Happy People Don't Watch As Much Television As Unhappy People

Is television the new opiate of the masses? An interesting study from the University of Maryland suggests that happy people don't watch nearly as much television as unhappy people:

...Examining the activity patterns of happy and less happy people in the General Social Survey (GSS) between 1975 and 2006, the authors found that happy people were more socially active, attended more religious services, voted more and read more newspapers.

In contrast, unhappy people watched significantly more television in their spare time. These results also raise questions about recent and previous time-diary data, in which television rated quite highly when people were asked to rate how they felt when they engaged in various activities in "real time" in these daily diaries.

"These conflicting data suggest that TV may provide viewers with short-run pleasure, but at the expense of long-term malaise," said Professor Robinson. ...

Well, that's a big part of where true happiness lies, isn't it; thinking and acting with an eye for the long-term, not for merely the short-term.

This next point reminded me of a comment made once upon a time by science fiction author Ray Bradbury in a retrospective interview I can vaguely recall from the dusty corners of my failing memory. A jovial Bradbury described himself not as an optimist, but as "an optimal behaviorist". He would work, he would do things, and at the end of a day he could look back and see many things accomplished, day after day. This made him feel good about himself, which in turn led to more productivity, and then more pride of accomplishment. Someone who never did anything, Bradbury said, would find it harder to feel as good about himself. That cycle of strength, built from actions, is interesting when contrasted against the cycle of passivity undertaken by the unhappy television viewers cited in the report:

The authors also noted the many other attractions associated with TV viewing in relation to other free-time activities. Viewers don't have to go anywhere, dress up (or at all), find company, plan ahead, expend energy, do any work-or even pay anything - in order to view. This becomes an unbeatable combination when added to its being quite enjoyable in the short run. This probably accounts for TV taking up more than half of Americans' free time.

This link of happiness to being purposefully engaged in meaningful actions gets further confirmation with the news that, for the unhappy individual, extra time was harming them more than a lack of time:

Unhappy people were also more likely to have unwanted extra time on their hands (51 percent) compared to very happy people (19 percent) and to feel rushed for time (35 percent vs. 23 percent). Of the two, having extra time on their hands was the bigger burden.

The whole story also brings to mind the wisdom of mothers (like mine) who used to tell their kids to shut off the television, go outside, and play. Thanks Mom..!

Farewell, Television News

This is a "Dear John" letter to an old flame of mine: television news.

For the last eight years I’ve gone without having a television or cable hook-up more often than I’ve had it. My wife recently talked me into getting basic cable again, so that she can watch her nature documentaries, which she had grown attached to during our last stint being "plugged in".

Before I got married, I would only watch tv news programming. I would watch a lot of it, a habit picked up from my father. This will be embarrassing to admit today, but I was delighted when I was finally able to watch CNN, back in the late 80’s. 24-hour news..!!! What an innocent thrill that was, to a news junkie.

Then life interfered. To save money we decided to not bother to plug in to television when my wife and I got married. As our fortunes have risen and fallen, and we’ve moved and moved again, so too have we plugged in and out of television’s window to the world. Now we’re plugged in once more.

Bowing to my curiosity, I’ve been checking the odd news show once again. Big mistake, as far as I’m now concerned. I’ve gone from a habit of being a tv news junkie, to choosing to never watch a single program. Frankly: what’s the point?

TV news today reminds me of a newspaper that carried only horoscopes, movie reviews and editorial cartoons.

So many of the headline stories are about polls. That new poll says this, this new poll reports that. Why is this called news?? It might be "fun" to review a poll’s results, but beyond that why would such things have any more practicality than an average horoscope. Polls are to news what astrology is to journalism, as far as I can tell. Am I missing something?

Next pet peeve of mine are the panel discussions. How are these supposed to inform us? An event happens, and the panel is convened to opine on "what this means". Not so much to talk about what happened, but to prophetize what shadow it will cast into the future. Back to astrology again.

There’s also an overwhelming (and unhealthy, I think) pre-occupation with reviewing events as if it were all a staged play. A politician gives an answer to a question at a press conference, and the panel analyzes the theatrical performance with as exacting an eye as any drama critic. Why not show more of the press conference, so that we can see for ourselves what the speaker said? It’s like showing a movie review instead of letting the audience actually see the movie. If time is limited, shouldn’t the details of the actual story take precedence over what the employees of the media company reporting on it may feel about it..??

This ties into my final point of dissatisfaction with tv news: they talk about things, rather than providing information on what it is that they are talking about. It reminds me of an editorial cartoon: you’re supposed to already know the story, so that you can put the cartoonist’s commentary into a context whereby their point adds to your understanding of the story. But first must come the actual story!!
As one of the commercials that interupted my old tv news shows used to say: "Where’s the Beef?"

Now I understand why so much political discussion nowadays is not much more elevated than "Bush is a warmonger!" "No he’s not" "Yes he is!!".

I remember, in the dim light of my youth, that our local news broadcasts used to have segments called "background". The news reader would read a report, for instance, Canadian troops being sent to Cyprus, then announce, "And now for some background on this story we turn to [some guy in a suit]. So why are we needed in Cyprus?" And we would be given a capsule history of Greek and Turkish conflict in Cyprus.

Now, who knows how biased or incomplete or inaccurate the resulting explanations would be… at least there was a pretense at providing a factual, rather than emotional, context for the headline, an intellectual foundation for the points of view later to be expressed in the panel discussions that made the most difference: at the dinner table at home, the water cooler at work or the playground at school.

These days it seems that the tv media have switched jobs with its viewers: now we do the fact-finding, they do the panel discussions.

I’ll tune in for live interviews, where I get to decide for myself what it is that I’m looking at.

Otherwise: it’s a –30– for me, as far as tv news is concerned.