European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - November 12, 1990, Darmstadt, Hesse                                By Daniel Coleman new York times the proposition that television can be addictive is proving to be More than a glib metaphor. The most intensive scientific studies of people s viewing habits in the United states Are finding that for the most frequent viewers watching television has Many of the Marks of a dependency like alcoholism or other addictions. For instance compulsive viewers turn to television for Solace when they feel distressed rather than Only watching favorite programs for pleasure and though they get temporary emotional Relief while watching they end up feeling worse afterwards. For a decade or More researchers have pursued the hypothesis that some american television viewers Are addicted to watching. But Only this year have a handful of studies produced the strongest evidence yet that some compulsive viewers Are indeed addicted under Standard diagnostic criteria. There is no definition of television addiction on which All researchers agree. But people who Call themselves Quot television addicts Quot studies find watch television twice As much As the average viewer. One study found that self described addicts watched an average of 56 hours a week a c. Nielsen co. Reports the average for adults is just above 30 hours a week. Recent studies have found that 2 percent to 12 percent of viewers see themselves As addicted to television they feel unhappy watching As much As they do yet seem powerless to Stop themselves portraits of those who admit to being television addicts Are emerging from the research for instance a study of 491 men and women reported this year by Robin Smith Jacobvitz of the University of new Mexico offers these character sketches a a 32-year-old police officer has three sets in his Home. Although he is married with two children and has a full time Job he manages to watch 71 hours of television a week. He says Quot i rarely go out  a a 33-year-old woman who has three children is divorced and has no Job reports watching television 69 hours a week. She says Quot television can easily become like a companion if you re not  a a housewife who is 50, with no children watches 90 hours of television a week. She says a a in a Home almost every Day and my to is my Way of enjoying my Day Quot the studies also shed new Light on More Ordinary viewing habits showing that people who Are emotionally dependent on television simply represent extremes of behaviour seen from time to time in most viewers in a study comparing television viewing with Leisure activities like sports Reading or gardening television fared poorly As a diversion. While Ordinary viewers say television relaxes them while they watch afterwards they feel far less relaxed less Happy and less Able to concentrate than after participating in sports or other Leisure activities to be sure Many people in the television Industry As Well As some researchers object to the idea that the medium can be addictive. Quot people May watch to kill time or for escapism but i be never seen anything conclusive that shows television to be psychologically addictive Quot said Richard Ducey senior vice president of research and planning with the National association of broadcasters in Washington. Quot its a proposition with no support except in some metaphorical sense the same Way you might be addicted to  the Issue of whether the most frequent viewers of television Are addicted to it is being argued against the backdrop of a larger debate within psychiatry on the nature of addiction itself. For the most part psychiatry has held to a strict a amps Susan Harris definition of Quot addiction Quot restricting its use to describe dependence on a substance like heroin to which the body develops a tolerance and shows withdrawal symptoms when deprived of it but in the current version of the psychiatric diagnostic manual issued in 1983, the category of addiction was redefined and broadened to include compulsive Behaviours that people turned to for Relief from distress and continued to rely on despite negative effects on their emotional or social functioning. Quot under the broader definition Many kinds of compulsive behaviour could be considered addictive including obsessive sex or compulsive television viewing Quot said or. Allen Frances a psychiatrist at Cornell University medical school who is overseeing the revision of the diagnostic manual. Quot however the Broad definition is under debate Quot he said. Quot Many of us think it has become too vague watering Down the concept of  the most commonly used scale to measure television addiction includes using television As a sedative even though it does not bring satisfaction lacking selectivity in viewing feeling a loss of control while viewing feeling angry with oneself for watching a so much not being Able to quit watching and feeling miserable when kept from watching it. Quot they turn on the to when they fee sad lonely upset or worried and they need to distract themselves from their troubles Quot said Robert Mcilwraith a psychologist at the University of Manitoba. Mcilwraith reported his findings on television addiction at the annual meeting of the american psychological association in Boston last August the most exhaustive data on television watching is from studies done Between 1976 and 1988 on several different groups involving close to 1,200 men and women who volunteered to fill out questionnaires about their activities and moods whenever they were alerted by beepers they carried. In analysing the data for Peoples television watching habits Robert Kubey a psychologist now at the school of communications at Rutgers University worked with Mihaly Csik Szentmihalyi a psychologist at the University of Chicago. Their findings Are reported in television and the Quality of Ufa published this year by Lawrence Erlbaum associates. While their conclusions Are drawn from the studies involving More than a thousand people the most detailed results come from a study in which 107 men and women reported on their experiences at randomly selected moments throughout the Day for a week the third of the men and women in the smaller study who watched television the most were markedly different from the rest of those studied. As a group the compulsive watchers were More irritable tense and sad than the others and Felt they had Little control Over their lives. For most people there was a Strong relationship Between being in a bad mood and watching television to get out of it. The strongest pattern predicting that people would watch television in the evening was that in the morning they Felt. The Day was going badly and by the afternoon they were in a bad mood. For All viewers researchers have found television tends to elicit a state of Quot attentional inertia Quot marked by lowered activity in the part of the brain that processes Complex information that inertia said Kubey May explain Why a mediocre television show can have High ratings if it follows a popular one. Quot it s common for people to say they Are selective television watchers a said Kubey. Quot  say they sat Down just to watch . Law but they re still watching three hours later a great Many people feel powerless to get up and turn it  for compulsive viewers that inertia becomes extreme so that the longer they watch the More passive and less discriminating they become Kubey found. Oddly while most people said they were More relaxed while watching television than they had been before starting they ended up feeling far less relaxed once they stopped. Quot we found no evidence that television offers emotional rewards that extend beyond viewing Quot Kubey said. A moreover the longer people watch television the less rewarding they find it the intensive study of 107 people  kinds of compulsive behaviour could be considered addictive including obsessive sex or compulsive television  16 a a a the stars and stripes monday november 12, 1990