Television and Our Need to Connect to Others
Wednesday, February 25th, 2009By Daniel Jordan, General Manager
Sunshine Coast Health Center
“The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.”
~ Henry David Thoreau in page 5 of ‘Walden’
A few weeks back, I was describing my vacation in the Philippines and how it was a great lesson in simplifying my life since I did not conduct any business during my stay. Rather than panic and despair about the lack of things to do, I decided to spend more time reading and getting in shape but perhaps most importantly, spend more time simply hanging out with my family. This shift in priorities was an important lesson for me and, a full 6 weeks later, I am still managing to maintain the sort of lifestyle I had come to love in Manila, even after going back to work.
While other factors are at play, I maintain that a big part of my change in lifestyle was my decision to stop watching the Three Screens - internet, mobile phones, and, especially, television - during my stay. By doing so, I am definitely not your average North American adult. According to The Neilsen Company, the average American watches more than 151 hours of TV per month, which is an all-time high, according to a new report. If that wasn’t bad enough, the same survey found that the average adult over age 65 watched 207 hours of TV a month.
That’s a lot of channel surfing. Just like online video gaming *, it’s difficult to say whether it’s an addiction since it does not meet criteria for the 3 Cs of Addiction Test: compulsion, control, and consequences. After all, one could say that the consequences of watching television are not as negative as say, cocaine or gambling.
Although it is not covered in the 3 Cs of Addiction test, any activity that takes up a lot of our waking hours begs the question “why?” If the motivation for watching TV is to connect to others, then maybe it’s time to find other ways to fulfil this need to speak and be heard.
It is no accident that the news typically has the highest viewership in television. The news feeds into our natural desire to feel connected to others but it is, at best, a superficial connection to people because there is no interaction with the newscasters or the people shown in their stories.
I often remind myself that, while I can remember many occasions being with my family (particularly vacations) I would be hard pressed to remember any one memorable occasion spent watching TV.
(*) Note: see recent blog article “Ambivalence is Fertile Ground for the Growing Popularity of Online Gaming.”
