Adolescents and death on television: A follow-up study

Abstract

The television viewing habits and perceptions of television violence and death of 712 academically heterogeneous students, grades 6 through 12, from three urban and three rural schools in north Florida were surveyed using a TV questionnaire revised from a prior study. The survey indicated that adolescents enjoy watching violent TV programs but are ambivalent about allowing younger children to watch them, and that two fifths of the deaths occurring on the adolescents' favorite programs were violent. Three fifths of the adolescents reported that death is “often or always” on the news and almost three fourths reported that death in the news is violent. While many of them believe that violence on television is true to life and hence educational, they typically vastly overestimated the number of murders that actually occur in a society. Most of the adolescents preferred not to discuss death with either parents or peers. Some form of death education to alleviate or lessen death-related fears is indicated. Further research to determine causal relationships, if any, between television viewing of violent death and young viewers' death-related feelings and behaviors is recommended.