ann Marie Seward Barry.

Thus we can conclude that while television viewing has both beneficial and harmful impacts on society, the benefits of television are overwhelmingly high. In order to maximize the benefits of television, it is necessary that television viewers are given the right to choose what they want to view from a free flow of information, and parental guidance is provided for youngsters in viewing programs that are beneficial to them.

Works Cited

Barry, Ann Marie (1997). Visual Intelligence: Perception, Image, and Manipulation in Visual Communication. Suny Press.

Berger, Asa Arthur (1987). Television in Society. Transaction Publishers.

Christine Fitzgerald, The Nefarious Power of Television, 2004. Web.

Davis J. Ann (2004). TV as Sex Educator. Journal Watch: Women’s Health. Web.

R Gorney, D Loye and G Steele, Impact of dramatized television entertainment on adult males, Am J Psychiatry 1977; 134:170-174, Association.

Singer, L. Jerome (1981). Television, Imagination and Aggression: A Study of Preschoolers. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Williams, Tannis Macbeth (2005). The Impact of Television: A natural Experiment in Three Communities.

Winn, Marie (2002). The Plug-in Drug: Television, computers and Family Life, Penguin Books.

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The Television: A Boon or a Bane to Society

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