The Power of Television What’s Left After Violence and Advertising?

Maurine Doerken

In this selection from the provocatively titled Classroom Combat: Teaching and Television, Maurine Doerken (b. 1950) makes a case for the powerful and dangerous influence television exerts over children. Pushing beyond the usual debates about violence and advertising, she argues that TV’s escapist fare diminishes social awareness and fosters passivity and personal isolation. Doerken is currently studying for a Ph. D at the University of Southern California.

Attitudes Toward Entertainment

If the average person on the street were stopped and asked what the three most frequent offerings on American television are (excluding commercials), he would probably answer action/adventure, situation comedy, and musical/variety talk shows. This same person then most likely would turn around and classify these all under the rubric “entertainment”.

But Shakespearean plays and grand opera are also “entertainment”, yet they are hardly the same kind as is usually offered on our TV screens. This is a problem we Americans face when discussing television programming… because we have grown so accustomed to think of TV material as general entertainment when it is. In fact, light fare of a very specific kind. The vast majority of TV offerings in this country has been and continues to be fantasy/escapist entertainment, not the entertainment we get from Othello or Beethoven. Some entertainment, to be sure, can be very engaging and very moving without being escapist, but those who organize TV material in America usually give the broad name “entertainment” to what is only a narrow selection of the whole. This is not always the case, but generally it is.

Consequently, over the past thirty years, viewers have been exposed with great consistency to fantasy/escapist entertainment and a narrowing of tastes to fit “the average”, not entertainment of a more serious, thought provoking kind or one based predominantly on real life. So when we discuss the impact of television on young people, we are talking about the impact of three decades of fantasy/escapist fare. Even during the mid-fifties, light entertainment constituted approximately seventy-five percent of total TV time, and a brief glance at TV Guide today hardly reveals much of a change. Escapist entertainment still dominates the screen. In this sense. TV material has become what one broadcast historian calls a strategy word, for it minimizes the importance of what is presented. Rather, entertainment is there to lull our critical faculties by sending un into the domain of low-involvement learning. It has no meaning, essentially, other than diverting and filling time between commercials.

This brings to mind several questions. With such a heavy diet of fantasy material, where are viewers, especially children and adolescents, to receive a comparable amount of reality presentations? Is it better to get a solid footing in reality or fantasy? Or at least an equal grounding in both? These questions are particularly relevant to preliterate youngsters who cannot read to counter balance what they see and hear, for they are even more susceptible to informal television influence.

The effect of this fantasy/escapist entertainment has to be different in character and kind than if we had three decades of plays and dramas from renowned writers; a spectrum of musical offerings; fewer commercials; or more quality programming geared specifically toward children. This is self-evident. TV has been promoted as a window to the world, and in many cases, this has been true. But, in many other ways, it most certainly has not been so, due to the fantasy material which has dominated the screen. One need only look at American TV-entertainment over the past three decades to see what a distorted view has been presented as life.

The sexes and Racial Groups

As far as men, women and various racial groups are concerned, television in this country has generally shown the following picture:

1. The most powerful group is the whit American male. He usually is young, middle class, and unmarried – and is likely to be involved in violence.

2. Women make up a smaller proportion of all TV characters, regardless of ethnic background. They usually appear in a sexual context or in romantic roles. Two out of three are married or engaged, though this is now changing.

3. Women participate less in violence but are victimized more, and if a women engages in aggression, she is not as likely to succeed as a man.

4. Women are also cast more frequently in domestic/comedic roles.

5. Married women are less likely to be a victim of aggression. Housewives are not portrayed as villains as much as single women or those who are employed.

It was not until 1968 that the first black series was offered over the TV airwaves. A young child growing up with TV during the fifties might have thought that blacks and other minorities did not exist. Not only were many people and races virtually ignored at TV’s inception, but when they did appear, they often were presented as unfavorable stereotypes (i.e. Indians as bloodthirsty drunks or Chinese as cooks, servants, and laundry owners). For nearly three decades, television has concentrated on showing the twenty- to fifty-year-olds, thereby ignoring the very young and elderly. There has been a constant push in the informal learning domain to telescope all age groups into a young adult market, focusing intently on the NOW.

