Television
is pervasive: 98% of American households have at least one set.
Children
watch an average of 27 hours of television per week.
Americans,
collectively, spend 231 billion hours per year watching television.
The
average adult, at the age of 65, will have spent 9 years watching television.
By
age 18 the American child has seen 350,000 commercials and spent more
time
watching television than any other single activity.
The
sixth grader has seen 8,000 murders and 100,000 acts of violence.
60%
of the information that children receive comes from TV.
Advertisers
spend 125 billion dollars a year to convince us to buy
their products.
The
average adult has experienced between 50 -100 advertisements by 9 AM.
Children
influence 250 billion dollars of buy decisions a year.
Sources for this data include:
A.C.
Neilsen CO (1996), Jacobson, Michael F., and Mazur, Laurie Ann. Marketing
Madness: A Survival Guide for a Consumer Society, Westview Press,
Boulder, Colorado, 1995
Gomrey,
Douglas. As the Dial Turns, Wilson Quarterly, Autumn, 1993
Huston, Aletha C.; Donnerstein,
Edward; Fairchild, Halford; Feshback, Norma D.; Katz, Phyllis A.; Murray,
John P.; Rubenstein Eli A.; Eiloz, Brian L.; Zuckerman, Diana. Big
World, Small Screen, The Role of Television in American Society, University
of Nebraska Press, Lincoln, 1992
American
Medical Association cited in Hazen, Don, and Winokur, Julie. We the
Media, A Citizen's Guide to Fighting for Media Democracy, New Press,
1997
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