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Ridgenet > Ridgewood High > Publications > Kevin Szaflik > Violence on TV |
Violence on TV: The Desensitizing Of America |
Written By Kevin Szaflik
Violence on television can influence people to commit crimes. This is a subject now in debate between Hollywood insiders, the government and the television viewing public. There have been several highly publicized studies recently published to look at the long terms effects of violence on television. The US government has put its faith into a computer chip in new TV sets to solve this problem. It is not just programs that contain violence, but many of the promos and commercials utilize violence also.
People need to ask themselves several questions. Do all the violence acts that children view on television cause them to commit crimes in their later lives? Are the effects of watching TV violence brief or lasting? Is TV as important a factor in fostering societal violence as economic poverty, bad schools and broken homes? Is it really possible or desirable to manage kids’ exposure to a cultural environment that can never be entirely beneficial or benign?
Television can be a powerful influence in developing value systems and behavior in children. Unfortunately, much of today’s television programming is violent. Several studies conducted by UCLA "have found that children may become ‘immune’ to the horror of violence; gradually accept violence as a way to solve problems; imitate the violence they observe on television; and identify with certain characters, victims and/or victimizers" (http://www.ucla.edu/curree…ne/violence/iiid.htm).
Extensive viewing of television violence by children causes greater aggressiveness. Sometimes, watching a single violent program can increase aggressiveness. Children who view shows in which violence is very realistic, frequently repeated or left unpunished, are more likely to imitate what they see. The impact of TV violence may be immediately evident in a child’s behavior or may surface years later, and young people can even be affected when the family atmosphere shows no tendency toward violence. However, this does not mean that violence on television is the only source for aggressive or violent behavior, but it is a significant contributor.
Television is being blamed for children becoming violent in later life because it is an easy scapegoat. In many families, television has become an electronic baby-sitter; a replacement for quality time with parents. Children who spend their after school time alone because parents work will find themselves learning behaviors not from their parents, but from television.
In order to determine the effects of TV violence, one needs took look at the research that has been done. Though it may be difficult to offer definitive answers, in the last three years alone, there have been four widely publicized studies on the effects of violence on television, each looking at a different aspect. One of the studies was conducted by four universities and financed by the cable industry. It found that of nearly 2,700 shows analyzed in a 20 week survey of 23 channels, 57% were said to contain at least some violence (Zoglin, "Chips" 58). However, the names of the channels were not mentioned and it should be pointed out that many cable systems now have over 100 channels. Another study was done in 1995 by UCLA which was financed by the networks. It found "promising signs" that levels of network violence are declining (Zoglin, "Chips" 58).
In a third study about TV violence, L. Rowel Huesmann and Leonard Eron surveyed every 8 year old in a typical American city in 1960. It did follow up studies with the same subjects in 1971, 1981 and 1994. They found some shocking results. "The correlation between violence-viewing at age 8 and how aggressive the individual was at 19 was higher than the correlation between watching violence at age 8 and behaving aggressively at age 8" says Eron (Mortimer 17). Eron estimates that TV is responsible for only 10 percent of the violent behavior in this country. "But," he says, "If we could reduce violence by 10 percent, that would be a great achievement" (Mortimer 19).
The fourth study showing the effects of TV violence conducted was The National Television Violence Study. A broad coalition of researchers, media executives and mental health experts from several universities, including the University of Texas, the University of North Carolina and the University of California at Santa Barbara, took part in the study, which was assembled by Mediascope, a nonprofit organization hired by the National Cable Television Association in 1995 (Carter C11). It billed itself as the "most thorough scientific survey of violence ever undertaken." The study made some damning observations about the way violence is presented. According to the survey, 47% of the violent acts shown resulted in no observable harm to the victim; only 16% of violent shows contained a message about the long term negative repercussions of violence; and in a whopping 73% of all violent scenes, the perpetrator went unpunished (Zoglin, "Chips" 60). These figures, however, were based on some excessively strict guidelines. Unlike some earlier studies, comic injuries were not considered violence. Kramer hitting his head on a door on Seinfield and accident prone Tim Taylor on Home Improvement were not considered violent. Also in the survey, perpetrators of violence must be punished in the same scene as the violent act. By that measure, most of Shakespeare’s tragedies would be frowned upon; Macbeth, after all, does not get his comeuppance until the end of the play.
The study found 44% of the shows on network stations contained at least some violence, compared with 59% on basic cable and 85% on premium channels like HBO and Showtime. The study referred to network stations, meaning that syndicated shows such as Hard Copy would have been included because it airs in the Chicagoland area on a CBS affiliate (WBBM-2 Chicago).
