Does TV Kill?
Aired January 10, 1995
Does TV Kill?
Aired January 10, 1995
Letter from David Fanning
Educator's Primer
Classroom Activities
Letter from David Fanning, FRONTLINE Executive Producer
Dear Educator:Before the age of eighteen, the average American teen will have witnessed eighteen thousand simulated murders on TV. While staggering in number, more disturbing is the effect this steady diet of imaginary violence may have on America's youth.
Over the past forty years, more than three thousand studies have investigated the connection between television violence and real violence. Social scientists have attempted to measure television's effect on behavior in different ways, including laboratory studies, field experiments, and correlational studies. Though none conclude a direct cause and effect relationship, it becomes clear that watching television is one of a number of important factors affecting aggressive behavior.
Today, in addition to entertaining and informing, television serves as background noise, as babysitter, as safe haven from mean streets, and as a way to avoid social interaction. But does our dependence on television stifle the development of creativity and skew the way we view ourselves and our society?
To answer these critical questions, FRONTLINE correspondent Al Austin examines what is known about television violence and how it affects our lives. "Does TV Kill?" a co-production of Oregon Public Broadcasting and FRONTLINE, airing Tuesday, January 10, on PBS, reveals some unexpected conclusions about the impact of TV.
"Does TV Kill?" is part of the Act Against Violence project of the National Campaign to Reduce Youth Violence, a joint effort of the Public Television Outreach Alliance, the Nitty Gritty Cities Group, and Bill Moyers' Public Affairs Television. The two-year initiative, funded by the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, will focus on solutions to youth violence through PBS programming, teleconferences, outreach materials, and school-based educational guides.
In the pages which follow, FRONTLINE has developed classroom activities to help students enhance their critical thinking skills about television. In a world comprised of selected images--including the making of FRONTLINE films--it is important for students to understand the powerful concepts of media literacy.
As a reminder, FRONTLINE has extended its off-air record rights, allowing educators to use most FRONTLINE programs for up to one year after each broadcast. I hope these expanded rights coupled with these materials provide you with a useful and enlightening classroom tool.
My best wishes to you and your students.
Sincerely,
David Fanning
Executive Producer
Educator's Primer
About the Program
"Does TV Kill?" is a probing examination of what is known about TV's effect on people, especially children. Through interviews with experts and the use of surveillance cameras placed in the homes of several families, the program uncovers some un-expected answers to the question, "Does TV Kill?"
While it is impossible to find a direct cause and effect relationship between viewing violence on TV and violent behavior, the program finds TV is having an impact. Social scientists have found that people who watch a lot of television are more fearful of their world, become desensitized to real violence, and diminish their creative capacity.
Following the 70-minute documentary portion of the program, Bill Moyers facilitates a 15-minute discussion with a panel of experts who have studied how TV affects America's youths.
Starting a Dialogue About Media Violence
It is hard to escape media violence in our culture. On television, violent images are seen in films, commercials, sitcoms, cartoons, news broadcasts, and reality-based programs.
But what is media violence? The question is deceptively simple. Violence means different things to scholars and to media industry representatives who have been wrestling with it for decades. Depending on your definition, violence may or may not include, for example, disasters, verbal threats, coercing or intimidating someone, car crashes, and destruction of property. Defining media violence is a challenge faced by social scientists who try to quantitatively measure its effect on youths.
In part, because of its pervasiveness, some of this violence becomes invisible. Why? The answer may come from understanding the complex ways in which television naturalizes violence by making it seem normal and acceptable, desensitizing viewers to its impact. One job of the teacher in helping students to think critically about media violence is to denaturalize it, to help the familiar seem strange. This creates the kind of critical distance necessary for analysis of popular media.
It is important to listen carefully to students talk about real-life violence and media violence. Often when teachers talk with students about television, a climate of defensiveness develops as students reject their teachers' attempts to tell them what to think about the pastime they love. Rather than trying to correct, dismiss, or trivialize students' interpretations, it is valuable for teachers to provide new questions and new ideas for students to explore in a nonthreatening and nonjudgmental environment.
Consider this sample of student and teacher comments in a discussion of media violence:
Student: Violence on television is okay because it's usually committed by the good guy trying to stop the bad buy.
Teacher: Why does television programming often make violence look like the most powerful and effective way to solve a problem? What other tactic could the good guy use to solve the problem?
Student: Violence in cartoons isn't violence. It's so unrealistic and the characters aren't real. That's just the way cartoons are!
Teacher: Do little kids always understand the difference between what's real and what's pretend? How do they learn to tell the difference?
Student: When something violent happens to a character in a funny program, it's just funny.
Teacher: Some people say that television teaches people to laugh at other people's pain. What do you think?
Student: Violent programs are exciting to watch -- they give me a thrill.
Teacher: Watching violence tends to create a state of psychological arousal, where your attention level is high and you're in anticipation of what will happen next. It's important to understand the underlying reasons why we are attracted to different kinds of television shows.
Other Issues Related to Media Violence
The issue of media violence is one of the most challenging and complex areas in which to engage students because there are so many important questions to consider. These include:
What role does the First Amendment play in the media violence debate? Who is protected by the First Amendment?
What factors make it difficult for the media industry to stop producing violent films and television programs?
What roles do conflict and violence play in storytelling?
What is the impact of violent videogames which create opportunities for young people to interact in a simulated environment and engage in fantasy violence?
