Opinions are divided on whether children should not watch TV because of its harmful influences, or whether it promotes their development. While I acknowledge the rationale behind the former perspective, I am still in favor of the latter for several reasons.
Those who believe that watching television can have significant negative effects may point to children’s TV addiction and ability to access harmful content. First and foremost, there are many TV programmes that mainly serve entertaining purposes, attracting children’s attention. Therefore, some adolescents tend to become addicted to following these forms of entertainment on TV even when sacrificing their study time for it. Additionally, some TV programmes wanting to attract more young audiences may consist of dangerous challenges or unsuitable content for their ages. For instance, children can try to imitate violent actions or rule behaviors in an animation, leading to harmful effects on their well-being and building undesirable habits in communication. As a result, a lack of parental guidance regarding TV content can severely impair children’s social habits.
On the other hand, I still think that watching TV may be advantageous for the development of youngsters for several reasons. Chief among these is that following high-quality entertainment on TV is essential for children’s cognitive development. Such programmes enable those to actively pay attention to education, trying various academic approaches to boost their interest in studying. Furthermore, watching television provides much knowledge which is closer to their daily life than theories in textbooks, making them more creative and easier to adapt to living conditions. Another reason is that when young people watch high-quality programming, it may have positive impacts on imparting information that is valuable to their lives and academic progress. For example, shows like a documentary on animal sanctuaries or travelogues on different locations provide a plethora of information on many subjects. Watching a variety of language programmes, moreover, allows them to improve their language proficiency. Consequently, if children can control their screen time and the quality of contents, they can learn numerous skills and knowledge that effectively contribute to their overall development.
In conclusion, viewing television may be a beneficial habit if done sensibly. However, an individual’s age primarily shapes the content and duration of any activity. From my perspective, television entertainment may have both advantageous and detrimental consequences. Nevertheless, targeted programmes might serve as a superb method of fostering understanding and advancement.