tvSmarter

Trump TV

terry33 — Thu, 03 Nov 2016 07:09:37 +0000

Is Trump a creation of our love of television?

Has Trump found the secret to political success in our entertainment-obsessed society?

For answers see: “The great entertainer: The mystery of our fascination with Trump” by Wilfred Clifton

The Screen Time Takeover – by Rachael Henson

terry33 — Wed, 05 Oct 2016 04:03:44 +0000

Beautifully done infographic for parents:

The Family Beat Blog

Here is an infographic created by Rachael Henson for FCS 231 at Illinois State University. Posted with her permission.

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People Unplugged – new Website

terry33 — Mon, 24 Aug 2015 06:50:24 +0000

People Unplugged – new Website

How does TV effect individuals and society?

A new website looking at the effects of TV has just gone live. Instead of short blog posts and/or links, PeopleUnplugged.org will specialize in longer form essays and books reviews. Wilfred Clifton is the webmaster and author and in charge of the graphics. I am also a contributor, writing as Terry Severson.

PeopleUnplugged.org

Hope you will check it out!

Snake oil salesmen selling torture

terry33 — Mon, 29 Dec 2014 03:54:43 +0000

Excellent critique of the CIA torture program from a scientific point of view.

Mind Hacks

The US Government has just released its report on the CIA’s Detention and Interrogation Program, aptly branded the “torture report”, which is available online as a pdf.

It makes for appalling reading but sheds light on the role of two psychologists in the creation and running of what turned out to be genuinely counter-productive ‘enhanced interrogations’ that were used in preference to already productive non-abusive interrogations.

In the report the psychologists are given the codenames Grayson SWIGERT and Hammond DUNBAR but these refer to James Mitchell and Bruce Jessen who have been widely identified by other sources in the preceding years.

Mitchell and Jessen were both contractors, who, according to the new report, arrived at detention centres to direct CIA interrogations, despite having no interrogation experience, and in face of sometimes severe reservations of regular CIA staff.

Later, Mitchell and Jessen formed a company, Mitchell Jessen and Associates –…

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Why Are Parents Getting Arrested for Letting Their Kids Go to the Park Alone?

terry33 — Sat, 02 Aug 2014 22:00:55 +0000

Kids, a photo by Stella Yodo on Flickr.

Is your child ready for grade one? According to a 1979 checklist there are number of things to look for, such as:

“3. Can your child tell, in such a way that his speech is understood by a school crossing guard or policeman, where he lives?

9. Can he be away from you all day without being upset?

8. Can he travel alone in the neighborhood (four to eight blocks) to store, school, playground, or to a friend’s home?”

http://www.chicagonow.com/little-kids-big-city/2011/08/is-your-child-ready-for-first-grade-1979-edition/

Via

http://www.slate.com/blogs/xx_factor/2011/08/31/a_1979_first_grade_readiness_checklist_asks_if_your_child_can_tr.html

So in 1979 (not that long ago) it was considered normal for a 5 year old to be able to walk eight blocks unsupervised to the “store, school, playground, or to a friend’s home…”

Now, parents are being arrested for letting their kids go outside unsupervised:

“Working Mom Arrested for Letting Her 9-Year-Old Play Alone at Park” http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/07/arrested-for-letting-a-9-year-old-play-at-the-park-alone/374436/

“Nicole Gainey Was Arrested For Letting Her 7-Year-Old Son Walk To The Park Alone” http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/07/30/nicole-gainey-was-arrested-for-letting-her-7-year-old-son-walk-to-the-park-alone_n_5633803.html

These are not isolated events. Children playing outside unsupervised is becoming increasingly rare. And the reason give is that we are living in dangerous times with too much crime and too many predators.

Interestingly, in Japan where crime is so much lower than in the United States, children do walk to school and back unsupervised:

“In Japan, 80 percent of kids between 6 and 12 walk to school grownup-free.” http://www.salon.com/2012/07/21/paranoid_parents_kill_cities/

And yet, even in very safe Japan, children have stopped playing outside:

“For example, in the 1970s a Japanese photographer, Keiki Haginoya, undertook what was to be a lifelong project to compile a photo documentary of children’s play on the streets of Tokyo. He gave up the project in 1996, noting that the spontaneous play and laughter that once filled the city’s streets, alleys and vacant lots had utterly vanished.” http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/27/opinion/27elkind.html?_r=0

Meanwhile, in Iraq, during the middle of a war, kids were playing outside, unsupervised:

“After all, nothing is more popular in Iraq than soccer. “There are soccer fields everywhere,” Reppenhagen said. “Mostly it is just dirt lots. They don’t have goal posts and so use stumps. Sometimes the kids play in the street. I swear, all they do all day long is play soccer.”” http://www.salon.com/2007/02/07/soccer_balls/

So what has really changed? Perhaps the fact that kids have become hooked on TV, video games, and other electronic entertainment?

