Television, Prosocial Content and

While numerous studies document the vast number of violent acts on television, less attention has been focused on television that teaches positive social lessons. Nevertheless, there is evidence that children can learn many positive life lessons from viewing programs intended to teach. The important life lessons can vary from the intrapersonal to the interpersonal but are often categorized as prosocial because they are designed to enhance children's and adolescents' social, emotional, and moral development. Several studies have examined the prevalence and kinds of prosocial acts that have been found in children's, family, and general audience programming. Most of these studies were conducted in the early 1970s and 1980s. Many televised programs as well as commercials contain prosocial behavior.

Interpersonal kinds of content that have been examined are positive interactions, altruism, and reduction of stereotypes. Content analyses conducted by Bradley Greenberg and colleagues found that altruistic acts such as sharing and helping were the most common prosocial acts and occurred about 14 times per television hour in Saturday morning and primetime programming. Similarly, Liebert and Poulous (1975) found 11 altruistic acts and 6 sympathetic behaviors per hour of television. Reduction of stereotypes or at least gender equality among male and female characters has also been found in several studies. For example, a study of Teletubbies and Barney & Friends found that both male and female characters hug, show affection, play together, and take turns.

The intrapersonal kinds of content that have been examined are such attributes as self-esteem, selfcontrol, and delay of gratification. Liebert and Poulous found that instances of self-control or delay of gratification occurred less than once per hour. Whereas programs such as Dragon Tales contain messages to children about task persistence, overall, most programs with prosocial themes tend to focus on interpersonal skills.