Themes and Format of Programs

Not only has our escapist TV entertainment centered on specific races and ages, implicitly denying the existence of many other people and life styles, but recurring themes and ideas emerge as well. As indicated previously, violence has been a staple on the American TV screen, but even though it has occurred with mind-boggling regularity as “true-to-life action drama, it still follows the same pattern of unreality. Street crime, for example, has not been as important in the world of TV as it is in real life. Murder and assault have accounted for about fifty percent of all TV crime, yet this is not true of life on the outside. As one can see [in table 1], almost a complete inversion has taken place.

Table 1

Frequency ranking of FBI Frequency ranking of TV

Crime index from 1970 crimes from 1972

1. Burglary 1. Murder

2. Larceny 2. Assault

3. Auto theft 3. Robbery

4. Robbery 4. Auto theft

5. Assault 5. Burglary

6. Rape 6. Larceny

7. Murder 7. Rape

Generally crime on American TV has:

1. overrepresented violent crimes directed against individuals; real-life crime is usually nonviolent and directed at property;

2. Underrepresented blacks, young people, and lower-class individuals involved in a crime;

3. Reinforced the moral that crime does not pay; the main intent is to reassure society that right will prevail; in the real world, however, this obviously is not so, for crime often pays well;

4. Concentrated on “the hunt” as being all-important rather than the legal processes involved after apprehension;

5. Underrepresented nonwhites as murder victims;

6. Underrepresented violent crimes between family members;

7. and made crime motives appear simple and easily understood; in real life, this is often not the case at all.

Quite clearly, this picture has little to do with reality, even though it has been presented as “true” life. Yet, how much misinformation is being assimilated incidentally by children who watch a moderate to heavy amount? How much do they accept at face value? A very false image of the world could be in the making, which might be difficult to untangle later on.

TV Employment

Aside from these misrepresentations of various groups and crime in our society, another important aspect of television distortion concerns employment. Not surprisingly, the most frequent form of TV work is law enforcement. Nearly one-third of the American TV labor force at one time or another has been concerned with the pursuit of law and order. In reality, however, only about one percent of the population is so involved… Jobs associated with entertainment rank second in the world of TV, which is hardly true of life either. Professional workers have been overrepresented, and there has always been that push for a higher socioeconomic status – informal messages consistent with the consuming world of TV. A corresponding underrepresentation of worker roles have been evident, though this changing. As a source of incidental learning for young people about jobs and work, television provides a very slanted view of what is considered important, which could have serious ramifications in children’s attitudes regarding employment later on.

A case in point: When a group of children was questioned about work, they overwhelmingly chose power as the most important factor to consider when thinking about employment. Money, prestige, and travel came next; helping others was last. The interesting point here is that these results held for both for both rich and poor children; urban and rural; male and female; dull and bright. Television’s influence was pervasive in all areas of society. The fantasy/escapist material had been successful in changing their attitudes and aspirations toward a career.

Is this a form of programmed discontent? Does television teach unhappiness about work in general by presenting a false picture of the way life really is? If a child consistently sees powerful or dangerous jobs cast in glamorous settings, what kinds of ideas will he form about what he wants to be? His informal learning from television may be a source of disappointment and conflict when he finally starts to work, for it is not easy to become rich and powerful. In effect, such portrayals take the child away from the ordinary, which is a very real part of living, a part which needs to be met and dealt with often. How might all this influence his evaluation of work or his choice of job opportunities after leaving high school or college? These instances of misrepresentation are but a few examples of how television’s escapist fare has twisted and turned images of life. All this may be obvious to the adult viewer, but how the past thirty years have affected children growing up under TV’s powerful, informal influence is another matter entirely. We are talking about analyzing human reactions and emotions in the area of incidental, deferred learning, which certainly is not an easy task. Yet, the impact of all this may be profound and go much deeper than many of us suspect…

Personal isolation and television

Another important aspect in the conflict of television and children is the personal and emotional isolation fostered by TV. How does this affect individual growth and development? It must be remembered that when a child accepts the box as a form of leisure activity or comfort, he turns away from people and all the direct stimulation they provide. His learning becomes vicarious rather than first-hand; he substitutes something inanimate for live, direct interaction. TV allows him to escape from personal involvement by substituting something that seems like close contact but which in fact is not. Some people believe television is the perfect refuge for those who are unable to cope with life because it acts as solace to the individual who cannot deal with the outside world. Rather than encouraging him to face his problems and learn from other people, TV offers him a place to hide or becomes a way to kill time so he will not have to cope with reality.

