Social Comparison Theory On Television

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Television has become a big part in children’s day-to-day lives especially in the 20th century. Children in this century rely on television to keep them entertained and educated instead of entertaining and educating themselves by participating in activities, which will teach them a lot more in life then the actual television. There is no doubt that children are most easily influenced by television because of the different content that they watch as well as the amount of time consumed watching TV. The television does have an emotional and intellectual development on children but this all depends on the content that they’re watching and the way that they absorb the information that the show is trying to send out. Different programs will portray …show more content…

Children do not know what is right and what is wrong that is why they are so easily influenced by what they see on television.

Social learning is a theory that can be used to explain the impact that television has on children. This theory is the method in which people obtain new information, form behavior, or attitudes from other people, meaning that children learn new information every time they watch a TV show and by what they learn is reflected on the way that they behave towards other people. Social Comparison Theory is when people compare themselves to others; comparison to others is highly informative. This theory can also be used to explain the impact that TV has on children because kids are more likely to act like their favorite character from a show rather then act as themselves. There have been many researches on the topic of children and the affects that television has on them. Researches state that the average eight year old will spend more then seven hours watching television and during those hours that kids are watching TV it is replacing other activities like doing homework, interacting with friends, and physical activity. Television is a good source to keep children occupied with informative shows as well as helps children discover more about themselves but this comes to a certain extent. If …show more content…

For example in today’s TV shows about police officers such as Rookie Blue, it portrays the officers to always be very busy with getting a calls to a scene, arresting people, police chase, shootings, solving crime in an unrealistic amount of time, and very little amount of paper work. When in reality if you were to ask a police officer what they do the most on the job they would respond with paper work and filling out reports and observing and protecting a neighborhood. Shows like Rookie Blue can set an unrealistic view on police officer by children. Kids who invest so much time into watching shows like these will not see that that is not a accurate description of a Police Officers job, where as kids who get educated from human interaction, books, and observing what happens around them will know that those police officers in the show are not your ideal police

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