Law Prof Worried TV Has an Effect ‘at a Level Below Reason’
Behavioral researchers studying television are warning that over-the-top emotional reactions on reality TV may be having a bigger effect that we suspect.
USA Today spoke to researchers who believe the TV exposure is making exaggerated responses seem normal, and to some legal experts with views on the phenomenon.
Staying calm used to seem a virtue, experts told the newspaper, but that is changing, as evidenced by the criticism lobbed at President Obama for appearing so calm in the wake of the Gulf oil spill.
University of Tennessee law professor Glenn Reynolds, who blogs at Instapundit, told USA Today that he doesn’t see people overreacting in his daily encounters in Knoxville, but there may be an effect “at a level below reason.”
“If you follow news, you may get angry and yell at the TV a lot,” Reynolds said. “If you watch reality TV, I don’t think many people think Jersey Shore represents an appropriate way to live, but it may nonetheless make you see the world as a coarser place.”
USA Today also spoke to lawyer Nick Smith, a former litigator who is an associate professor of philosophy at the University of New Hampshire in Durham and the author of a 2008 book on the meaning of apology. “The standards for what constitutes an ‘overreaction’ seem to change because strong reactions garner the most media coverage and seem to overshadow thoughtful and measured responses,” Smith said.
In a separate USA Today article, Reynolds commented that political volatility is being fueled by technology. Big corporations and political parties are losing power to an online “army of Davids” fighting the Goliaths, he said. (Reynolds has written a book on the topic.)
The story says that institutional failures are fueling anger and disgust by voters. A March poll found that 21 percent of the respondents were angry at the government, and 56 percent were frustrated, the highest levels of anger and disgust in 50 years of polling by the Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.
