Arguementative on Television Viewing - Draft 1 #

Everyone in the world are familiar with television as more than 90% of the people especially from the develop countries have at least one of them at home (Sharif 1999). It is said to be the most popular form of entertainment compared to radio as television provides visual image that manage to fascinate the audience, both young and old (Leigh 2001). Through television it is possible for us to know so many things without leaving the comfort of our homes. Based on the American Time Use Survey, 2003, watching television is the most hours spent by the people and on top of them are men. This shows how human nowadays cannot be separated by technology like television that improves their material standard of living but yet this kind of technology has cause a lot of problem in our world today. Watching television can create addiction that leads to extensive viewing. This has been an issue for quite a long time where it brings bad effects mainly to our future generation by affecting the children to develop their thinking process, creates bad behaviour in the children themselves and worse health problem.

Watching television is said to be a passive activity as most people are not using their brain to work. They describe television as a kind of entertainment rather than information as television shows nowadays are full with drama series and game shows. The same goes to children where there are plenty of cartoon shows displays in the television. This can affect the development of their thinking process (Sharif 1999). Moreover, they are not capable to develop their own imagination, situations and make-believe worlds which are an important skill for problem solving and organisational ability (Leigh 2001). On the other hand, television allows children to think that all problems can be solved easily but when they come across with a real life situation, things are not the same as they see and at the end they become frustrated and give up easily in life (Sharif 1999). Most importantly it is difficult for the children to focus on things like homework or exercise when the television is on (Leigh 2001). “Dr. Geraldine Jones, an educational psychologist, is convinced that children who are heavy viewers are among the lowest achievers at school” (Leigh 2001, pp. 24-25). This proves that watching television for a long period does affect the children school performances.

Subsequently, as television is a format of visual image, children can easily imitate or follow what the television taught them. They always think that everything that comes out from the television is a good example to resemble. “There have been instances where children have put on Superman costumes and injured themselves seriously by jumping out of trees” (Sharif 1999, p. 34). Most of the children are left alone when watching the television without any guidance from an elder. This can create a misconception in the children minds where they think that people are characterized as either ‘good’ or ‘bad’, girls are shown as decorative and sexy while boys are future as rugged and tough (Sharif 1999). Other than that, violence are said to be depicted on television where most of the shows aired are graphic scenes of violence (Sharif 1999). In the UK Times Use Survey, 2000, it shows that males spent a lot of time, either during the weekday or weekend, watching television, video and radio. This proves that why most of the criminals in the world are male. “They may think that violence is a normal part of life and a natural way of solving problems” (Sharif 1999, p.34). If this problem is not taken seriously, our future children will live in a rotten world.

The worse problem is the health of the children where prolonged periods of watching television shows that children are not physically active (Sharif 1999). They do not have time to indulge in sports or school activity as they like being in front of the television. They do not see this as a time-wasting activity even though it takes away the time for them to study (Rutherford 2002). Reports about television mainly focus on the detrimental effects that make the health problem aggravate (Leigh 2001). Surprisingly, most families nowadays eat their meals in front of the television and because of its invasive nature; communication is hardly to occur (Rutherford 2002). “It is a sedentary activity and, when indulged in with snacks, can cause obesity and related diseases” (Rutherford 2002, p. 14).

In a nut shell, it is important for the children to have less exposure on the television as it affects the development of the children thinking process. Other than that, it creates bad behaviour in the children as they can easily imitate a character they like from the television. In addition, extensive viewing can also cause health problem as children are doing less physical activity. Therefore, television does bring more harm than good if it is watch for a long period of time.