"Someone would have to have a lobotomy to believe that 44% of programs on network television are violent. Since I’ve been here, I can’t think of a program that glorified violence, that hasn’t shown the pain of violence and attempted to show there are other ways to resolve conflicts," responds Don Ohlmeyer, NBC West Coast president (Zoglin, "Chips" 60). However, according to a survey conducted by US News and the University of California at Los Angeles with many top-level Hollywood figures found that 63% of the Hollywood Elite say the industry glorifies violence (Guttman 39).
This current wave of concern about TV violence seems oddly timed. The violent action shows that flourished on TV a decade or so ago -- The A-Team; Magnum P.I.; Miami Vice -- have largely disappeared. The few crime shows left are cerebral dramas like Law & Order and NYPD Blue, which have little overt violence. The sniggering sex talk on network sitcoms is far more alarming trend. However, according to a survey conducted by US News and the University of California at Los Angeles with many top-level Hollywood figures found that 45% of the Hollywood Elite say the overall quality of TV programming has worsened in the past decade (Guttman 40).
This terror by statistics has made it all too easy to engage in a parlor game called television bashing, citing numbers that simply measure acts of violence without examining the content of the program or content of the action. The irony is that some of the most objectionable shows in these survey are cartoons and other children’s shows: they are the ones that portray violence "unrealistically," without consequences or punishment. "When you show a young kid somebody being run over and they pop back up without harm, that’s a problem," says Ed Donnerstein, communications and psychology professor at the University of California at Santa Barbara, who is referring to many cartoons in general, from Saturday morning programs on network television to Warner Brothers, MGM and Paramount theatrical cartoons from the 1930s to 1960s. (Zoglin, "Chips" 61).
The problem Donnerstein is talking about is compounded because of the amount of television children watch. In America, children watch an average of three to four hours of television daily. The American Academy of Pediatrics suggests children watch no more than two hours of television a day (Neifert 52). Even in that recommended time frame, they will have witnessed 8,000 murders (Donahue 25) and more than 100,000 other acts of violence by the time they finish elementary school (Diamant 40). On television, perpetrators go unpunished in 73% of all violent scenes and only 4% of violent programs emphasize an anti-violent theme (MediaScope 1). By seeing so many acts of violence, children become desensitized.
What are parents to do? "To limit your child’s exposure to these negative influences, select shows that model positive behavior, such as helping, caring and being considerate of others," says Dr. Marianne Neifert, a children’s health specialist (Neifert 52). This is easier said than done because many of these helpful and caring shows filled with promos and commercials with violent acts.
Violence is used in many ways in promos as a hook to draw viewers into the program. Viewers see violence in the promos encouraging them to watch both the entire announcement and the program it advertises. When they tune in, viewers then see violence in the preview at the beginning of the show. During the show, commercials and promos often interrupt violent scenes or occur just as violence is about to erupt to ensure that viewers will continue watching. All these promotional efforts demonstrate that networks think rather than alienating viewers, violence attracts them to the program.
That is because violence is an effective promotional device. In some instances, violence can live a long promotional life. In the program Model’s Inc., viewers saw a rape in a preview, in promos during the week between episodes, in the actual episode, and during the recaps for three more weeks. (http://www.ucla.edu/curree…ne/violence/iiid.htm).
There are logical reasons why so many promotions feature scenes of violence. Promos have only a very short time to show something interesting enough to attract the viewer. Most promos contain several scenes thus complicating efforts to explain the plot in 10 or 20 seconds. With so little time, the easiest things to feature are those that require little explanation: violence and sex. Viewers may need context to know why the violence is occurring, but they need little or no context to know that a show will contain action, guns or fist fights. Even promotions for situation comedies feature what little "action" may actually be in the show. Many jokes need a longer set up or explanation than is possible in a promo, contributing to the tendency for promos to feature a scene of comedic violence (or a sexual reference).
Some promotions do not even make a pretense of context. Walker, Texas Ranger knows that its fans are not watching because of a particular story that week, but because of the certainty that Chuck Norris, the show’s star, will get into a fight. This point was made clear in a promo for Walker that aired during Hearts Afire on 9/24/94 (http://www.ucla.edu/curree…ne/violence/iiid.htm). The promo features Chuck Norris from the waist up doing nothing more than throwing punches. Nothing in the ad mentions anything about the show and the promo is not episode specific. We see no one but Norris and there is absolutely no context. In many ways it was an honest promotion because it highlights exactly what the show is about: fighting.
