TV has both positive, negative impact on development

Growing up, we’ve all heard the phrase, “Television rots your brain.” Whether it’s from your parents or teachers, the negativity has tended to reside on the adults’ side, meanwhile children typically have a more positive outlook on television affecting their minds. Senior Aaron Gordon reflected on his all-time favorite show giving him a brighter mood.

“TV influenced me a lot because I got to see all of the different superheroes and cartoons; they really influenced me and my character and who I wanted to be when I grow up,” Gordon said. “Spongebob impacted my childhood tremendously. With Spongebob, [I learned to] always have a positive attitude. When you see Spongebob, you think happiness; he’s always ready to take on the day.”

Although Gordon had a positive experience with TV growing up, he recognizes the negative influences that come from TV. Gordon recommends children to not always resort to TV.

“[I view TV] as a negative [mechanism]. [A better alternative would be] books. Books are full of characters and [have] the same things that they can see [on tv]. They can increase their imagination. They should read books. TV’s decent, but it can have a negative influence,” Gordon said. “For children, I guess it depends on what you’re watching. [TV is not a positive mechanism] in a way because TV has a lot of negative influences. There are a lot of hidden messages in a lot of shows we watch like Spongebob, everybody watches Spongebob. [Spongebob] has a bunch of hidden messages that you’d probably never figure out. He was watching porn on the tv once and then Gary came in and [Spongebob] switched [the channel].”

Gordon watched a minimal amount of TV as a child, but wouldn’t be where he is without it.

“[As a child, I watched TV] not often; maybe an hour a day,” Gordon said. “My childhood would be different without television because I wouldn’t be able to relate with a lot of different people. There are a lot of experiences that I wouldn’t have had through trial and error like trying things that I saw on television.”

Junior Guillermo Torres spent most of his childhood outside, rather than watching TV. Even now he finds himself watching a minimal amount of TV, but when he does watch TV, Torres finds it to be somewhat helpful to socially interact.

“I usually don’t watch TV because I don’t really like what’s on. I do watch a good amount of Netflix. Not so much, but about like an episode, so 45 minutes a day and that’s when I’m eating or I don’t have anything to do. I usually don’t have anything to do, so I’m doing homework or wrestling,” Torres said. “[The amount of TV I watched as a child] wasn’t that much; one hour, two hours max a day. I would usually be outside playing all the time. [Watching TV] wasn’t something where that was the only thing I did.”

Torres has found it easier for him to socialize through common interest in shows or movies.

“I would probably not be able to interact with some people that watch a lot of anime stuff. I can kind of connect with some of them because I’ve watched some [anime] stuff, so just because you watch certain things, you can get this connection between you and another person. It’s kind of cool; I don’t regret it,” Torres said.

Torres considers TV to be a positive mechanism for children to an extent where children are able to balance both physical activity and electronical entertainment.

“I think a lot of people see TV as really bad just because they overdo it or overwatch it. I think it can be very informative; you can learn a lot of stuff. It depends how much [children] are watching TV [to differ if it’s positive or negative]. I know as a little kid, I used to watch TV, but I wouldn’t watch it a lot, I would just watch it when there was literally nothing else to do. I would usually be outside, so if kids are just watching TV all day, they’re not going to get their exercise in or their social [interaction], so it can be a negative thing, but it shouldn’t be,” Torres said. “I think kids should definitely [watch TV]. They miss out on connecting with people I guess. If I see somebody and they’re a complete stranger and say a line from Dragonball Z and they’re a Dragonball Z fan, they’ll just be like, ‘Hey I know that.’ You’ll miss out, but don’t overdo it; they should still have time to play around.”