How is watching tv scientific

Further study will be needed to evaluate this claim, but the combined evidence suggests we need a more nuanced attitude toward our viewing habits. To understand the argument against television, we should rewind to , when a team ofresearchers at Tohoku University in Japan, led by neuroscientist Hikaru Takeuchi, first published findings from a study in which the brains of children between the ages of five and 18 were imaged.

The kids' TV viewing habits, ranging from zero to four hours each day, were also taken into account.

Takeuchi and his colleagues found that the more television these kids watched, the bulkier the brain's hypothalamus, septum, sensorimotor area and visual cortex became. These areas are implicated in multiple processes, including emotional responses, arousal, aggression and vision, respectively.

In addition, the brain showed thickening in a frontal lobe region, the frontopolar cortex, that is known to lower language-based reasoning ability. Testing confirmed that verbal IQ scores, which measure vocabulary and language skills, fell in proportion to the hours of TV the children watched. The changes in brain tissue occurred regardless of the child's sex or age or his or her family's income. Some of these brain differences could be benign: an increase in the visual cortex's volume is likely caused by exercising eyesight while watching TV.

But thickening in the hypothalamus is characteristic of patients with borderline personality disorder, increased aggressiveness and mood disorders. Perhaps watching TV shows, with their high density of drama, action and comedy, engages circuits of arousal and emotion such that these areas, rather than circuits of intellect, strengthen.

This change could lead to psychological and behavioral issues. Previous studies have shown that for each additional hour of television watched in childhood, the odds of developing symptoms of depression increase by 8 percent and the odds of being convicted of a crime increase by 27 percent. And other findings suggest that for every two hours watched in one's youth, the odds of developing type 2 diabetes increase by 20 percent. There are many possible explanations for these links.

TV viewing is generally sedentary and solitary, denying children many health benefits of physical activity and socialization. The development of verbal proficiency, reasoning and other intellectual abilities could atrophy from passively viewing a screen. But the correlation between TV viewing and brain and behavioral changes does not necessarily tell us the whole story.

The quandary scientists face is determining whether TV viewing causes changes in brain and behavior or whether preexisting personal traits or other conditions underlie binge watching. Schwartz and Beaver analyzed middle and high school students to look for associations between TV viewing and a range of factors such as race, gender, antisocial behavior and incarceration for violent crimes.

Researchers checked back with nearly 15, of these children about two years later and again after they had reached adulthood, between the ages of 18 and Much like previous studies, they found that young adults who had watched more television during early adolescence were more likely to engage in antisocial behavior, to be arrested at least once and to be incarcerated as an adult.

The researchers then added one more factor to their analysis. Although the studies accounted for some factors that may affect brain health — including age, education level and the presence of certain genes tied to Alzheimer's risk — they did not ask about total sedentary time, or tease out TV viewing from other types of sedentary behavior.

The studies also relied on participants' reports of their TV viewing time, which may not be reliable. In addition, the studies cannot determine why TV viewing was linked with these outcomes. It's unclear whether sedentary behavior is indeed responsible for the link or whether some other factors tied to TV watching, such as increased food consumption, may play a role. The researchers said more studies are needed to confirm the findings, including studies that use objective measures of sedentary behavior like activity trackers , and those that examine differences in passive and active sedentary behavior, in relation to cognitive decline and brain health markers.

Rachael has been with Live Science since She also holds a B. Live Science. Rachael Rettner. This may be why I enjoy watching the cinematographic masterpiece that is Pride and Prejudice over and over again, but I cannot get myself to watch that final episode of Sherlock.

The latter deals in themes that trigger my anxiety. A study conducted by the University of Waikato in New Zealand had nearly 1, participants across six studies watch graphic video footage, sometimes preceded with warnings, sometimes not. With trigger warnings hardly making a difference for first-time viewers, I struggle to see how it would help quell my anxiety when watching a second time. The truth is, some stories, no matter how brilliantly written, can evoke feelings that you do not want to experience more than once.

It is fear of the known. Never miss another story. What do you watch for a feel-good night? The Lion King on repeat anyone? Movies and characters that hold a piece of magic, or feel like a warm hug, are powerful.

Clay Routledge, professor and psychological scientist at North Dakota State University studying human motivation, conducted a study where he states:. In addition, as people get older, nostalgia makes them feel youthful and more optimistic about their health.

Our emotional connection to characters and their plots can affect our ability to re-watch something. The anxiety that often comes with the prospect of an ambiguous ending is gone. For me that is comforting. But as you move along the curve, on the opposite side, you start to get a stress response.

So if you become too hyped up, too worked up experienced by people with test-anxiety , it would actually interfere with how well you do at the puzzle. These stress levels are regulated by both hormones and by neurotransmitters. You could think of that as being performance or gathering information — where people seem to prefer to gather a medium amount of information.

And I feel like for a lot of people re-watching TV shows, it that middle amount of interesting, the middle part of the Yerkes-Dodson curve. In a way, re-watching something gives us a sense of control over it.

When we feel distressed, we are able to go back to the moments in television and cinema that bring us happiness and warmth. We are able to watch something that helps us shift our perspective, something that makes us feel the way we want to, when we want to. In Jaye L. Television, movies, and books can be more than leisure activities; in some cases, they fulfill needs, like restoring self-control.