Unhappy people turn to the tube, researchers say http://www.cbc.ca/arts/tv/story/2008/11/18/tv-patterns.html
Researchers at the University of Maryland have found that unhappy people watch more TV and do less reading and socializing than happy people. At the same time, watching TV stops people from developing social networks or other interests that might lead to well-being in the long term. In the long-term, TV watching tends to make people less happy, according to a study by John P. Robinson and Steven Martin, both sociologists at the University of Maryland. "TV doesn't really seem to satisfy people over the long haul the way that social involvement or reading a newspaper does," said Robinson, who specializes in time-use studies. "It's more passive and may provide escape — especially when the news is as depressing as the economy itself. The data suggest to us that the TV habit may offer short-run pleasure at the expense of long-term malaise." The researchers studied two sets of data spanning nearly 30 years — time use studies and general social survey attitude studies that relied on interviews from more than 30,000 participants. Very happy people were more socially active, attended more religious services, voted more and read more newspapers. In addition, happily married couples engaged in 30 per cent more sex than those who considered themselves unhappily married. By contrast, unhappy people watched significantly more television in their spare time, about 20 per cent more, after taking into account other differences such as their income, age and education. In the short term, television seemed to make them feel good as well as being easy to do, Robinson said. Diary entries in the time use studies indicate people are conflicted about using their time to watch TV, he said. "What viewers seem to be saying is that while TV in general is a waste of time and not particularly enjoyable, 'The shows I saw tonight were pretty good,' " Robinson says. TV watchers don't have to go anywhere, dress up, find company, plan ahead, expend energy, do any work or spend money, which might explain why Americans spend half their leisure time watching TV, the researchers say. Paradoxically, unhappy people are both more likely to feel they have too much time on their hands (about 51 per cent) or that they are too rushed (about 35 per cent). Only 19 per cent of happy people had too much time on their hands and only 23 per cent felt too rushed. "TV is not judgmental nor difficult, so people with few social skills or resources for other activities can engage in it," says the study. "Furthermore, chronic unhappiness can be socially and personally debilitating and can interfere with work and most social and personal activities, but even the unhappiest people can click a remote and be passively entertained by a TV." If the economy worsens over the next few months, Robinson projects that TV viewing will increase significantly. "Through good and bad economic times, our diary studies have consistently found that work is the major activity correlate of higher TV viewing hours," Robinson says. "As people have progressively more time on their hands, viewing hours increase." But Robinson cautions that some of that extra time also might be spent sleeping, as sleep-deprived Americans catch up on shut-eye they formerly lost to work. --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ Like TV only smarter. You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected] To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