The following case study is a good example of this type of influence and how it can directly affect a child’s behavior in school. A little girl named “Susie” exhibited marked antisocial tendencies in class. She would not participate in group activities and refused to become involved with other children. When her teacher discovered that Susie was a heavy TV viewer, she suggested to the mother that she put her daughter on a TV diet.

During the first week without TV, Susie was very upset over not being allowed to watch. Her teacher reported that she was moodier than usual and would sit and stare at the ground. After only a week, however, changes began to appear. Susie started to ask her mother to invite playmates over to the house after school. This was something she had never wanted before, and her teacher also noticed her playing more with the other children during class time. By the end of the four weeks, the youngster no longer was just an outsider but a participant. She played by herself and with other children, and both mother and teacher thought her a much happier child. Several weeks later, however, when the girls mother allowed her to resume watching television, Susie’s previous Symptoms returned. She simply refused to interact with other people. There appeared to be a direct relationship between the little girl’s social maladjustment and her TV-watching behavior…

Table 2

Characteristic Watch a great Watch TV Watch TV

Deal of TV frequently seldom

Lonely 95% 5% 0%

Shy 70% 22% 7%

Listless 51% 22% 27%

Pampered 49% 25% 28%

Emotional 39% 39% 22%

Obedient 4% 79% 17%

Has friends 4% 29% 68%

Active 1% 34% 65%

There is also the possibility that those who consume large amounts of television may possess certain introverted personality traits which are only reinforced by the medium’s tendency to isolate and remove. As one can see [in Table 2], there is evidence to support this claim.

Though television by no means warrants universally adverse effects, among heavy viewers certain patterns do begin to emerge. Like the little girl just mentioned, the heavy user is lonelier, more listless, and shy. On the other hand, children who watch little TV, according to the above figures, are almost the opposite. Nor is it merely the only child or the child whose parents work who is the heavy viewer, but more importantly, the insecure child who has trouble making friends or who feels safer alone than in a group.

Whether television stimulates these personality/emotional tendencies or draws individuals to it who are already predisposed to such traits does not really matter, because the net result is a negative influence on personal development. TV can prevent a child from being lonely, but this is not necessarily good, especially if that child is inclined to shyness in the first place. He should. On the contrary, be encouraged to participate with those around him. In other cases, television may keep children from learning how to be alone and cope with aloneness, both of which represent vital aspects of growth. As psychologist Bruno Bettelheim suggests:

Children who have been taught or conditioned, to listen passively most of the day to the warm verbal communication coming from the TV screen… are often unable to respond to real persons because they arouse so much less feeling than the skilled actor. Worse, they lose the ability to learn from reality because life experiences are more complicated than the ones they see on the screen, and there is no one who comes in at the end to explain it all… If this block of sold inertia is not removed, the emotional isolation from others that starts in front of the TV may continue. This… is one of the real dangers of TV.

This isolation and lack of personal involvement may lead to an increase in all dependant behaviors and may hamper the development of individuals into people capable of forming their own decisions…

It must be remembered, too, that television’s isolating effect has been going on for several decades now. It is not a question of a few random individuals like little Susie holing up with the box, but if the Nielsens are correct, almost an entire nation! This fourteen-year-old’s comment states the case as well:

Television is perfect to tune out the rest of the world. But I don’t relate with my family much because we’re all to bust watching TV.

Narcotic Dysfunction of Television

This tendency of television to isolate individuals may have further educational and social ramifications. As people substitute watching TV for doing and as they interact less with one another, they cease in a sense being social creatures. They decrease their actual involvement and learning from others and the world around them, though they may vicariously see a great deal. In this way, television acts as a narcotic or drug, as some people have claimed, for it removes people from people by taking real life away. At the flick of the switch, seas of fantasy/escapist material are readily available to pass the time of day.

