Scientific American on Television Addiction

Etcetera writes: "The Drudge Report had an interesting link to a Scientific American article on Television Addiction. Talks about some of the quantifiable effects TV watching can have on the body. Very interesting read. There's also a paragraph or two at the end about game/computer use and why that might be a *little* bit different. But, similar to Jon Katz's essay Browsing Alone, they conclude that when a habit interferes with a growing, active life, it should be taken seriously."

Comments

isolated by technology

[rakerman]

E.M. Forster was writing about people isolated by technology in "The Machine Stops", 90 years ago. So it's not a new concept that our machines are isolating us from one another, and that we get addicted to connecting with our gadgets, not with each other.

Re:isolated by technology

[lightfoot jim]

Sure all technology, in fact all activities that some people like more than others have the potential to draw us apart. Television however, is just not the same because it can ONLY draw people apart from one another. When I was in my teens I used to spend long, long periods of time playing my guitars, tinkering with amps, etc. That was time I could have spent with my friends and family so I, not with each other suppose you could call that me being isolated by my hobby. However the same hobby also gave me the chance to connect with other people by playing in bands and performing for audiences. The same could be said of computers. Sure, a few hours spent browsing the www are a few hours that a person could be spending with other people, but computers and technology also bring people together in user groups and technology clubs. Television is the exception. Have you ever heard of TV clubs? Remote control users groups? No, and you won't because television viewing is not something people can learn more about from a club. People cannot channel surf cooperativley the same way they could work on a programming project together. TV is inherently an isolating and non-interactive technology.

we get addicted to connecting with our gadgets, not with each other

The difference is that we actually "connect" with certain types of gadgets. The type of person who likes to tinker with kernel source or build electronics projects in the garage or just play tetris all day long may well display what could be called an addiction. But these types of activities are addisting because they stimulate the person who engages in them. Generally, I'd call the desire to be stimulated a healthy one.

Television is the only addictive technology I know of that has all the charasteristics of a depressant, or a numbing agent.There is hardly any interaction or connection between the viewer and the tv like there is between a person with a soldering iron and a do-it-yourself oscilloscope kit or what have you. When people choose to watch tv for hours on end, they are chosing to experience effects not at all unlike the use of a depressant drug, lulling their minds away from reality. Is it really so healthy for a person to want that? I'd have to say no.

Re:isolated by technology

[kmellis]

I'm an introvert. How do researchers calculate a "healthy" amount of social interaction? A great many productive people that have made important contributions to science and art have been extreme introverts. You can't really define a certain amount of TV watching as harmful for everyone (I mean in the "addiction" range, not the merely physiological) in the same way that you can't define a certain amount of alcohol consumption as harmful for everyone. Someone can be a heavy drinker and not have it impair their life in any way, and another person may drink relatively little but have a very harmful addiction. It's a problem when it's a problem. This is the objection I have against all of these sorts of studies.

I've just discovered that TV can be helpful. I'm a 37 year old tech professional who's watched very little television. I can go months without watching even a single television program. But I have always had a severe problem with depression, and I also don't like to live alone. I may not always want to talk with other people, but I like them around.

Well, my partner made a big life decision and moved away and started school at my alma mater. I'm alone, and I'm damn lonely.

I don't work, as I am one of the luckier beneficaries of the internet bubble. I live off of my investments. So I spend most of my waking time either reading or online. I don't "surf" the web, my activity is almost exclusively reading current news and opinion journals, and researching some topic or another that catches my attention. I'm extremely curious, and an autodidact by nature. This keeps me busy, but it doesn't satisfy my lonliness.

A couple of weeks ago I ventured out into the living room and, just for the hell of it, turned on the TV. Even though I almost never watch TV, I have digital cable on the premise that since I'm so picky, I need a large number of choices to find anything worth watching.

I watched a few shows (reruns of "Buffy", actually, which I've kinda got turned on to), and I noticed that I felt less lonely. I wondered why that was. It's not as if I interacted with anyone -- I interact with other people online.

But it occured to me for the first time in life that maybe, just maybe, humans have a basic need to hear, and even better, see other humans. TV satisfies that where all of the other things I do (like reading) don't. I really understand now why lonely people spend so much time in front of the television.

You're not getting that much from it, though, and that matters. It's extremely passive. That can't be good.

But I've been watching a couple hours of TV a day, and it's helped my mood. Within moderation, I think that its unique kind of stimulation may be healthy.

There is definitely some truth to this

[aethera]

The article argues that it the changes in sound, rapid changes in images, fast cuts, etc. cause an instictive fight or flight alert response in the viewer which results in elevated levels of certain chemicals in the brain. Makes sense, in the wild, if you detected a sudden movement or change you would respond with heightened alertness. It seems television mimics this effect, and we can get hooked on the stimulation.

I know that tossing my TV was one of the best things I've ever done. No more mind-numbing hours in front of the tube soaking up ads from corporations I really don't like, no more seeing fake images of how I should like and behave and waste money. And best of all, spending more real *quality* time with my girlfriend, getting outside, even posting to slahdot.

On the article and my TV

[nyquist_theorem]

Quite an interesting article - for me, my family was never much into TV, but I always had friends whose families were. I still have memories of seeing an entire family gathered around a TV, staring blankly into it as Jeopardy or The Price Is Right would blare into their skulls... zero conversation, dinner plates on their laps... yikes.

I routinely go without TV - I just moved to a new country in August and only plugged my TV in Sept. 11th at the urgent insisting of a friend's IM.

