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American Morning
How Does TV Violence Affect Children?
Aired March 10, 2003 - 08:44 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: How does TV violence affect your children? We're paging Dr. Gupta this morning about a new study that links aggressive behavior in adults with exposure of violent images during childhood.
Sanjay has more now from Atlanta. Good morning, Sanjay.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula.
Yes, a really sobering study actually. By the time most American kids are 18 years old, they'll have seen 200,000 acts of violence on television alone. What is the impact of this? Well, it's been speculated on for quite sometime, but now there's a study, a long-term study from the Journal of Developmental Psychology actually looking at this issue. What they did, is they looked at 329 Chicago-area kids back in the late '70s, and what they -- they asked them about their viewing habits and whether or not they were watching violent television, and then they resurveyed them again when they were in their 20s to find out some specific things.
Now some of the violent television programs back then, "Starsky & Hutch," "6 Million Dollar Man," and "Road Runner" cartoons were considered the most violent. What they found was that -- you can look at the list there -- if they had a significant exposure to television violence, if there is an actual identification with the characters, and if there was a belief in the realism of the actual television show, they were much more likely to be violent.
A couple of points with regard to cartoons. In fact, because the characters often had no consequences for their actions, that was also considered a risk factor.
And also, television programs where the hero is also a violent person, that was also a risk factor. What was interesting about this was that there was an increased level of aggression for both men and women now when you fast-forward them to their 20s and 30s. For men, they were three times more likely to be involved with criminal acts and actually be convicted of a crime. With women, they were four times more likely to have punched, beaten or choked another adult if in fact they met those risk factors as well.
Paula, there has been a lot of studies trying to link television violence and violence later in life, but this is one of the more definitive ones that have come out -- Paula.
ZAHN: Another reminder how important it is that parents very carefully monitor what their children watch, huh?
GUPTA: Absolutely. And they made some specific recommendations regarding that as well -- watching television with your kids, limiting the television use, no question, to one to two hours per day, talking about the realism, or the lack of realism in some of these things, and if you want to get fancy about it, there is something called V-Tip technology, which will actually allow you to monitor or restrict what broadcast actually come through on your home television.
ZAHN: Thanks for bringing it to our attention, Sanjay. Appreciate it.
GUPTA: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
Aired March 10, 2003 - 08:44 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
PAULA ZAHN, CNN ANCHOR: How does TV violence affect your children? We're paging Dr. Gupta this morning about a new study that links aggressive behavior in adults with exposure of violent images during childhood.
Sanjay has more now from Atlanta. Good morning, Sanjay.
DR. SANJAY GUPTA, CNN MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT: Good morning, Paula.
Yes, a really sobering study actually. By the time most American kids are 18 years old, they'll have seen 200,000 acts of violence on television alone. What is the impact of this? Well, it's been speculated on for quite sometime, but now there's a study, a long-term study from the Journal of Developmental Psychology actually looking at this issue. What they did, is they looked at 329 Chicago-area kids back in the late '70s, and what they -- they asked them about their viewing habits and whether or not they were watching violent television, and then they resurveyed them again when they were in their 20s to find out some specific things.
Now some of the violent television programs back then, "Starsky & Hutch," "6 Million Dollar Man," and "Road Runner" cartoons were considered the most violent. What they found was that -- you can look at the list there -- if they had a significant exposure to television violence, if there is an actual identification with the characters, and if there was a belief in the realism of the actual television show, they were much more likely to be violent.
A couple of points with regard to cartoons. In fact, because the characters often had no consequences for their actions, that was also considered a risk factor.
And also, television programs where the hero is also a violent person, that was also a risk factor. What was interesting about this was that there was an increased level of aggression for both men and women now when you fast-forward them to their 20s and 30s. For men, they were three times more likely to be involved with criminal acts and actually be convicted of a crime. With women, they were four times more likely to have punched, beaten or choked another adult if in fact they met those risk factors as well.
Paula, there has been a lot of studies trying to link television violence and violence later in life, but this is one of the more definitive ones that have come out -- Paula.
ZAHN: Another reminder how important it is that parents very carefully monitor what their children watch, huh?
GUPTA: Absolutely. And they made some specific recommendations regarding that as well -- watching television with your kids, limiting the television use, no question, to one to two hours per day, talking about the realism, or the lack of realism in some of these things, and if you want to get fancy about it, there is something called V-Tip technology, which will actually allow you to monitor or restrict what broadcast actually come through on your home television.
ZAHN: Thanks for bringing it to our attention, Sanjay. Appreciate it.
GUPTA: Thank you.
TO ORDER A VIDEO OF THIS TRANSCRIPT, PLEASE CALL 800-CNN-NEWS OR USE OUR SECURE ONLINE ORDER FORM LOCATED AT www.fdch.com