Many shows such as Law And Order and Dark Shadows use violence minimally and in an appropriate context, but end up showcasing the violence decontextualized in the promos. This is a serious problem for several reasons. First, the viewers get a wrong impression of the show. They may believe there is a great deal of action and then become disappointed when they find only two or three minimal scenes spread throughout the course of the story. Sometimes a promo for a show such as Law and Order, a program which would not appeal to fans looking for fights, guns and mayhem, features what little violence there is in an effort to attract these action fans. Furthermore, violent promos frequently are run during programs geared for children or on completely non-violent shows. Even shows that are virtually free of violence are promoted utilizing the merest suggestion of violence that can be gleaned from the program. An example of this is the prime time series Dark Shadows which aired on NBC in 1991. While the plot of the program dealt mostly with the romance between two main characters, NBC chose to air promos featuring a scene where one of those characters is violently drained of her blood and killed. Subsequently, both people searching for violent programs and viewers looking for non-violent programming were offended. Because of this, viewership declined and the program was canceled (alt.tv.dark_shadows).
Two ways of preventing children from viewing violence on TV are the V-chip and the new television ratings system. The V chip is a device that can block transmission of violent programs into homes. The chip would allow parents to prevent a television program from being seen in their homes if a rating system determined that it had a high level of violent or sexually explicit content. The current V chip technology was developed by an engineer named Tim Collings (Zoglin, "Chips" 59).
Common sense alone dooms this gizmo to failure. Who can rate 600,000 hours of programming broadcast per year by even our current 70-channel cable systems? Hollywood, in contrast, has to rate roughly 550 moves (1,000 hours) per year (Rich 23). Should crime-sated local news be blocked? "MASH" reruns? Reports from the gulf war? "E.R." Pro football? "Schindler’s List?" (If so, a network may be tempted to duck a V chip block, which would lower ratings and revenue, by sanitizing the Holocaust) (Rich 23).
Even if all the practical, political and legal questions raised by the V chip could be miraculously resolved overnight, it is still pie-in-the-sky. The chips are only required on new TV sets, so it will be years before most households are in the V chips’ harness. In homes with multiple set, that means each set needs a V chip, otherwise Junior will watch violent programs on an older set. Even then, parents with kids in different age groups will have to choose between their younger and older children as they decide whether to flick the switch each night. And it is only a matter of time before children learn to break the security code of the V chip. After all, many Americans rely on their children to set the clocks on their VCRs.
"The thing nobody is taking into account is that there’s going to be a V-chip warning on Homicide, NYPD Blue, Law & Order, ER, Chicago Hope-any of the adult dramas that deal with real-life substantive issues. Once that happens, you are going to have a television landscape that’s far, far different from what you have today" responds Dick Wolf, Law & Order and New York Undercover creator. (Zoglin, "Chips" 60) "If all these shows have a warning on them, you could have a situation where producers are saying to standards people at the networks, ‘I’ve got a warning. I can say whatever I want. I can kill as many people as I want’" (Zoglin, "Chips" 60). When the new TV Ratings system became effective on January 1, 1997, Wolf said, "A Canadian-type system would be the kiss of death…an age based system can reach a greater consensus than a subjective evaluation of content."
Because of the reasons I pointed out earlier and fears of an advertiser exodus, the V chips original 1 to 6 ratings system has been changed. A nine month, 21-member task force overseen by Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, had devised another system (Zoglin, "Wars" 1). The force established six broad rating categories. Children's programming would be labeled either TV-Y (for shows acceptable for all ages) or TV-7 (for shows with some violence or other material unsuitable for children under seven). Other fare would be classified as TV-G (for all audiences); TV-PG (parental guidance suggested); TV-14 (not suitable for children under 14); or TV-MA (for mature audiences only). The ratings would be made by the producers and distributors of shows, and would be printed in newspaper TV listings so parents could use them as a guide for shielding their kids from rough stuff on the tube (Zoglin, "War" 1).
