It鈥檚 not news that it is the emotional content as much as the information content of films and television programs that can affect our moods and subsequently other aspects of our thinking and behaviour. This applies to both adults and children.
An increasing number of data-based studies now suggest that television content might even be playing a significant role in the successes enjoyed by populist politicians around the world and that these victories are because of media-savvy political speakers who rely on entertainment rather than thoughtful political messaging.
In a recent Washington Post article, Andrew Van Dam makes the case that the lowest common denominator of popular media 鈥渉as paved the way for the lowest common denominator of populist politics.鈥�
Van Dam bases his case on a study by Ruben Durante of Universitat Pompeu Fabra in Barcelona, which also concludes that exposure of kids to vapid, entertainment-based programming has been followed, in later adult life, by support for more populist candidates peddling simple messages and easy answers.
Young people who watched TV that features a heavy content of cartoons, trash sports, soap operas, fictional movies and other light entertainment during their formative years would, says Durante, grow up to be 鈥渓ess cognitively sophisticated and less civically minded鈥� than their peers who had access only to public broadcasting and local stations during that period.
Durante describes it as a matter of educational growth opportunity lost: Every hour spent watching TV is an hour kids aren鈥檛 reading, playing outside or socializing with other kids.
鈥淚鈥檓 sorry,鈥� says Durante, 鈥渂ut that may have long-term effects on what kind of person you will become.鈥�
According to Dr. Graham Davey, professor of psychology at the University of Sussex, TV programs that generate negative mood experiences such as anxiety, even anger fantasies create a short but psychologically direct line to how we, both as children and later as adults, interpret and worry about events in our own lives.
In terms of adult anxiety, Davey singles out 24-hour TV news that, according to his research, has been gradually increasing in terms of the negative sensationalism over the past 20-30 years.
The increasing tendency for news broadcasters to 鈥渆motionalize鈥� news emphasizing any potential negative outcomes of a story is basically 鈥渟caremongering鈥� in order to sensationalize the impact of a news story and present a dystopian view of a world in chaos.
With the advent of 24-hour TV news and unfettered social media coverage, other researchers point out that both adults and, increasingly, adolescents, have an almost immediate access not to facts but to more entertaining, if troubling interpretations of what is happening around the world.
As journalism professor Bob Franklin wrote in the 1997 edition of Newszak and News Media: 鈥淓ntertainment has superseded the provision of information; human interest has supplanted the public interest; measured judgment has succumbed to sensationalism.鈥�
Michael C. McGarrity, assistant director of the FBI鈥檚 counterterrorism division, stated that: 鈥淰iolent extremists are increasingly using social media for the distribution of propaganda, recruitment, target selection, and incitement to violence.鈥�
McGarrity added that 鈥渢hrough the internet, violent extremists around the world have access to our local communities to target and recruit like-minded individuals and spread their messages of hate on a global scale.鈥�
The problem for parents is that 100-channel 24-hour TV and devices such as iPads and smartphones have become convenient child minders.
Unfortunately, one of the inevitable consequences of allowing a child unsupervised TV viewing or hours spent alone exploring social media is the reduction of how much parents talk with their children.
This diminished parent-child interaction can have significantly negative effects on children, especially when they are young.
The good news is that parents who read books to their children also tend to employ higher-quality forms of communication with their children which includes asking questions, labelling objects, affirming their child鈥檚 curiosity and responding during the formative years to their child鈥檚 statements or questions with relevant information.
It is this more thoughtful fostering of intellectual curiosity that drives learning, critical thinking and reasoning.
That alone can be what motivates young people to learn, and what keeps them learning throughout their lives.
Geoff Johnson is a former superintendent of schools.
