the box

This page considers 'television addiction'.

It covers -

• introduction
• anxieties
• disputes
• the plug-in drug

     introduction

Claims of television addiction or videogame/computer game addiction (and precursors such as pachinko addiction) offer a perspective on -

• media reception of claims of a new pathology or increasing epidemic
• debate within the health professions about the characterisation of disorders, the potential confusion of causation with correlation, and the appropriateness of specific therapies
• government responses to community pressure that reflect broader social discontents rather than particular medical problems.

Critics have claimed that television is addictive, is a 'plug-in drug', erodes community and individual health, and fosters a range of ills from violence to gendered discrimination.

Those claims encompass mere viewing of television and exposure to particular types of content, from soap operas to cartoons (hotbeds of violence) and feature films (inducing violence, sexual licence and substance abuse).

As with cyberaddiction, those claims are disputed by addiction specialists, by industry and by people who are sceptical about misuse of 'addiction' as an expression of what Alan Dershowitz dismissed as "the abuse excuse".

They are reminiscent of past jeremiads against the movies (particularly viewing by children, women or the lower classes - all deemed more excitable and suggestible) or reading novels, comics and the yellow press.

There is disagreement about what constitutes addiction to television (or to games), whether the supposed addiction is a manifestation of an underlying disorder, and the number of addicts. Is addiction to the box measurable? Is it simply a matter of a critic's perception that the 'victim' has 'over-used' the medium and thus is addicted?

     anxieties

Aric Sigman, author of Remotely Controlled: How Television Is Damaging Our Lives (London: Vermilion Press 2005), in describing television as "the greatest health scandal of our time" claims that "viewing even moderate amounts of television -

• may damage brain cell development and function
• is the only adult pastime from the ages of 20 to 60 positively linked to developing Alzheimer's disease
• is a direct cause of obesity — a bigger factor even than eating junk food or taking too little exercise.
• significantly increases the risk of Type 2 diabetes.
• may biologically trigger premature puberty.
• leads to a significantly elevated risk of sleep problems in adulthood, causing hormone changes which in turn increase body fat production and appetite, damages the immune system and may lead to a greater vulnerability to cancer.
• is a major independent cause of clinical depression (of which Britain has the highest rate in Europe)
• stunts the development of children's brains
• increases the likelihood of children developing ADHD
• lowers adult libido
• is a leading cause of half of all violence-related crime.

A sceptic might ask whether pastimes such as reading novels (or reading exposes of media ills) have the same effects ... and whether some people confuse correlation with causation?

     disputes

Sigman was preceded by the widely-publicised - and arguably mythologised - dispute involving US consumer Timothy Dumouchel. That dispute is of interest because it raises questions of law's recognition of new pathologies and because it has been uncritically assimilated by popular culture.

In January 2004 Dumouchel, of West Bend (Wisconsin) threatened as a self-represented litigant to sue his cable television provider Charter Communications for causing his alleged TV addiction. He reportedly claimed that said his family's viewing habits - "forced" by cable television - caused his wife to become overweight and his children to grow lazy. It has been claimed that in a written complaint against Charter he stated that "I believe that the reason I smoke and drink every day and my wife is overweight is because we watched TV every day for the last four years".

In response to ungenerous questions such as why didn't you use the remote control to turn off the box, Dumouchel reportedly explained that "the reason I am suing Charter is they did not let me make a decision as to what was best for myself and my family and (they have been) keeping cable (coming) into my home for four years after I asked them to turn it off". He claimed that Charter was liable because it continued providing service after he had requested the cancellation, in some accounts for four years and without billing. Why not simply disconnect the box or cut the cord? Dumouchel is reported as claiming that he thought such an act was illegal and did not wish to face prosecution.

The nub of his case, which did not proceed, is that his remote control exerted a power so irresistible that he could not force himself to stop watching. His family were similarly bewitched. He reportedly claimed that he had previously given up drinking and smoking, habits he resumed under the influence of cable TV. Some accounts of the dispute feature claims that he unsuccessfully sought US$5,000 or three computers and a lifetime free Internet service from Charter to settle the dispute.

There have been no legally accepted claims in Australia that cable or free to air television is addictive.

The basis and interpretation of research on tv addiction remains contentious, with disagreement about the implications of exposure to television per se and exposure in particular locations such as bedrooms. One study in Pediatrics of 781 Minneapolis area adolescents for example noted that 62% reported having a tv in their bedroom. Twice as many of those teens were classified as heavy TV watchers compared to those without a box near the bed. Girls with a bedroom tv reported less vigorous exercise (1.8 hours per week compared to 2.5 hours for girls without a TV) and ate fewer vegetables, drank more sweetened beverages and ate meals with their family less often. Boys with a bedroom TV reported a lower grade point average than boys without one, along with a lower consumption of fruit and fewer family meals.

A study by Tracie Barnett, Jennifer O’Loughlin, Marie Lambert, Lise Gauvin, Yan Kestens & and Mark Daniel at the American Heart Association’s 48th Annual Conference on Cardiovascular Disease Epidemiology and Prevention in 2008 indicated that although 60% of US teens spend on average 20 hours per week in front of television and computer screens, a third spend closer to 40 hours per week, and about 7% are exposed to more than 50 hours of 'screen-time' per week. Boys and those whose parents had lower educational attainment were much more likely to be in the ‘high-screen time’ group. Teens with high levels of screen time "may be at increased risk of obesity". The study indicated that 52% of boys and 26% of girls reported average total screen-time levels above 42 hours per week; 52% of boys and 39% of girls reported average levels of TV/video use above 23 hours per week; 24% of boys and 7% of girls reported average levels of computer/internet use of almost 30 hours per week. Television accounted for most of the screen-time, with 85% of the teens reporting less than 10 hours per week of computer/internet use.

That consumption does not, however, equal addiction, with one of the authors subsequently commenting on the importance of making the streets safe so that teens have diversions other than the box.

     the plug in drug?

Salient works on addiction to the box include Marie Winn's The Plug-In Drug (New York: Penguin 1985) and Unplugging the Plug-In Drug (New York: Penguin 1987), Jerry Mander's Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television (New York: Quill 1978), Robert Kubey & Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi's Television and the Quality of Life (Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum 1990) and 'Television addiction is no mere metaphor' in 286(2) Scientific American (2002) 62-81 and Robert McIlwraith, Robin Jacobvitz, Robert Kubey & Alison Alexander's 'Television addiction: Theories and data behind the ubiquitous metaphor' in 35(2) American Behavioral Scientist (1991) 104-121.

Responses include Why TV Is Good For Kids (Sydney: Pan Macmillan 2006) by Catharine Lumby & Duncan Fine, 'The Cultural Power of an Anti-Television Metaphor: Questioning the "Plug-In Drug" and a TV-Free America' (PDF) by Jason Mittell and Grand Theft Childhood: The Surprising Truth About Violent Video Games and What Parents Can Do (New York: Simon & Schuster 2008) by Lawrence Kutner & Cheryl Olson. Other works are highlighted in the following page

 

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