• Kansas City Star, Wednesday, April 5, 2006 11:15 AM

A series of just-released studies say constant exposure to media may be harmful to individuals, especially children.  Kansas City Star writer Alan Bavley provides a good summary of what researchers are telling us: "This week, the medical community is releasing a stack of studies linking TV and video games to a host of modern ills among America’s youth, including obesity, sexual activity, consumerism and antisocial behavior. 'Media need to be recognized as a major public health issue-- as they are among the most profound influences on children in this country,' researchers Dimitri A. Christakis and Frederick J. Zimmerman write in Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine.'" Among the researchers' findings: The more TV that third- and fourth-graders watched, the more frequently they asked their parents for the food, beverages and toys they saw advertised. White 12- to 14-year-olds who had a heavy diet of sexually oriented TV, music, movies and magazines were more than twice as likely to have intercourse when they reached 14 to 16 as teens who consumed less sexy media. The more time school-age children spent watching television, the more calories they consumed, largely in the form of potato chips, pop, candies, cookies and other foods commonly advertised on TV.

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