“A new survey reveals that today’s children are missing out on pursuits such as cycling and swimming enjoyed by past generations of youngsters, with experts blaming the findings on their parents being too afraid to let them play outside. Rather than go out and ride their bikes, the survey says that today’s kids are more likely to be engrossed in electronic gadgets such as mobile phones and computer games consoles, watching TV or surfing the internet. “ http://road.cc/content/news/35089-experts-blame-parental-fear-kids-shunning-cycling-and-swimming-tv-and-computers

“A poll of 2,100 children conducted by the Telegraph has found that half of eight to 14-year-olds watch a minimum of four hours of television a day during term time. Even more time is spent in front of the television at weekends and holidays, with some children more than doubling their daily viewing.” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1467815/Children-watch-more-than-4-hours-of-TV-a-day.html

Then for the parents willing to risk the wrath of society and allow their kids to go outside to play, who are they going to play with, if the rest of the neighborhood kids are inside playing video games and watching TV? Sad times indeed for kids growing up today… Note: if there was a huge power outage, and all these electronic gadgets died, it would be just a matter of time before parents got irritated by active and loud kids underfoot, and decided to kick them outside so that the parents could quietly mourn the death of their wonderful electronic babysitters.

Does too much TV damage the brain?

terry33 — Wed, 30 Jul 2014 09:26:56 +0000

Via Whitedot Board:

http://whitedotboard.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=21&t=11092&sid=3e4f21aa181f28857d30094b9bd355a3

Scientists at Tohoku University in Japan decided to look at the brains of children (ages 5 to 18) and look for any differences between those who watched lots of TV and those who watched much less.

“MRI brain scans showed children who spent the most hours in front of the box had greater amounts of grey matter in regions around the frontopolar cortex – the area at the front of the frontal lobe. But this increased volume was a negative thing as it was linked with lower verbal intelligence, said the authors, from Tohoku University in the city of Sendai. They suggested grey matter could be compared to body weight and said these brain areas need to be pruned during childhood in order to operate efficiently.”

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/health/article-2537240/Children-watch-TV-damaged-brain-structures.html

See also Science News:

https://www.sciencenews.org/blog/growth-curve/tv-linked-brain-changes-kids

And Cerebral Cortex:

http://cercor.oxfordjournals.org/content/early/2013/11/18/cercor.bht315.short?rss=1

So what about the idea that more “grey matter in regions around the frontopolar cortex” is associated with “lower verbal intelligence”, is that really the case? I couldn’t find anything specifically mentioning the “grey matter in regions around the frontopolar cortex”, but did come across a couple of interesting articles that mention the topic:

“Adolescent brains normally reduce their size to become more efficient, so 14-year-olds with larger, more immature brain were more likely to become binge drinkers by 16 years of age. “There’s refining and sculpting of the brain, and most of the gray matter — the neurons and the connections between them, are getting smaller and the white matter is getting larger,” Garavan said. “Kids with more immature brains — those that are still larger — are more likely to drink.””

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2014/07/07/we-can-predict-which-14-year-olds-will-be-binge-drinkers-by-16-brain-researchers-say/

And

“The precise contribution of each of these factors to the development of cognition is not yet known; however, gray-matter thinning is thought to be critical for age-related cognitive improvements (Casey et al., 2005, Sowell et al., 2004 and Tau and Peterson, 2009). Here we explored the role of gray-matter thinning in age-related improvements in cognitive control and working memory span in children ages 5–10, using structural MRI.”

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878929313000467

Anyway, this is a very interesting first step. Note, this is a correlational study, it could be that kids with excessive gray matter are drawn to watching TV, or that there is a third factor that causes both excessive gray matter and more TV watching, or that watching excessive TV really does cause too much gray matter in the brain.

Hopefully more studies will be done looking at the neurological effects of TV on the growing brain. Considering the huge amounts of time kids spend watching TV, the fact that these types of studies are just now starting to be done is pretty sad.