But by provoking the individual, especially the growing child, with so many escape valves from outside pressures, television may simultaneously stunt the growth of personal and group responsibility. It may provide steady relief from daily life and all the tensions that go along with it; but if used to hide from anxiety or duties, it can also reduce the likelihood of involvement and genuine concern. Using the medium to run away from problems or to put them off indefinitely makes the viewer less aware of troubles that do in fact exist. Continually accepting a dream world or confusing reality with fantasy is not conductive to the development of social consciousness. It is quite possible that gradual changes could result in attitudes and behavior, away from individual awareness and public commitment.

The term narcotisizing dysfunction has been coined by psychologists to describe this particular effect of television. Even though the medium exposes us to vast amounts of information, it still may evoke minimal interest in real social problems, and this could develop into mass apathy. Excessive TV exposure may actually deaden rather than enliven the emotions of the average viewer, because the more time he spends with television, the less time he has for action and work. Similar to the case of excessive violence viewing, a general habituation or desensitization to life’s problems may take place. A person might have enormous amounts of material open to him but still fail to make any decisions regarding that information or to act upon his own feelings and instincts.

TV will not necessarily reinforce apathy among those already committed but it will tend to do so with those who are poor self-starters in the first place. The problem here is that the apathetic generally make up a far larger number of the whole. There are always more people who do not wish to act or who have trouble overcoming their own inertia. Teachers and educators have always been confronted with the problem of student motivation. Yet, however difficult genuine social concern may be to achieve, it does not change the fact that we need a critical, perceptive, and caring citizenry, particularly among the young growing to adulthood. In an age of global politics, social awareness and responsibility toward the whole are crucial to all.

Television certainly has a great capacity to foster the development of such attitudes, but something seems to have gone amiss along the way. There can be no doubt, for example, that TV helped to encourage some of the awareness and concerns which manifested themselves during the sixties. Some very real and disturbing events found their way into the screen, events which have left a deep impression on an entire generation. But perhaps the habit of escaping into fantasy and materialism – also promoted by television – was stronger in the long run than the effort required for continual commitment to social activism. In the short term, TV can inspire concern among people because immediate events are exciting or disturbing. But over longer periods of time, a different pattern to avoid real life or which places material above ideological concerns, may contravene both social and political action…

American Schizophrenia

There are other points to consider in relationship to this narcotisizing aspect of the mediums power. In conjunction with TV’s tendency to isolate and its potential for, in effect, drugging people to not care, there is also the real danger of much personal, internal conflict resulting from heavy exposure. Constantly shifting between what is and what is not; between shows, ideas, images, and channels literally is enough to push some people over the “deep end” or to make them nervous temperamentally. So much TV is based on illusion and fantasy that it becomes very difficult at times to know what is truth and what is not. This is especially true of young children, who have not yet accumulated a vast catalogue of personal experiences against which to evaluate TV content.

One wonders: is there something inherently jarring and debilitating about the American television experience? The National Institute of Mental Health Report actually cites a study comparing American and foreign TV which suggests this may be so. Foreigners who are accustomed to a much slower pace of television say the find American TV unnerving and experience a kind of physical pain when they first see commercial television in this country. The Report declares:

The rapid form of presentation characterizing American television in novelty piles upon novelty in short sequences may well be counterproductive for organized and effective learning sequences. The young child who has not yet developed strategies for tuning out irrelevancies may be especially vulnerable in this respect; even programs that seek to be informative as well as entertaining may miss the mark because they allow too little time for reflection… Extremely rapid-pace material, presenting novelty along with high levels of sound and fast movement, may generate surprise and confusion in a viewer whose anticipatory, strategies… are not yet prepared for coping with this material.

All this points to the fact that a very disturbing element of schizophrenia lies at the very heart of American television. On the one hand is a vast display of random bits of life; on the other is the constant psychic irritation of rampant consumerism. If mental breakdown is the common result of endless new patterns of information, then TV in this country certainly provides agitation in abundance. All the contradictory input could very well create a widespread state of subconscious confusion. This is most true for the young, because they generally need reassurance, structure, and freedom within reason in order to grow and learn at their best.

