THE FACE OF TELEVISION
Published on April 21, 2002
© 2002- The Press Democrat
BYLINE: Paul Gullixson
PAGE: G1
COLUMN: Paul Gullixson

"I find television very educating. Every time somebody turns on the set, I go into the other room and read a book.'' Groucho Marx

We've all seen that face. It's the vacuous expression of a child glued to the tube. If pharmaceutical companies could package and sell it, it would put Botox out of business.

In this case, it's the face of a 6-year-old Minnesota boy featured on a poster titled "12 minutes of TV.'' In the first shot, "2 Minutes,'' his mouth is open, his eyes are glazed, and he is devoid of expression. The next five photos, taken in two-minute intervals, are exactly the same.

On his Web site, the photographer, Jerry Sedgewick, a scientist at the University of Minnesota, said, ``I wasstunned at how little his expression changed over time.''

The experience motivated Sedgewick to get involved in campaigns against the influence of television. The photo series is now being promoted as part of TV-Turnoff Week which starts Monday.

These expressions are reason enough to get America to shut off the tube. But if you need more, consider this:

* The average child will spend 14 percent more time watching TV this year than he or she will spend in school. (According to Nielsen Media Research, children spend on average 1,023 hours per year watching TV -- compared with 900 hours spent in class.)

* The time per day that a TV is on in an average U.S. home now exceeds the time adults are paid to be at work. (According to Nielsen, TV time now stands at 7 hours and 40 minutes. According to my paycheck, the normal paid work day is still 10 minutes less.)* If the average child received $1 for every violent act he or she saw on TV over the course of their young life, the individual would be able to buy a $200,000 Santa Rosa condominium in cash by the age of 18.

One evening I was getting ready to take my 3-year-old son, Christopher, upstairs to read good-night stories, when he looked at me with pleading eyes and said ``Daddy, can we watch a video first?''

Seeing the expression on my face, he knew what was coming. So he quickly qualified his request. ``Just for three hours?''

He was being more realistic than he knew.

Studies show the average amount of time per week that children between the ages of 2 and 17 watch television is now 19 hours and 40 minutes.

If you're a glutton for more of these kinds of numbers, check out the Web site www.tvfa.org for the TV-TurnoffNetwork, a nonprofit group that's trying to convince America not just to tune out all the violence and sexuality on TV but to turn off the tube all together.

"Ten years ago nobody was talking about TV time as being important,'' TV-Turnoff Network Executive Director Frank Vespe said last week. ``All the talk was about content.''

But the concern has shifted. Studies now show the more the TV is on at home -- regardless of what's on -- the greater the risk in children of underperforming in school, developing poor social skills and struggling with obesity.

This is, so to speak, a no-brainer.

The critical period of cognitive and language development is between the ages of 3 and 5. During these years, neurons in the brain are responding to stimuli and building connections called synapses. These create the networks that are the foundations for reading comprehension and analytical thinking.Experts note that at this age the more the brain does, the more it is capable of doing. The problem is that many children are sitting comatose in front of the TV for 20 hours a week. When you add in time spent interacting with computer games and listening to music, the total time children between 2 and 18 spend absorbed with entertainment totals 38 hours a week.

The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) is so troubled by the evidence that it is now recommending to parents that children under the age of 2 not watch any television. None. Zip.

After 2, parents are encouraged to ``limit children's total media time (with entertainment media) to no more than one to two hours of quality programming per day.''

But these guidelines haven't quite reached the level of attention they deserve.

The AAP is the same organization that's behind the ``Back to Sleep'' campaign that has encouraged millions ofparents to put their infants on their backs at night as a preventative measure against Sudden Infant Death Syndome (SIDS). When this organization says ``jump,'' parents ask how high -- except, it seems, when it comes to TV.

Despite the AAP's recommendation that children have TV-free bedrooms, that's exactly where 56 percent of American children have a TV set.

I would love to eliminate TV from my household. But I have one major obstacle -- me.

I have a particular addiction for news programs, old movies and any televised event featuring a ball.

Fortunately, I'm blessed with a wife who does not share my need for sensory input. I once shut off our cable service, and it took several weeks before she even noticed. Unfortunately, I still had a small black and white TV to help me maintain my addiction.For those like me who are products of a television generation, there are challenges to going without TV. You feel left out of conversations at dinner parties about ``West Wing.'' You never get to host Super Bowl parties. And it sometimes makes it hard to find babysitters. But all of those are issues for the parents -- not the kids -- to work through.

As with so many other things about parenting, it's rarely the kids that have the hardest time adjusting to changes in house rules. It's the parents.

As my football coach used to tell me while pointing at my helmet. ``Gullixson, this is the hardest muscle to get in shape -- your head.''

So my family is going to give it a try. We're going to shut off the TV cold turkey during the next week. No videos either.They're a little nervous about how Dad is going to do, but I'm going to show them.

As Vespe of TV-Turnoff Network said, ``It's really a simple message that we're trying to get out. Turn off the TV for a week -- and try the rest of life.''

Life? I can live with that.
Paul Gullixson is assistant editorial director for The Press Democrat.

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