The Effects of Television Violence on Children

Thesis Statement: Unsupervised children who watch violence on television exhibit violence in their everyday lives and develop into aggressive adults.

“Research shows that television violence increases levels of

aggression, fear, and desensitization among some who consume it”

(Hamilton). This quotation by James Hamilton briefly summarizes the

potentially negative effects of television on young minds. A child’s favorite

television show can keep a child occupied while the mother prepares dinner

or makes a quick trip to the store. However, leaving a child alone to watch

whatever show is on can be dangerous to the child in the long run. With the

amount of violence on television, parents should not allow the television to

become a babysitter for children no matter how tempting it might be. A

television set is a bad babysitter because unsupervised children who watch

violence on television exhibit violence in their everyday lives and develop

into aggressive adults. “The violence-content on television programs exceeds all other contents on television programs.” (Comstock et al 30)

Although the above table was put together in 1963, it still provides a

snapshot of the amount of violence that existed on television. And since

there are more sources of violence on television today, commercials, rap

songs, documentaries, one can only imagine what that table would look like

today (Hattemer). Alarmingly enough, the child-program type has the most

violence, which means that children--who cannot tell the difference between

fiction and reality--are absorbing more violence than adults--who can.

The violence on television sends the wrong message by making the

perpetrators look attractive. Almost half of t...

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