Slate has published an article on a Cornell University study that links autism to the exposure young children get to television.
As much of the programming made for pre-schoolers is animated, this is something that may have an impact on the animation industry.
Studies are done all the time and it takes several to corroborate a finding. I am curious to see if this study will be backed up by other research and more curious to see how the broadcast and animation industries will deal with it if it turns out to be true.
The typical corporate response to inconvenient facts is to deny them by commissioning biased studies of their own and to throw money at government officials to protect business-as-usual. Should this study prove to be true, I'm wondering if we'll be able to tell the difference between the tobacco, oil and animation industries.
Thanks for posting this Mark, I have little ones and this is a really interesting article.
ReplyDeleteThe NYTimes had an earlier article in Jan of 2006 about mirroring devices in the brain. Autism was very much a principal part of the study, as was violence on television.
ReplyDeletego to:
http://select.nytimes.com/search/restricted/article?res=F60A12F934540C738DDDA80894DE404482
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ReplyDeleteAutism isn't because of TV, it's because of GENETICS. TV may cause impairment in eye development but certainly not autism. The autisic baby is usually already with autism even when they're in the womb.
ReplyDeleteThese journalists or so-called scientists need to check their facts first.