Yet, how can youngsters possibly analyze and catalogue all that they view on television – especially if their parents do not take the time to discuss with them what they see? Is television somehow grooming us for mass nervous disorder and resentment? A pervasive malaise existing just below the surface of our lives? There is evidence that this is indeed likely. A survey of fifth- and sixth-grade students, for example, reveals that many emotional and personal problems suffered by these children, such as worries about looks, being fat, having bad complexions, and being accepted by others, all related to the kinds of television they watched. Moreover, this country’s mental hospitals are now overloaded with young patients, and many children today currently undergo some form of counseling or private therapy because they seem so unable to cope with life. There is also growing evidence that many children in the United States suffer from clinical depression and suicidal tendencies even though very young.

… If I were to construct a picture of the average TV consumer based upon the data presented thus far, the image we come up with is rather disheartening. The moderate to heavy viewer is somewhat duller, more materialistic, and less knowledgeable about life. He reads less and may lack a certain amount of spontaneity and creativity. He is less interested in the real world and people than in an edited, fantasy version of life. He may be somewhat shy and introverted; and though he may crave human contact, he ahs not had the practice to know how to go about being a friend. He may even be a personality type bordering at times on the mildly neurotic and mentally unstable. Or, he simply may be an inert mass which does not care and is willing to watch life go by.

* * *

Television for Learning: Our Foremost Tool in the 21^st Century

Dr. E. Palmer

Depending on how one looks at the status of educational television in the world today, one sees either a glass half full or a glass half empty. Great advances have been made worldwide in forging inventive applications. Many different program genres have been used to address diverse audiences for a variety of formal and non-formal learning purposes, with scientifically measured results. The record of accomplishments is impressive, yet TV is drastically underutilized as a teaching tool in countries that have the highest prevalence of urgent and otherwise unmet education needs. The large gap that exists between the state of the art and the state of practice in the use of television for development has many causes, including a major lapse of international attention to national capacity building and application.

Among the nations that receive the greatest amounts of international assistance in health, education, child rights, ecology and the environment, many now contain 20 to 40 million or more individuals who regularly see TV. This means that in some of the most economically limited countries of the world, tens of millions of households of very meager means have invested in the purchase of a TV set which for them is immensely expensive. Although these sets are purchased mainly for entertainment, the result is to make one of the world's most powerful educational tools available on a massively wide scale to many people in the world who have limited access to education through other means. A critical mass of TV viable countries now exists for educational purposes, to justify undertaking unprecedented levels of international coordination in such areas as experience exchange, training, resource development, and national and regional capacity building.

Huge numbers of non-literate or marginally literate individuals, for whom formal education has little practical applicability, will live out their lives in print-scarce environments with few or no reading materials in their homes, but with regular access to television. TV and radio, for as far as we can see into the 21st century, will be their most important outside source of lifelong and lifewide learning. Viewed in this light, the real costs in terms of human survival, quality of life, and productivity in countries that fail to develop educational television more fully must be reckoned with as an important policy consideration.

Television during its earliest stage of growth in a given developing country is useful mainly as a means to reach and influence policy makers in urban settings. We know a great deal today about the role TV often plays in "agenda setting" -- i.e., in elevating issues in the agendas of nations, ministries, and professional groups. During its second (intermediary) phase of availability, television also begins to function according to the classical two-step model, whereby it reaches significant numbers of influential community opinion leaders, who in turn relay its educational and motivational points to large numbers of individual householders. Policy makers in countries where television reaches only a fraction of the population need to be aware that this fraction will include a disproportionately large number of community opinion leaders, who can be counted on to further disseminate the practical lessons that they see presented on TV. In the third (mature) phase, TV continues to reach policy makers and community opinion leaders and, in addition, reaches significantly large numbers of individual householders. It is during this stage that television begins to reach the "neediest of the needy" in significantly large numbers.

Model uses of TV for national development have emerged in widely separated times and places, but never has a determined human effort been made in a single locale to realize anything approaching the full scope and impact of television in its capacity to teach, illuminate, and empower. Totally absent in developing countries at the close of the 20th century are exemplars of carefully planned, comprehensive national policies geared to making the best-informed and most rational uses of television to address the highest priority education needs, based on a realistic sense of what these nations actually are going to spend.

