Violence in the media for entertainment purposes has been established as a major contributing factor. Daily, our children see on the screen that violence is fun and exciting and the hero's method of choice for solving their problems. Physicians throughout the country recognize that violence in the media is a major public health issue that warrants community-wide attention and a unified effort for change.
Many children now spend more time in front of a screen than in the classroom.
More and more, research is showing how deeply violence in the media influences how people behave. Heavy TV viewers are less imaginative, more impulsive, more aggressive, and have poorer concentration. The average child will see 8,000 murders and 100,000 other acts of violence by the end of elementary school. Viewing violence in the media teaches aggressive attitudes and behaviors, desensitizes viewers to violence, and produces fear of violence. Even when children are not in front of the screen what they do is highly influenced by the toys and other products marketed with TV shows.