Thinking Outside The Idiot Box Analysis

Does Watching TV Make You Smarter? Television serves a purpose in life; whether it is a positive one or negative one is completely up to the person who is watching it. For many years, there has been an ongoing debate on whether or not television makes an individual smarter. The majority of the articles that has been written agrees that watching television is more harmful than it is helpful. For instance, Dana Stevens, author of “Thinking Outside the Idiot Box”, believes that watching TV does not make you smarter, it just makes you want to watch more of it. However, there are still a few articles that reach an agreement that TV can make people become more intelligent. Steven Johnson, author of “Watching TV Makes You Smarter”, believes television is more helpful to the brain than it is harmful. After reading some point of views on this controversial topic, there are definitely positives and negatives behind each argument.

TV shows today are more developed than shows from forty years ago. Back then shows were more predictable and easier to comprehend than they are now. Steven Johnson is a definite believer that watching TV can develop one’s mind and cause them to become more intelligent. He supports his position by introducing his theory of the “Sleeper Curve”. Johnson writes that the Sleeper Curve, “is the most important force altering the mental development of young people today”. Basically, the Sleeper Curve is meant to improve learning capabilities. With TV shows like, 24, it demands the viewer to keep track and pay attention to what is going on throughout the show. Also with shows similar to Family Guy, which makes a comedy out of actual events, it makes the watcher use inferences to what is actually being said. The idea that the observer has to really think about what is happening and make interpretations is what the Sleeper Curve is