A great deal is known -- if not widely known -- about how to use TV effectively as a disseminator of knowledge, shaper of attitudes, and motivator of recommended actions. Television also has been used in documented ways to bring about measured gains in the thinking skills of viewers in such areas as scientific and mathematical reasoning and analysis of distortions in TV news and advertising. The literature includes, still further, many articles on how to collect and make use of audience data, such as research on pilot productions, to guide improvements in the appeal and educational effectiveness of the completed programs.

"Best practices" are defined according to important criteria. Some are low-cost/high-yield. Others are ones that TV organizations are likely to perpetuate on a sustaining basis. Still others make use of popular program genres, in which education and entertainment are blended, to be able to attract large viewing-learning audiences during peak TV viewing periods.

The literature on educational uses of TV focuses, variously, on applications of particular TV program genres; research and evaluation practices; evaluation results; design of effective educational and motivational program approaches; specialized producer and researcher training; and patterns of international co-production. The Japan Prize Contest, now a decades-old tradition, serves as a screening center for identifying and honoring the best educational programs from all over the world, and as a venue for professional exchange. The NHK generously makes its library of prize-winning programs available for study at selected centers located around the world.

Program genres that have been widely used and found to work effectively for education in countries all around the world include communication campaigns based on minute-long public service announcements, somewhat longer program "fillers," soap operas (popular dramatic serials), magazine-style variety series with recurring features, hosted talk shows with live audiences and expert panels, interview shows especially when these contain interesting and informative inserts, animations, popular music specials, news and documentaries, and re-enactments in the form of docu-dramas, to mention just a few. The range of subjects is large and diverse, and includes farm shows, doctor's advice shows, shows on food preparation and preservation, shows on ecology and on international and inter-ethnic conflict resolution, specials on child development and child rearing, and shows about education and schooling, automobile and appliance repair, and do-it-yourself home and community improvements.

The following ideas for capacity building to improve educational television in developing countries were chosen more to suggest a range of ways in which capacity can be increased than necessarily in all cases to address top priorities.

Expand and improve technical facilities. Shortages of technical facilities for creating educational TV programs often result from prior failures in national planning. The best results come when planning is comprehensive and open to wide stakeholder participation, and when stakeholders and decision makers alike are well informed on how and how effectively television can be used to serve various national education needs. Helping them become so informed is a crucial early step in promoting increased investments in technical facilities.

Best practices. An especially important international capacity building activity, one that provides a foundation for other crucially important actions, is to develop an extensive data base on best practices, make it easily available, and actively promote its fullest possible use worldwide. A data base of this type, available on the internet, could show program excerpts with full motion and sound, illustrating for policy makers and educational TV practitioners alike what television has the demonstrated capacity to accomplish in education. Countries would be saved the cost of "reinventing the wheel," and could download for each genre technical information on content planning, audience research, presentational design, and evaluation.

Planning for global policy implementation. Many countries that are signatories to the various global policy initiatives (e.g., in education, health, child rights, ecology and the environment) have no systematic plan for how to use TV and radio to implement these policies. A capacity building activity is to help interested countries launch this type of planning.

Planning for increased channel capacity. When countries increase their TV channel capacity, usually with an increase in satellite-imported programs, special steps are needed to ensure that local educational programming receives adequate consideration, funding and air space.

Show doctoring. Countries that wish to improve under-performing educational TV series may be interested in show doctoring, whereby experts come in for a short time to help plan and implement sustainable improvements in such areas as content planning, use of audience research, educational strategies, and technical and artistic production values.

Grassroots community empowerment. A TV series on grassroots empowerment might feature emulatable forms of community action, which could range from funding a community irrigation system or setting up cooperatives, to improving health conditions.

Train those who invest in or manage educational TV offerings. Many in positions of educational TV funding and oversight lack related policy and technical backgrounds, and might welcome access to training and resource materials geared especially for them.

Training of TV scriptwriters and directors. Untold levels of expenditure have been made worldwide learning how to make TV for learning more engaging, interactive, persuasive, and sensitive to the needs and interests of the learner. Yet this accumulated knowledge often sits on the shelf. An effective self-teaching course for scriptwriters and directors is urgently needed.

It is no idle forecast to say that TV will be the preeminent tool in learning for development during at least the first half of the 21st century. It is happening already, but not with anything like the focus and intensity that the field deserves from the international assistance community.