"Rather than having Hollywood judge the content that is appropriate for children of the same age across the country," says Vicky Rideout of Children Now, an advocacy group based in Oakland, California, "tell parents what's in the show and let them decide what is appropriate for their kids to see (Zoglin, "War" 2)." Dr. Marjorie Hogan of the American Academy of Pediatrics, which was a consultant to the Valenti panel but opposes the new system, says, "I'm a parent of four, and what I really want when I look at a movie or a television program is to know what the content is. Is there sexuality? Is there violent content? A rating of TV-PG doesn't give me that information (Zoglin, "War" 2)." In a survey released by the Media Studies Center, 79% of the parents polled said they preferred a system that specifies the objectionable content to a general one giving only age limits. Another poll conducted by US News and World Report found "62 percent of parents prefer a system based on content instead of age markers (http://www.USNews.com/usnews/issue/16tele.htm 2)."
The sizable cadre of TV watchdogs in Washington were once again roused to chastise the industry for shirking its responsibilities. Representative James Moran, a Virginia Democrat, said the TV industry has "reneged on its pledge" to create a useful rating system "and has instead proposed a toothless system that tells parents nothing about whether a show contains violence, sexual content or profanity (Zoglin, "War" 2)." Representative Edward Markey, the Massachusetts Democrat who was the V chip's initial backer in Congress, objects to giving the rating responsibility to the people who produce and distribute shows. "If you look up conflict of interest in the dictionary," he says, "you will see that it is defined as letting TV producers rate their own shows (Zoglin, "War" 2)."
The industry and the government are looking for a quick fix with the V-chip and new regulations, but ultimately there is violence on television because people are watching. The respondents to the US News-UCLA survey named viewers and ratings pressure as most responsible for encouraging violence on television. This may be even more true now because networks are now owned by bottom-line-conscious corporations like General Electric, Westinghouse and Disney. Lee Rich, former chief of Lorimar, says NBC promised to support his family drama "Against the Grain" at the start of last season no matter what the ratings because it was a "quality" show. "[Those promises] were crap. The networks are into numbers, numbers, numbers." After eight episodes, Against the Grain failed to win top ratings in its time slot and was replaced by the action series Viper. Responds NBC’s Don Ohlmeyer: "It was my favorite show. But I can’t force people to come to the set."
Ranging from "TV-G" for all audiences to "TV-MA," mature audiences only, the voluntary ratings have been a barrage of criticism from lawmakers and children’s advocacy for not providing parents with enough detailed information about objectionable content.
Valenti, who also is president of the Motion Picture Association of America , made his remarks in an interview at the National Association of Broadcasters convention in Las Vegas.
In addition to the polls, Valenti said the industry would be talking to the nation’s roughly 1,600 TV stations to get parental feedback on the ratings’ effectiveness.
Kevin Szaflik is the Media Production Supervisor at Ridgewood High School. He is the Station Manager of WRHS Television 19 on Comcast Cable and WRWX Television 4 in Norridge, Illinois. He is the Program Director of the radio station WRHS Jack FM. He can be heard Tuesday nights from 6:00 PM to 8:00 PM on WRRG FM 88.9 in River Grove, Illinois.
Note: the three URLs that are hyperlinks below no longer point to the articles that were there when I wrote this back in 1997. Since some are from actual magazines. Some libraries may have printed versions of these magazine articles.
alt.tv.dark_shadows. May 10, 1996.
Carter, Bill. "A New Report Becomes a Weapon In Debate on Censoring TV Violence." The New York Times February 7, 1996: C11, C16.
Diamant, Anita. "Media Violence." Parents Octobers 1994: 40-41, 45.
Donahue, J. Christopher. "What’s Right With Television" America October 8, 1994: 25.
Guttman, Monika. "A Kinder, Gentler Hollywood." U.S. News And World Report May 9, 1994: 39-44.
Neifert, Marianne. "TV: How much is too much?" McCall’s June 1995: 52.
Mortimer, Jeffery. "How TV Violence Hits Kids." The Education Digest October 1994: 16-19.
Rich, Frank. "The Idiot Chip" The New York Times February 10, 1996: 23.
Seppa, Nathan. "TV displays violence without the mess." APA Monitor April 1996: 1-2.
"TV Ratings." http://www.USNews.com/usnews/nycu/TVHIGH.HTM January 3, 1997.
"TV Violence." http://www.cep.org/tvviolence.html October 10, 1996.
"VideoFreedom: Chronology of Action on TV Violence." http://www.videofreedom.com/chrono.html
Zoglin, Richard. "Chips Ahoy." Time February 19, 1996: 58-61.
---. "Rating Wars." Time December 23, 1996: http://pathfinder.com/@@CuAywAQAlm…bestof1996/nation.rating_ wars.html
For more information, visit http://www.howtotalktoyourkids.com .
Created: May 3, 2000; Updated: November 24, 2004