Argumentative Essay - The effect of television viewing: Draft#2

As the sophisticated lifestyle spearheads this modern century, television has become a prevalent necessity rather than a luxury good. American Time Use Survey(2003) states that men and women in United States spend approximately 2.4 and 2.8 hours per day respectively in watching television. This statistics manifests the truth that more than ninety percent of households in modernised countries own at least one television set (Sharif 1999). Parallel to this, issue on television viewing becomes highly controversial when the detrimental pitfalls of television viewing are getting noticeable on all levels of people. Nevertheless, I strongly believe that television viewing can bring negative effects, such as affect the children’s thinking, intervene their positive behaviour building and jeopardise people’s health.
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Firstly, children’s thinking skills can be adversely affected if they watch inappropriate television programmes for a long period. According to Sharif (1999), short segments with interesting presentation in modern children’s programmes and music video clips encourage the development of short attention spans in children. Children may have the wrong thoughts that overwhelming all the difficulties in life will be a piece of cake as they are used to those thirty minutes problem-solving programmes like ‘Friends’. As a result, they always lose out patience when it is the real time for them to counter the hardship and rigour situations. Moreover, Jones claims that children who are heavy viewers are among the lowest achievers at school because they do not develop imaginative skills to create fictitious characters, situations and make-believe worlds (Leigh 2001). In short, excessive television watching hours may plague the healthy thinking of the children.
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Secondly, the structure of children’s behaviours will be less desirable, particularly the emanating of wildness and violence. Television programmes and even the news, televised at prime time, depict violence scenes which may cause the children to become desensitised to violence (Sharif 1999). Consequently, they may feel that violence is a plausible and acceptable way in solving problems. Furthermore, some children attempt to imitate the superhero in the television shows they have watched. For instance, there were children jumped out of trees in Superman costumes and got themselves injured (Sharif 1999). Besides, the stereotyped movies showing the narrow roles of characters played by the women and men in society influence the children’s behaviours towards themselves and others. These evidences prove that television viewing can be actually harmful by forming disfavour behaviours among children.
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Prolonged periods in front of the television which is a sedentary activity can trigger many health problems such as obesity and related diseases. Nowadays, people, especially the youngsters, become inured to the habits of indulging themselves with snacks while watching television (Rutherford 2002). The elevated number of couch potatoes is intractable as it spreads erratically without control. Meanwhile, extended periods in front of the television mean that children are not being physically active (Sharif 1999). Moreover, children may become autistic as television viewing encourages the development of antisocial behaviour. Briefly, obesity will become the most discernible fallout when children consume too much calories, adding to the dearth of physical exercises.
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In conclusion, I strongly believe that television viewing can bring harmful effects such as underdevelopment of thinking skills, formation of negative behaviours and cultivation of unhealthy lifestyles. The negative effects of television viewing are stark, albeit, some people assert that its pros outweigh the cons. However, I am prone to the stance that television viewing brings more harms than benefits. A balance point on television viewing should be adhered in order to best utilise the television by minimising its negative effects and at the same time get ourselves refreshed and ready to concentrate on things like homework (Rutherford 2002).
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