In what way is television a teacher? How is it different from a teacher?
Classroom Activities
Overview
The powerful concepts of media literacy can be used to enhance students' critical thinking skills about the mass media, helping them to look at television and mass media in new ways and to understand the role that media consumers play in the economics of television. The following key concepts are central principles of media literacy.
1. All messages are constructions.
Awareness of the choices involved in the making of media violence sensitizes viewers to the subtle shaping forces at work in the choice of hero, conflict, resolution, and consequences depicted.
2. Each form of communication has unique characteristics.
Violence on television news is different from violence described in newspapers, and the impact of violent music lyrics is different from the violence in popular film.
3. Individuals make unique interpretations of media messages.
A violent scene on television will mean different things to each individual, depending on the age, race, religion, ethnicity, personal experiences, attitudes and background of the viewer.
4. Messages are representations of the world.
Messages which depict violence are powerful because they project a societal view, a perspective on how people can (or should) behave, act, or feel.
5. Messages have economic purposes.
The purpose of mass media is to sell audiences to advertisers, and violence is a predictable way to guarantee a large audience.
In analyzing media messages, it is important to create a classroom climate where students are encouraged to carefully examine media messages and to take note of the language, images, and sequence of elements which were used in their construction.
What We Watch:
Identifying Violence on Television
Learning Goal
Students will become more aware of the pervasiveness and variety of violence in television programming.
Skill Development
Observation, critical viewing, writing, data analysis, hypothesis formation, collaborative problem solving.
Video Segment
Professor George Gerbner explores the variety of violence which can be found in commercials, sitcoms, music videos, films, cartoons and other programming. [Approximately 47 minutes from start of "Does TV Kill?"]
Instructions1. Introduce this activity as a "scavenger hunt" exercise to help students identify and analyze the presence of violence on television.
2. In a large group, brainstorm a list of all the types of programs on television which contain violence: sports, action-adventure, popular films, soap operas, commercials, reality-based programs like Rescue 911, tabloid programs like Inside Edition, MTV, cartoons, network and local news, etc.
3. Ask students to brainstorm a list of examples of media violence, including verbal aggression like shouting or intimidating others, explosions and car crashes, destruction of property, physical aggression, use of weapons, hurting others, etc.
4. Have students create a data form which logs the show name, channel, time, and the major categories of violence observed.
5. Assign teams of students to each of the major categories of programming. Within each small group, have students select two hours of specific programming to monitor, preferably over a weekend. Use TV Guide or a Sunday TV supplement to ensure that a wide variety of programs is monitored.
6. Have students summarize their data and make a brief presentation to the class. Discuss the following questions: What differences exist in the types of violence in different genres? Which types of programs have the most and least amount of violence? What factors make less violent programming entertaining?
Why We Watch:
Understanding Our Relationship with Television
Learning Goal
Students will become more aware of the many reasons why we use television as a source of entertainment and information.
Skill Development
Imagination and role playing, collaborative problem solving, organization, public speaking.
Video Segment
A "day in the life" portrait of a boy in front of the television. [Approximately 28 minutes from start
of "Does TV Kill?"]
Instructions1. After viewing this segment, break the class into at least five small groups and assign each group the task of role-playing a specific age group. Examples of these age groups might include preschool children, teen-agers, college students, parents, and retirees.
2. Give each student five index cards and ask them to individually complete the following sentence, "I watch television because..." Encourage students to construct realistic sentences that reflect the variety of different reasons why members of their assigned age group might watch television. For example, students may discover that they use television to escape, to pass time, to monitor the world around them, to learn, or to have something to talk about with friends.
3. In their small groups, have students read all of their cards aloud to their team members. Ask each group to develop a system for organizing and labelling the cards into categories.
4. Have each team give a brief presentation and list all the reasons for watching on the blackboard. Analyze the results of this activity by considering the following questions: What common reasons for using television exist across age groups? What reasons seem age specific? Which reasons are most popular within each age group and why? Which reasons for using television are potentially harmful and why? What other ways could people meet their needs?
Comments or Questions
To obtain a copy of additional classroom exercises and a list of resources on media literacy, contact FRONTLINE's Eileen Warren at 125 Western Ave., Boston, MA 02134. (617) 783-3500; fax, (617) 254-0243; e-mail, eileen_warren@wgbh.org FRONTLINE also welcomes your comments and suggestions.
"Does TV Kill?" is a co-production of Oregon Public Broadcasting and FRONTLINE. The producer is Mike McLeod. The correspondent is Al Austin. The senior producer for FRONTLINE is Mike Sullivan.
"Does TV Kill?" educational material by Dr. Renee Hobbs with input from Simone Bloom Nathan, Jim Bracciale, and the Outreach Advisory Board: Faith Rogow, Nancy Hoene, Edwin Ortiz, and Ben Walker. The designers are Jim Augusto and Dennis O'Reilly. Photography by Julie Nestingen.
Act Against Violence
The National Campaign to Reduce Youth Violence is a joint effort of the Public Television Outreach Alliance, the Nitty Gritty Cities Group, and Bill Moyers' Public Affairs Television. The two-year initiative will provide outreach materials and school-based educational guides, broadcast programming for PBS stations, and teleconferences to community organizations working to reduce youth violence. For more information, call Cheryl Head, Project Director, at 202-879-9839.
Reminder
You can record and use most FRONTLINE programs for up to one year after each broadcast.
Ordering Information
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