TV Kills

From Adam Curry [ http://www.blognewsnetwork.com/members/0000001/2004/04/06.html#a5496 ]:

I remember as a kid the stories that circulated around television usage. Of course the kid next door was doing poorly at school, his brain was rotting away because he watched too much tv! I think I recall another one about it causing cancer, which was probably too big a concept for me in 1970, when I was a wee lad of 6 years.

The stories are back, only this time a bit more plausable: “TV can cause the developing mind to experience unnatural levels of stimulation.”

The BBC health watch has more on the study.

Don’t forget going blind from sitting too close to the TV….  Indeed, any activity we engage in heavily affects the mind. Meditate for 20 minutes twice a day and your mind will be different even a year later, regardless of age. Those who garden and fish will have different neurological tendencies than those who passively watch TV. With TV we are watching events unfold. There is a stimulation that is inherently non-creative. The creation was done for us. We “entrain” with the creativity of others in order to be entertained. This is done in a way that stimulates attention, yet it also gets us used to the idea that dramatic events and “scene changes” will occur regularly. Contrast that with life in general and the classroom in particular. It just isn’t stiumlating in the same way!

An interesting question for me is the issue of retention for things learned on TV. Our kids do a lot of learning through the computer, participating in classes through Stanford’s EPGY and http://www.k12.com. Retention there seems to be strong. However, for “educational” shows on TV, and certainly for retention of what happened in shows and movies, the level of retention is not there. The lack of interactivity and engagement reduces the effectiveness of television as a learning tool. One thing that may help is if we have specific goals around a show or TV seminar. For example, I am taking DVD learning on EFT. There is an open-book test that goes along with it for certification. The combination of TV-based learning with a specific outcome of knowledge does help make it more effective and retained (for me).