Wondering if anyone else has comments or similar preferences, for I never thought about it before I read this article - I have zero interest in "pre-produced" TV shows. Virtually everything I watch is either live, (ie the news), or more commonly what I would call non-produced or underproduced footage: auto and bike racing on Speedvision, Cops, America's most Inbred Drunk Drivers, When Ex-Girlfriends Attack, TLC / Disco channel etc etc...

Of course for the amount of time I spent online... I'm almost tempted to read that Katz article... no wait somebody slap me.

.

Re:On the article and my TV

[RFC959]

Hey, Jeopardy looks like a PhD thesis defense compared to some of the newer game shows on TV. I don't own a TV anymore, but last night I was over at my girlfriend's, and I figured I'd watch a bit of "The Chamber". It was disgusting. Not so much the "watch the wretched sod in the chamber suffer" part as the questions. The questions were pukable. The entire show was one long questionnaire on how well you absorbed advertising. Actual questions: Who's been named as People magazine's "Sexiest Man Alive"? What flavor is added to Pepsi to make it Pepsi Twist? What fast-food chain uses Joe Schmoe's weight loss in its ad campaigns?

Now I feel nauseated that I've actually wasted brain cells on remembering this stuff.

not really a drug

[heideggier]

TV isn't really a drug, but rather a psycological addiction, I think that this article is mistaken in this regard (or at least the impression I got from reading it), if a person spends a large amount of time in front of the box it is due to other problems that this person in having and not directly related to the TV itself.

Personally, I feel that the greater problem is that people tend to objectilfy stuff which they see on TV with their own personal life, I think due to the nature of the medium. For example it is not uncommon today to see parents watching their childen playing, a situation unheard of years ago, the only reason for the emergence of this pattern is that such people have become scared of the peadofile, or kidnapper, becasue of news reports or whatever. However the chances of any misadventure are so small, that it is not worth depriveing childen of some freedom in their childhood and the resulting psycological damage. If you don't like that example imagine all the people who stopped reading all their mail with that Antrax scare a few months back. None of this is helped by the people who report the news.

This has greater context if you consider question's like, "would America pulled out of WWII if CNN had been on omenha beach"

I would love to chuck out all the tv's tomorrow if only to prevent this nation becoming a land of hysterics unable to walk down the street lest the sky fall on their head. Or worst, Apathic to any change in their life.

To me TV represents, what Sartre called bad faith, being a force of objectification with the final aim being the disinfrancement of the human sprite. Without the pretension: A mild form of conditioning, and this is the far greater harm then any concerns of health.

Of course

[Jennifer Ever]

What constitutes a "growing, active life" is up to society. Likewise, habit is defined the same way. I spend 8 hours a day in front of a flickering box myself--but it's called work, and by society's definition, is probably part of a growing, active life. TV addiction? Yeah, whatever. Defined by people addicted to their own intellectualism--how much credit can you give it? It's not that I don't agree--I do. I'm sure some people watch more TV than they should. But addiction in general? It's human nature--we just put a friendly face on the vice that we like. TV, internet, pornography, drugs, religion, jobs, morality--eventually we'll have a disorder for everything.

It's the REMOTE not the TV

[filtersweep]

No, the sky is not falling... as I sit here with my 500+ channels of digital cable (and still usually end up watching Law & Order or the History Channel [have you seen all that new color WWII footage?]) while surfing on DSL.

I think the real issue is that people today have too much control over their stimuli- channel surfing and web surfing.... if you don't like what you see, change is only one click away. Unfortunately reality doesn't exactly work that way.

I look at the number of kids today who are diagnosed with Oppositional Defiant Disorder, and aside from the toxic parenting these kids endured, the kids' poor coping skills are arguable reinforced by the infinite options they are given when "surfing" whatever they are viewing. Most parents end up NOT giving the kid an "option" whether to "clean their rooms" or whatever simple task, and the entire household explodes for an evening of a police visit, a possible fifth degree domestic assault, and a trip to a shelter for some kid. This happens all the time in surburbs all over the place. (I moonlight in emergency social services with the County- so this is first hand info.).

I haven't even mentioned ADD or ADHD- two diagnoses that I feel are more or less environmentally conditioned- but that would take us way off-topic. But both "attention" disorders could as easily be characterized as involving kids who have the ability to pay close attention to what they "choose" to pay attention to- they simply lack skills to pay attention to what they are "required" to (such as authority, teachers, etc.).

I really believe technology changes the way the mind operates. On a grand scale, we certainly feel more connected to the world at large with air travel, international long-distance, email, cable TV, etc... vs. living on a "flat world" with an ocean that extends infinitely filled with sea monsters. On a smaller level, I've lost my capacity to easily remember phone numbers in the days of speed dial, my cell phone that holds hundreds of numbers, and five times as many local area codes to keep track of.

Getting back to TV- watch some old movie on TCM... it is like watching a play. Each scene can last for several minutes before there is a cut, and shadows are often projected on the wall behind the actors. These movies really stand out as being "staged" compared to an MTV video where I'm lucky to catch a camera shot that lasts more then two seconds- even though many videos are literally shot on a stage. It seriously would not surprise me if this affects how we think and process the world- it is almost digital vs. analog- that we receive the world in a billion still images vs. drawn out and linear. Movies use jumbled time... beginnings/middles/ends have lost their meaning. In personal relationships, people often start out in what would once be considered the middle of a relationship.... courtship is either redefined or non-existent, depending on your definitions. I could go on and on.

Whether there is any causality here is open to debate- but if you believe at the very least that TV/media gives people what they want, it definitely has changed over the last 40 years.